Studio shots of the Soul are up: http://cotic.co.uk/product/soul

Hora, have you got the post, should be with you by 1pm (special delivery) or I can claim so let me know 😉

Northwind, I'm on bike radar under a different name but have you got a link to that epic Orange thread that went on and on and our friend Grantway livened up so much?

Orange, Fox, Hope and Raceface here lol, such a terrible bike!

Ignore him, he got hounded off bike radar for being too enthusiastic about his own bike and trollish as you like about all others.

Wait till he's had a few and posts in the evening! It's brilliant!

Nakajima is only in the williams because of his passport and toyota engines.

So why not Sato? Who when BAR were doing ok managed an 8th overall in 2004? I accept Nakajima is not exactly a great driver but I personally think it's more about Rosberg out performing the car…

Uplink Why do you rate Rosberg so highly? Just out of interest?

Well either Nakajima really is that bad (I doubt it having got into F1 in the first place) and the williams is a pretty good car.

Or, the williams is a mediocre care and Rosberg is a stellar driver.

Either way, nowhere on the grid is there a bigger gap between two drivers in the same machine. And it's widely regarded that in the same car, most drivers would normally be within 3 tenths of each other. Which is why it is believed that Rosberg is potentially something special.

im sure apples are great, but the smug factor totally repulses me.

The inverse snobbery really repulses me. You happen to mention usage of one and the haters are literally off like a shot!

And do you use Guest accounts on any of those machines?

Yes actually, a freelancer upgraded a machine they were using and went straight into the guest account which we have on but locked down for freelancers to work internally.

It was fine…

Hamilton is too reckless to be classed as an all-time great driver imo

You're kidding right?

Naturally sit on one but I'd say 20.5. I have a 17.5 at 5'10", I could have happily ridden a 19" in reach but not in standover so they're not the longest of bikes for their size.

Apple said in a statement that the problem "occurs only in extremely rare cases" and that it was working on a fix.

Which given I've updated 6 machines of various ages here and not had any issues, I'd still definitely agree that it's pandemic!!

My emails in my profile, email me and I'll give you my address. I've deffo got two, maybe even a third knocking around. I only ever need the one on my Five and every BB I've bought has three in the box…

I can only suggest battery life myself. But then it charges off of a USB cable, and it charges pretty quickly all things considering so it's a null point ultimately.

Do you mean the spacers that sit between the frame and the BB cups? I think I've got a few on the garage floor going unused if you want them…

1994 Kona Cinder Cone Ltd Edition… like this one:

Touché!

Technically you did say it was too heavy for enduros, which is not the same thing as it's too heavy to be ideal for enduros.

To put it back at you, none of us were under any illusion that it was the perfect machine for enduros. 🙄 😛

I find the key is to book rides in early, and get them in a calendar of sorts. "I'm going riding on Sat" said on the thursday generally isn't going to go down well…

Or you know… MTFU 😉

Hora, wouldn't increase wear but the shock will be tuned to behave in a certain way as you move through the stroke. You'd have terrible small bump response at the very least.

RE: the pedal feedback and chain growth, I can understand why logically it seems like a negative and you can't understand why anyone would like it. If you're a strong high cadence pedaller, it doesn't have that hook up feeling because the chain growth stays more consistent and doesn't tug on the legs, it just firms up a bit. It will defeat you if you're unfit or tired but it's a bonus if you're fit and fresh. The harder you attack the bike, the better it rides, and this seems to be the case up down and along. You tend to approach techie climbs "balls out", pedal pedal and then boost into technical moves. If you just trudge on up, it's not going to work so well.

I've blindly evangelised about the bike for the 2 years I've had it, I've ridden other bikes, nothing compares… for me. But I'm also starting to understand why it isn't for everyone, there's a misconception that it's purely a great beginners/nervous riders bike – it is in that it's stable and safe feeling. But in many respects it's not a beginners bike because I think to get the most out of it, you have to literally try and kill it! To this it just responds so positively, and this is why so many rave about it.

