Finale is a must-do. We rode 7 days there in September last year. You won’t struggle to fill 9 days. The minibus & trailer uplifts work very well and you’ll have them waiting for you at the end of each descent, ready to load-up and take you to the next one.
Trails here are either fast and flowy or rocky and tech, plenty of both.
<EDIT> Get the uplifts, don’t waste precious riding time plodding up the hills </EDIT>

Garda is also a must-do, but deserves to be a holiday in its own right, not just a couple of days. Descents here are much longer but so are the minibus & trailer uplifts, so you’ll probably get two long runs in a day at most.
Trails here are mostly rocky walking paths, with some nice tech sections.

There’s three options:

1. Pedal up the road from Black Dog in Belmont.
2. Offroad from the other pub in Belmont and climb parallel to the road.
3. Ride back up San Marino.

I’d recommend the third option. It’s a good challenge to climb it.

the descents are best when they’re streams

yep, did the Ciaran Path from Blackwater in May and had to wade the crossings in a couple of places.
2′ of raging torrent = not quite ridable

God’s Trailcentre = Kinlochleven

For the last three years, my go-to configuration on all my bikes has been dual-ply Maxxis running tubeless. It is the only thing that withstood the rocky impacts on the rear.

One particular set of rims don’t seem to like DP Maxxis tubeless though, as I’ve blown the tyre clean off the rim on landing small jumps twice now.
Once – I’d have been put down to random failure.
Twice – means I need to find another option. Currently waiting for delivery of a Supergravity Mary.

I’ve tried Schwalbe snakeskin and Maxxis Exo. Neither have been up to it IME as I’ve been pinchflatting straight through the tread at 30-35 psi (cuts beyond the healing capacity of the Stans).

I will be installing Procore on the rear end of my FS bikes at the first opportunity.
Tried an early twin-valve prototype Procore last year in Finale and was the only one in our party not to pinchflat all week. Despite putting some big dings in the rims, they held up perfectly.

I used similar Ashima rotors for a while with XT brakes and ss sintered pads. The wear rate on the rotor was noticeable and a distinct pulsing effect could be felt. I ditched the rotors soon after and have been fine since with; SS floating rotors, Hope floating, and Shimano (non Ice-tech) rotors.

To be honest, I think the problem would have started from the moment you ran sintered but only happened to become really obvious in the short time with kevlars.

unsure how I feel about those formula forks though.

Having ridden them on a demo 601 in Garda, I’m quite impressed with them.
I’ve also ridden a 601 with ‘zocchi 66Ti forks. Of the two, I actually prefer the Formulas. They feel quite “Pike-y”.
Maintenance manuals are available on-line now too and they look relatively easy to do. Haven’t checked availability of parts though.

Stevied, I’ve just ordered my 601 Werksmachine in raw :)

Does it NEED to be Alps?
I keep going back to Garda. Plenty of family friendly MTB routes and some really tough technical stuff too.
Did a couple of VF days this year with my daughter. Loads of diverse VF routes, as you’d expect.

OK, so what are the constraints/options around 11spd?
I’m about to press the button on a new bike which will come with X01 group. I’don’t fancy replacing the rear mech with the same every time I trash one, 11spd XT would make a lot more sense.
So, I think that means that pretty soon after I’ll end up with XT shifter and mech on an XD hub and SRAM cassette.
Would it make more sense to install XT cassette and std hub from day one?

Is there a market for X01 mech, shifter & cassette unused?

I couldn’t think of much worse than riding with a club. When I have tried it they have been the most boring soul sapping rides. They seemed to go out of their way to miss out the good bits of riding (up and down) in search of tedious rubbish. They preferred miles over smiles.

You’re in the wrong club andysredmini!

I’m leading a club ride on Sunday. A 4 Passes variant with a bit of extra cheek thrown in to get a slightly sillier descent in for good measure ;)
Less than 20 miles but it’ll take most of the day!

I think the secret of club rides is to get some variety in the calendar, so there’s different rides for different folk, plus making sure they know what they’re getting into so no-one finds themselves out of their depth in the middle of no-where.

The benefit for me of putting up a schedule of club rides is having a bigger population of folk, some of whom will be up for an epic or a tech-fest or whatever, so rides happen and don’t get postponed just ‘cos somebody’s got a family commitment or whatever.

