120mm was always people’s sweet spot in the past –

…and before that it was 80-100mm

🙄

“Hardcore hardtail” originally meant something short travel with BMXesque parts you rode everywhere, hit proper dirtjumps on and weren’t afraid to use at a skatepark. It now means something with powerful brakes, massive forks, big soft tyres that are generally skittered down slightly steep tracks in the woods with all the flamboyance of a duck.

Hmm, Can you get the seat post length to pedal it?

Yes. But with a 450mm seatpost. although I haven’t ridden it any way other than completely slammed (shorter seatpost) since before the summer.
I’m only 5’11” (33″ inseam) though.
I don’t also mind riding a bike stood up everywhere.

Nope.

I have a Hornet 4X. it’s the exact opposite.

in short.

Coming from a road background and being new to mtb the Boardman’s geometry should suit you better.
The Bossnut’s geometry is better if you want your reach/Headangle numbers to sound RAD. But it won’t really help unless you’re riding places where stability at speed is an issue.
The Boardman’s rear suspension should stay more active under rear braking.

I’ve ridden both but I’m tryin to be impartial.

19mm rims for trail riding with 2.2-2.35 tyres are absolutely fine. wide rims only really came into fashion when everyone started craving much lower tyre pressures. being a road rider you’ll probably be happy on the firmer side of tyre pressures anyway.

Brakes/gearing on both bikes are great. infact all the components on both bikes are at this price.

You can worry far too much about the details. Go with the frame that suits your needs best.

None of Halfords stores seem to have them in stock. Order one online and it’ll be delivered to your store of choice. You don’t have to buy it.

Capra CF are in stock in Large (Black)

mixture of suburban/country B-roads

unless you have loads of junctions/lights you should bearely need to brake at all. So what other wear and tear are you worried about? At that sort of mileage you should get at a year out of your drivetrain and tyres.

Before this thread I had no idea what a vaude bag was. but using a bike based around fitting an ugly £15 bag seems madness.

kinda seems like you’ve already made up your mind though.

So long as you can store it safely at work why not just fit mudguards to your roadbike to commute on?

Mine has crud racer guards on all year round, 2 mins with a sponge and a hose when you get home each night if it’s been wet has gotta be less hassle than switching wheels, cassettes, guards.

Ps. how far is your commute?

Forget the old style XC 100 mm or 120 mm hardtail with 2.2 inch tires. They are NO fun.

Hahahahaha
You might want to look at the geometry, travel and tyre wdths of every slopestyle/Jump hardtail out there.
Other than an inch shorter stays they’re all really close to a 14″ XC frame.
(longer stays only make it more stable and slightly more effort to spin/manual)

Personally. I find long bikes No fun.

I dunno why anyone uses anything other than esi’s.

Because they’re too soft
Because throttle grip
Because they feel horrible without gloves
because they offer zero grip with any moisture between them and your skin.
because silicone is a better material choice for a sex toy than bicycle grips.

hold it’s value best

Never understood the logic behind this way of thinking.

If you’re thinking about resale value before you’ve even ridden the bike it’s obviously not the right bike for you.

Why Blast when you can…

M E G A B L A S T !!!

‘enduro practice’ = cheating Kayla 😉

Your arms will take less of a beating but in reality you probably won’t actually go any faster. The rear wheel may still take more of a beating though as the bike won’t pump/pop as nicely or require quite the same imput to ride. This can cause riders to get lazy lifting/placing the rear wheel. infact you see a lot of long travel hardtail riders actually sat down descending. Whether they always did that or not I don’t know.

I’m guesing the WRC driver didn’t weigh 6x more than their car?
or constantly move from the front to rear and side to side of the car for the duration it’s journey to…

No matter how retarded it is. If you genuinely enjoy riding bridleways more while being sagged 35% into a 170mm fork keep doing it.

it’s your money.

10% more sag is huge.
imputs aren’t just from below the bike

Forget the first year Uni mathematics/physics

Let’s go back to your stupid 1000mile on a WC DH bike anology…

Would you really want your suspension cycling through all 200mm on the sort of bumps you find on a bridle way?

No.

Just because you payed £800 for 170mm of suspensionz doesn’t mean it’s appropriate to set it up to be using it all on every ride.
Blowing through travel too easily is not only horrible. it performs poorly, results in an unstable ride and loss of grip.