Man, what a ramble… 🙄

If you have to ask, you already know the answer… 😛

Sure by modern standards it's nothing but that bike took me to all sorts of places where people now seem to think that you need 6" travel, 2.3" tyres and a Saint groupset for the XXXC trails…

Yeah but when I was 14 and had shit for brains, my '94 Cinder Cone would take me to all sorts of places that I now think I need 6" of travel and 2.3" tyres! 😆

The Police have caught a chap in Bristol who confessed to actually following folk home from Afan and Cwmcarn… so it's deffo happening.

Mine are always transported inside the car thankfully!

A bit too heavy for Enduro races I think. Good for rocky UK stuff.

I do enduro's on mine without any problem !

Yeah, I've done 100km, 12 hr and 24hrs on mine. Just stick a set of 2.1 High Rollers on it, put the triple back on and it's good to go!

nick, I believe there was a much lighter tune used in '09 as all the pro pedal settings were too harsh. It goes either way though, my '08 has pro pedal off nearly all the time, even on fire road I only stick it on if I fancy a bit of a grunt standing up, I leave it set on max and it's almost like a lockout. Wide open is then great for scenarios. That said, I'm not one for faffing with levers and buttons…

The idea for '09 was to make the pro peal settings more useful and not just a lockout. I believe the rear end on the '09 should feel more supple (I didn't notice) which I guess makes sense given that it's a bit slacker and possibly puts your weight back. I can then see why you'd need the pro pedal more as well…

I did find the '09 slightly better in a straight line, the '08 is definitely better in the slower twisty stuff and in switchbacks.

Hora: OT, Your seatpost will be going out special delivery tomorrow, was waiting to see whether RM were going to strike or not before sending…

Quite curious about Madison's motivation here. You could argue they're already cleaning up the mainstream steel hardtail market with the Genesis name, the Saracen name has nothing like the kudos it had back in the day and I reckon they'll be up against it trying to recapture those glory days of old.

18" Five is 6.8lbs…

Doing my CTC Trail leader next month!! 😀

29ers!!! 😈

I did the HONC on Small Block 8s (half road, half offroad). I found them alright, they're alwasy going to be well draggy compared to a semi slick but then they are genuinely usable offroad…

Fair enough, stand corrected!

The new BFe at least is a degree slacker than the Soul…

I don't hate spesh, I bought my wife one…

Just used as an example as they're big and offer lifetime warranty yet have a nice history of that warranty actually being needed.

I'd wager Turner are a lot bigger than Orange. Bare in mind not many Orange's make it outside the UK…

RE: warranties, I've said this time and time again, it's just a numbers game. Orange haven't sold millions of Hardrocks and Rockhoppers which go practically unused and will never require the lifetime warranty thus offsetting all the broken/faulty enduros…

Please don't tell me you think Spesh offer lifetime because they think the product is well built enough? They can just afford to offer it, and to be fair, I'd only entertain a spesh because of it. On the other hand, when I bought the Orange I didn't even bother looking at the warranty, the shop I'd bought it from (and they shift a fair few and are friends so wouldn't lie) have never warrantied an Orange full susser.

I don't know if the P7 and R8 are made in the uk yet but they did say they were thinking of bringing the higher end hardtails inhouse…

its much more condusive to standing out of the saddle style pedalling and giving it some welly.

Pedal feedback, firms up the rear end under strong pedal load. Some hate it, some love it. I personally like it, seems to do a better job than propedal. That said, you need a strong but high cadence otherwise it just feels wrong, if you pedal like you're mashing spuds it's just going to kill you.

When I used to live in central Bristol, I had two occasions where youths had been waiting in side streets on my road to catch me coming back from night rides. The underground garage area of our block was regularly robbed for bikes and they obviously knew of my bike but could never find it in the garage (it was kept indoors).

Luckily there was always a downhill street to detour off down and lose them but really shit me up. Really sad but I had to start driving the two miles to the ride destination! 🙄

Hmmm, I wonder if RRP on an XT cassette hits £100, it should be time to introduce one? 😆