I’ve only ridden Antur once, more than a year ago now.
It’s very good but I just can’t get on with all the big doubles. The one at the bottom of Y Du bit me, twice. It’s a bit “do-or-die”. When I “went for it” I died, hitting the up-face of the down-ramp both times and crashing out. My gripe is that you can’t build up to it like you could on a big tabletop for instance.

The uplift was very efficient, I think we got it down to <£1 per run by the end of the day just repeating Black Powder and Y Du all day. :)

http://travelmoney.moneysavingexpert.com/%5B/url%5D

fine right up to the point where junior has a bump and there’s a claim… whereas the telemetry from the box says it was somewhere else, just sitting still…

Ton, which model/year is your XL spec enduro 29er pls?
If you’ve fallen out of love, I might just be interested. (29er curious)

Just a couple of comments that I’d add:

Normal fabric tape doesn’t work well

It doesn’t work at all. You do need to remove any existing rim tape and clean off any gunk/debris to allow your tape to seal the centre of the rim over the spoke-holes.

and
The Stans valves have removable cores. This is a major advantage when dealing with a stubborn tyre/rim combination. Pop out the valve core before inflating and you’ll get more volume through more quickly and stand a better chance of getting an initial seal. Better still with a garden sprayer or coke bottle compressor.

The two “Dudes” descents you’re looking for are called “Kennels” and “Grey Mares”. Take a look on Strava. Both drop from the track above Mamore Lodge back into Kinlochleven.

wot badbod99 said
Blackwater Dam is Ciaran Path (same thing)
We also did Ben Lawers this year on the way up to Kinlochleven.

Oh, and the cabins at the MacDonald do have fly zappers installed.
Food there is excellent too and good value. We ended up eating there every day.

wot Binners said…
SS kevlar are great on dusty trails. Two sets lasted me for a week of uplifted riding in Garda. I had more than 50% left on the second set when I got back to the UK.
…BUT…
That remaining 50% was gone within half an hour in Calderdale grit & slop.!!!

Great in the dry.
Useless in local grinding paste.

Only Sintered seems to last.
Recently been using the race matrix pads and they seem to be lasting better than the SS kevlars but they haven’t had a proper prolonged gritty “eat your pads and drivetrain” test yet.

Sorry, I can’t join you this Thursday (work commitment).
Have fun!

cheers citizeninsane,
I’ve already had the bung/grubscrew/pivot/spring/lever out and adjuster backed right off as you describe, then tried to push the piston out but obviously wasn’t trying hard enough. Will have another go.

I don’t think cheeky tech is really their thing

Cheeky Tech is what Hebbers is all about.
Count me in.

I’ve recently had a similar problem with an XT.
First off, I’ve been a big fan of M785 XT. I have them on three bikes. Yes I know how to bleed them and yes I know about the free stroke screw.

However, I’m now experiencing problems on a rear brake that is about 3 yrs old.
I can no longer bleed it bottom-up. It seems the master cylinder has a blockage which is isolating it from its reservoir and not allowing fluid to flow in either direction, be that bottom-up when bleeding or top-down where it’s no longer adjusting as the pads become worn.
Breaking the hose joint at the lever allows fluid to flow bottom-up, so it’s definitely a lever end problem.
Anyone experienced similar?

Our MTB club charges £25 a year.
CTC membership/insurance takes about £17 of that I think.
The remainder goes on:
1. Free pizza as a bribe to those willing to turn up at a rides meeting and lead a ride or two.
2. Purchase of a few bits and pieces like a set of club lights to loan to anyone new to nightrides.
3. A donation to MRTs and/or air ambulance.

I’m 48 now and starting to consider if it’s time I should sell the Patriot… and buy a Demo 8 or LV601 instead :P

and the upside of turning 50 soon is that I’ll hopefully be higher placed in my age-group at the Mega.

One of my riding buddies’ dad still rides with us on occasion. He’s at least 75 now I think and still doing high mountain all-day rides. He just sets off a couple of hours before us… and quite often we don’t catch him!

My two penneth:

Rock Razor = Pinchflat magnet (snakeskin). Of the group of friends who’ve had them delivered as standard on new bikes, none have lasted more than a couple of rides before swapping out for a dual ply Minion.
I never even bothered fitting the one that came with my bike. Stuck a dual ply Larsen TT on tubeless instead. A much more robust alternative as a Summer tyre.

Magic Mary = Excellent all round tyre but susceptible to ripping the side knobs off (durability). Snakeskin trailstar is tough-enough for front.