It’s probably best I leave you to figure it out yourself.

so long as you enjoy the ride!

Softening a long travel bike’s springrates for 25 miles of bridleway riding?
Really?
erm… ok. :/

Deliberately obstreperous?
No. far from it. You asked me to enlightened you regarding the poor advice you give. I took the time to explain something very basic to you. You can’t grasp it. Fair enough. I tried. No skin off my nose. I’ll leave you to enjoy your badly set up bike.

now back to these guys…

*sigh*

Running your fork “deliberately soft”. ie. with too much sag ie. For “comfort” while pootilng around is going to equate to blowing through too much travel the first time you hit a transition or infact make any manouver where you are pushing through your bars or riding your bike properly. An overly soft fork is also way more likely to spit you on your chin in a corner.

This shouldn’t be enlightening. it’s the fundamentals of how suspension works.

You may well have experience. Experience is not the same as expertise or even knowledge or understanding. Not understanding the fundamentals and having no real knowledge of whatever you’ve experienced means every time you share advice. You are in fact more likely than not giving out poor advice.

The “stupid” meme summed up the above very well. I didn’t think it needed explaining. But then i wouldn’t think someone with an £800 bicycle fork wouldn’t understand how it worked either.

was it a Large?
I’m on Medium. Despite being 5’11” and it has a little over 210mm of seatpost exposed (Rails to collar) at climbing height
I’m running 18-20% front 23-25% rear sag. Rarely ever use the last 10mm on the fork (but like all my forks that way). do on the shock.

I ride hardtails and BMX more than I ride mine.

As with most of your *skills* advice Max

Are you a bit heavier than your friend or does he have it set up with too much sag? or are you just not used to long travel bikes?
That progressiveness is what makes the Capra sit so nicely at the sag point giving you a nice firm platform to push from. Run with the same % of sag and compression my Capra jumps and pumps better than my 120mm slopstyle bike.
I run the slope bike with way less sag, 50psi tyres and in the middle “pedal” compression setting rather than full open for jumps/berms.
Despite climing a minimum of 3000ft on every ride I never move the Capra’s compression lever from full open. infact. the lever’s taped in that position.
Forks these days (Lyriks especially) are already progressive enough. Thing is most folk run too much sag and then stick bits of plastic in to stop them bottoming out. ramping up the progression ruins that nice firm sag point. Run less sag. no plastic and they will give you a firmer ride same as the back end of that Capra. Yeah you lose a tiny bit of small bump suppleness but c’mon. if you’re riding a 170mm fork surely you’re hitting stuff fast/hard enough not to mind that.

I was just watching this documentary featuring Singletrackworld forum user TheGhost and his mate having to walk down a descent as their 32mm stanchion forks just weren’t up to the job…

Thornie sounds like the right place to wake a fella up.
I love that place. CBA mountainbiking these days either.

To answer the OP
if you want a longer travel bike that’d still rides well in less than gnarly terrain look for one with a very progressive leverage curve.

I’ll take them all.

OMG. it’s moving each hand outwards 30mm.

you either like that or you don’t. No need to overthink it.

Not digging today? that mean you’re going riding tomorrow?

Whereabouts?

You didn’t think I actually read the thread did you?

sounds like it’s broken mate

underbiked… overbiked…

wombling free… the wombles of wimbledon common are weeeeee…

+1 to gwurk apart from the bit about not needing a dropper if you are clipped in. Dunno what that’s about

Ok. Let me try to explain. With flats you *need* to squat/drop down lower to preload the bike, you *need* to get behind your pedals (dropped heels) more to keep your feet in control and all your hip controlled directional changes require loading the pedals (ie. squatting). This is exentuated by my choice of not ever using a sticky soled shoe or particularly grippy pedals (I just happen to like to move my feet all over the pedals and occasionally the crank arms). you also tend to ride flats with your leading pedal higher than the trailing one.
I don’t *need* a dropper to control my bike in the air or off the sort of drops I encounter on local rides or even down super steep stuff when my feet are mechanically connected to the pedals. This alone allows you to control the bike while remaining in a tall stance (straighter arms and legs than with flats) and with properly level pedal position so means I don’t *need* a dropper for XC riding. infact. I find it more fun/enjoyable having to ride properly committed clipped in with saddle at full height. like I said. XC is kinda dull on the whole.

