The sanchez is steel so it will be quite heavy, the forks will be hard as they are coil argylls. It does look pretty long in the TT as well. I would imagine he might struggle if there is any climbing involved.

It obviously depends on how tall he is but my son (10) is still riding a 24″ and its much more suited to messing about than an overly big/heavy 26″ bike, he uses it for XC as well. Something like this for example:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Kona-Shred-Jump-Bike-/251362019819?pt=UK_Bikes_GL&hash=item3a865809eb

or

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/kid-mountain-bike-kona-shred-/181245040964?pt=UK_Bikes_GL&hash=item2a330bd944 and some air forks

Also a bit miffed with orange as read a post sometime ago where someone wanted to buy a replacement swingarm from them only to be told the were keeping the ones they had for any future warranty repairs.

Now surely if you spend thousands of pounds on something that you would hope to get good use of would you not expect said companies to make parts for it for atleast 5 years or so.

This is one of the things that really annoys me. The whole industry seems to be saying “we were happy to take your money last year, but now you can F++* off as we have found a new set of suckers to fleece”

*Everyone looks ungainly at a BMX track on an MTB regardles of wheel size

4x/jump bikes seem to handle it fairly well, even the DH riders on their race bikes looked way better.

*The pro’s would prbably ‘school’ them on BMX’s

The 7 yr old could manual and jump, so probably not* .

* Honorable exception goes to Jose Ulloa (mexican junior) who was rad, even on a 29er.

but none are in stock.

I would be surprised if Decathlon had no stock of its mid range bikes, maybe contact the local store to ask about availability.

I was camped by the BMX track near Vallnord when the WC was there, loads of the XC riders would drop by for some laps. It was pretty shocking how ungainly the bikes were, even in the hands of “pro/good” riders. I think I only saw one guy that managed to look good with his big wheels.

It was pretty amusing to see them getting schooled by little kids on their cheap bmxs.

In America Wal-Mart have a policy of allowing RV’s to stay overnight

Apparently B&Q have a similar policy here, as long as you are gone by 8am

I have never tried French aires (apparently some are dodgy)

Always use them but I draw the line at anything too close to Paris or Marseilles.

I only use campsites if I need a shower.

Where does this leave Niner are they going to have to rebrand?

Seven Point Fiver or Seven Hundreder doesn’t sound half as snappy :-)

Giant guy “the future of off road technology” FFS :roll:

http://www.decathlon.co.uk/rockrider-51-c1-2013-id_8231773.html

Loads at decathlon.

I had an earlier model scenic (02) it was s–t. The ignition coils were always giving up and the car would refuse to start at random intervals and always at really awkward moments. Renault is the car equivalent of Ryan air, reasonably cheap but poor quality and dire after sales/customer care. Peugeot/Citroen seem much better.

http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/c4-lock-on-bmx-grips/rp-prod71464

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2009 was OK in my experience, my 66’s are ace and I have had to service them once.

In your position, I would probably go with the R, the RC3 is pretty expensive and tbh most of the ability to faff with the settings is superfluous.

It’s definitely an improvement over the Perp (or the Judge)

But it’s no looker, and the complicated shock would worry me.

If I get one day, just one day, a year where I’m outside in the countryside with warm sunshine, blue skies, twittering skylarks overhead, and that rich, warm scent drifting on the breeze then it keeps me going for a year.

Go somewhere like the pyrenees orientale and you can have 360 odd days like that per year, skylarks might have all been eaten by the eagles though.

http://www.troc-velo.com/
http://www.troc-velo.be/
http://www.leboncoin.fr/velos/offres/ile_de_france/occasions/?f=a&th=1&q=course French ebay type thing
http://www.velo-occasion.net/velo-course-route/

Its the same everywhere. In Andorra this summer we found a guy quite badly hurt, the bike patrol came in a 4×4, asked if he could walk and called the heli as soon he said that it hurt to try. Didn’t even bother trying to get him the 100m to the 4×4.

Seemed reasonable to me, if in doubt get a professional to deal with it.