I must be soft!
26″ hardtail has 30t and 11-42
Might try a 32t as I’m running out of gears at the top end occasionally, but I wouldn’t want to go lose much more than that at the low end as I’m using ’em all.
I find it roughly equivalent to my 26″ 2×10 (24t granny) 11-36 for climbing ability.

Can’t see where I’d get much benefit from a 901 over a 601 personally.

The unanswered question for me is, will I get away with a 301 and a 601 in the garage? (The fun-suppression sub-committee might take a dim view).

Stevied,
I own a 301 and have used a 601 for a week in Finale and a couple of days or so around Calderdale.

With a bit of time invested in setting up the suspension, the 601 seems to climb almost as well as the 301 and there’s only about a kilo difference between them. Point both downhill and the difference is more apparent though.
The 301 excels on steep, rocky tech. The perfect tool for all-day Lakeland hike-a-bike techfests.
The 601 just eats the same sort of steep rocky tech for breakfast and you find yourself flying through bigger, nastier stuff as fast as you dare.
In Finale, our group had a mix of 301s and 601s. In summary, side-by-side on uplift stuff, the 301s were no match for the 601s.

I’m seriously thinking about buying a 601 too now.

NorthCountryBoy, I recognise some of your Garda locations. Last one looks like a 601 on the 601 (trail) there :)

I had the pinch-bolt swingarm on mine. It initially needed a pair of bearings about twice a year (riding throughout Winter etc).
Over time I discovered the biggest factor effecting longevity was water/crap getting in there, rather than the “quality” brand of the bearing. The cheapest bearings lasted just fine so long as they were well sealed with bucket-loads of thick calcium based marine grease. It stays put and forms a barrier that muck sits on top of rather than working into.

I have the Syntace SCS guide on mine.
It works extremely well but the inserts are prone to wear in UK conditions.
I’ve not found it noisy at all though. Running 2×10 on a triple XT crank, with big ring removed to fit a Syntace bash instead.
My SCS guide originally came with the polymer insert for triple but I fitted double insert when that wore out (circa 1 year). It’s the same thing but with a narrower surface, as you’d expect. Functionally identical unless you’re wanting to run a triple.

I probably wouldn’t bother with the SCS guide TBH if I was running single narrow-wide. Very effective on double though.

KMC ones do Craig.

I must be doing something wrong!!!

Mondeo 163bhp
Daily pootling/comute through town and a bit of A road – 44mpg

Longer motorway trips taking it easy for economy (<80mph)- 42 mpg

Disappointed! Was expecting >50mpg.

Once you’ve got a minimum of 2 ltr of water, a day’s food and some extra clothing in your backpack,

Don’t carry 2 litres of water, a day’s food and extra clothing then

njee20 & scotroutes
If you’re suggesting that it’s a good idea to head into the mountains in Winter for a long day out without sufficient water, food and adequate clothing, then I don’t think we’ll reach agreement.

Yes, a quick local blast is different.

Sorry, I just don’t get it.
Once you’ve got a minimum of 2 ltr of water, a day’s food and some extra clothing in your backpack, trying to save a few grams by leaving pads, quicklinks and cables out hardly seems worth it. 8O

White cars don’t show the dirt as much as most other colours

No, I’m not having that!
The only colour criteria I apply is NOT white and NOT black, thankyou.

The best I’ve had so far is dark metalic gunmetal grey. I washed my last Mundane-o quite religeously (every other Easter, or 40k miles maybe) and it still looked clean/new at 160k.
Whereas my new (dark blue) Mundane-o looks mucky already and I’ve only done about 6k miles in it since October!

ABI list of which insurers need to be informed etc:
here

[edit] too slow! [/edit]

I’ve got a 30mm Syntace Megaforce 2 on my Liteville.
It’s a very nice little piece of engineering, as indeed everything from Syntace seems to be (their carbon bars are very nice too).

Foundation level or Practitioner? You’d want the latter if it’s to count for anything in the jobs market.
Yes you COULD do the course without having any previous PM experience, but I’d not want to encourage you to throw (presumably your own) money at it unless you think you’re going to use it in your current job.

NB
Foundation level does not expire, but Practitioner does (after 5 years).

I can recommend the 5 day combined Foundation/Practitioner course offered by QA[/url]

I’ve been running Syntace moto grips on one of my bikes for the last year and rate them very highly. They come it two different widths, 30mm or 33mm.
Scroll down the page linked below for pics/description.

syntace moto[/url]