The one time I do miss a dropper is for manualling. But no dropper puts your saddle anywhere near out the way enough for my liking when it comes to manuals. My slammed saddle height is 250mm+ lower than my fully extended XC saddle height. and there’s a QR fitted for this very reason.

BTW. Lycra also gives you much more room to move around a bike and less need for a dropper. and it just so happens to be far more suitable clothing for riding in wet manky conditions.

I’ve had one the last two winters for local xc rides from the house. I’m just about to rebuild it with a rigid fork (the suspension fork is too knackered) but I’m in no rush as I’m riding more BMX than mtb at the moment.

Old Alu dirtjump hardtail – I don’t like long bikes and there’s nothing to warrant rear suspension locally.
knackered revs at 100mm – you don’t need decent suspension in mud
knackered brakes – don’t need good brakes to ride xc in mud
shit tyres – I quite enjoy sliding about and having to search for grip. XC s too dull otherwise
SPDs – the shoes clean up and dry out better/faster than flat pedal shoes
massive seatpost – don’t need a dropper when clipped in
QR seat collar – just incase I’m riding by my local jumps
mudguards – muckynuts type, and downtube/rear crud catchers. keeps you drier so you stay out longer.
lights fitted to bars- bike was used roughly 3 nights a week and I don’t wear a helmet
frame fit pump, tube ziptied to the frame, multi tool under the saddle.
1×8 gears with cheap 32T NW, 11-28 and old XT. stays cleaner needs less maintenance and lasts better than modern clutch mech and 10/11/12 spd.
mix of old durable reliable parts
QR wheels – less faff if you have problems
Bike gets soaped up, (warm) hosed down straight after every ride (as is my kit), dried, chain lubed and lights charged so as to be ready to ride again at a minutes notice.
Entire bikes worth about half the price of an 11speed cassette

Update if anyone is interested.

I now have a good 50hrs play time on GT Sport and 50 cars in my garage now so thought I’d come back to this thread to update my initial thoughts.
All the waiting I moaned about in my first comments has gone and with the first few updates the whole thing got a lot slicker.
Now I know my way round the menus they’re far easier to navigate (still not as easy or intuative as I’d like though.
The actual game play is awesome.
Graphics awesome.
Servers flawless.
Online racing (with friends) is great.
Single player (Not Arcade) is online rather than against AI and is massively improved from what was available at launch. the GT Sport aspect promotes fair racing and punishes dirty racing through the ranking sytem. so if you’re half decent at driving and not a dick you’ll get way more out of the game.
The campaign is split into 3 categories. and all 3 are designed to teach you how to become a better driver.
Driving School – self explanitary, a series of challenges to pass with either bronze, gold or silver starting off with simple braking challenges, cornering, then progressing to segments and entire laps.
Missions – More advanced than Driving School but also a series of challenges awarded with gold, silver, bronze beginning where Driving School has taken you and going on to races/challenges
Circuit experience – is similar to the segment/lap challenges but lets you choose every track in the game so it basically teaches you the tracks and the fast lines, braking zones etc. through challenges.
There are far less cars than the last 2 GT games. But I don’t see that as a bad thing particularly. there’s a great selection in every category so you’ll definitely find something to suit your particular driving style.
The tuning is still there if you want to geek out on your power/gear/weight/downforce ratios etc.
liveries are completely customisable so if you’re a computer arty/designery type you can customise everything from your helmet to your tyres. for folk like me with very little skill in that dept there are thousands other folk have done and shared for you to use for free.

Press BUY.

Ah. apologies. I must have used the trade in offer just as it was ending.

I bought a Decathlon bike recently too (Summer) it was good value for what it was and although the bike was fine there were noticable corners cut to get the rrp down. Nothing that would worry me too much though.

I’m through West at least once a week so could easily meet you closer

The bike I traded in was a 24″ kids bike my exs son grew out of 9 years ago.
If the offer is still available it’s gotta be worth asking around to see if anyone has a suitable scrapper you can have. If you’re near Edinburgh I can get you something suitable.

Dude. I recently bought a friend a Boardman team FS for £720 by taking in an old bike to trade in* and using my BC discount.

Amazing spec and value for that price and rides pretty nicely.

*not sure if this offer is still on

plus.

Ape index does not take shoulder frame or torso length into consideration.

ie. it’s a pointless formula with regards to riding bikes.

No.

Ignore all the number obsessives and buy a bike you enjoy riding the way you like to ride.