Having an uber expensive bike and knowing with 100% certainty that the bike will handle the type of riding you are doing, will encourage people to push a bit harder than they have previously?

I really doubt this, look at all the nice bikes in the classifieds: no dints, scrapes, excellent condition etc. It would seem that having an expensive bike makes people afraid to crash them.

The point for me is that, for the vast majority of riders, a 20g saving on this, an almost indiscernible amount of extra rigidity on that, a 0.1% increase in potential speed etc is totally irrelevant as they are not chasing podiums. Therefore why pay £XXX for a bike when you could get the same fun for £XXX/2 or 3. It’s just a waste of money.

Save your money and wait for Adam Ondra.

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The tractor that built the Vallnord WC course.

I broke my schaphoid years ago bouldering. A massive blow as I was climbing pretty well at the time and I was really keen. I had a cast for 3 months and when it came off the wrist hurt a lot, had limited mobility and climbing was really hard (like 6a instead of 8a hard!)

I basically forced the wrist to start moving again by putting pressure on it while immersed in hot water (the hot water really helps). A couple of weeks of pain got it working to the point where I could start training seriously again and had reasonable flexibility. 3/4 months in a cast will make your wrist really stiff, you just need to get it moving properly again.

some mag out there ought to do a review of bikes they purchased second hand for £500.

Bike (a french mag) did a series of challenges a few years ago, a few of them revolved round cheap bikes. On one of them the journalist had to ride the Mega on a bike bought from the supermarket, changing nothing but the tyres. He finishes around the 200 mark and the bike survived.

I feel sorry for this guy, new wheels in January and they are seemingly already obsolete.

Now that’s how to make mountain biking expensive :?

I quit my job in June because I hated it and it was taking over my life. I am glad I did but: No mortgage, Reasonable savings, No dependants, so the risks involved are minimal.

I don’t think your position is the same (£10,500 pa mortgage for a start :o ). Its a massive risk and in your position I would grin and bear it until something new comes along. Unless of course your humble lifestyle means you have loads of savings put away :-)

Tiger bread at the very least?

No way, they sell that at Asda.

This is pretty mental.

Meta SX
NS Soda

My DH bike with one of these:

or

on it.

Otherwise, a demo 8

I lived in France when I was a student and it gave me a real sense of perspective how great UK is…

Where did you live though, Roubaix?

South of Dijon, France is a great place to live.

Andorra? Hmmm – not as cheap as I expected, petrol station/tax free shop every 50 yards. It’s not for me. Great riding though.

Pal/Sispony/Ordino or even La Massana are a bit different than Andorra La Viella.

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and even the fire service is cool in Andorra! :-)

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Andorra: the people are super cool, its beautiful, the riding is ace, most things are cheap (except housing) and its not far to sunnier climes in the winter.

Biking is pretty accessible: bikes can be had cheap, you don’t need mates or to join a team, you can learn most skills without going far from home etc. But, if you want better equipment it soon becomes ridiculous.

We met a guy in France this year whose son was really good and had just landed a deal with Giant. Prior to riding downhill the lad had ridden MX and his dad reckoned that it had been much cheaper to keep him going at MX than DH. He didn’t even ride a super expensive bike.

That rockrider is £619. Strip it, sell all the parts, buy an air shock with the proceeds and you will have a decent frame for 1/2 the price of any of the other options.

Lets face it, its not that hard to design a decent single pivot and I am sure the decathlon designers will have got it right as their downhill bikes are actually pretty good. If its not boutique enough you could always respray it and get custom graphics, it will still be cheap and no one will know where it came from :-)

Bargain :-)

Help with the personal statement, most kids write total crap if left to their own devices.

MDE Bolder 6

http://www.sps-distribution.co.uk/shop-online

Knowing the weather, the best bet would be:

Whooping and hollering as you ride? More the sort of behaviour you’d expect from High-fiving tossers that call each other “Brah” really…

I was amazed how much of it went on at Coed y Brenin, must be where all the gnarly dudes congregate.