we stretched him out which was very tricky due to his weight and the tight singletrack.

Was it Scruff?

The frame is designed for riding around flat fields. I guess the rider must have hit a rock hard cow pat. I’d blame the farmer.

Gnargnargnargnargnar, I didn’t realise that rocks have got bigger in the last 20 years. Anyway, a fairly typical UK (i.e easy…) DH course like the ones at Bringewood and Hopton are pretty well the same as the old courses once organisers realised that holding a DH race down a fireroad didn’t quite cut it. Racing was always a toned down version of what we’d ride on a normal ride. The main difference was that ‘when it was all fields’ the bikes meant we couldn’t go as fast as we do now.

So last night I cycled up Fromme, then rode some DH / freeride / and agressive XC trails on my slopestyle bike. **** me, I’m surprised I made it out of the house with all that confusion. I just went for a ride :roll:

Good morning Scruff :wink:

Hmmmm…..I won a road hill climb on the bike below, came in the top 10 in National Junior XC races, competed pretty well in DH, rode it to college etc. It doesn’t get more ‘All **** Mountain’ than that :roll:

http://willwaters.fotopic.net/p21799981.html
http://willwaters.fotopic.net/p21800078.html

So yeah, it’s all bollox.

Ha…I lived around three hours away.

I first raced around there in an NWMBA race circa 1991 and loved the area even if I did have a massive crash which removed half my arse…. So I fit into the ‘it’s been sanitised’ camp. When I started mountain biking again around ’98 I was amazed that the pastime had come on so far, with trails like the Adams Family, or whatever those three good sections on KM were called being built specifically for mountain bikers. But these days CyB sums up British mountain biking…..ride cruisy trails with bikes with 6″ of travel.

As an ex-guide, I noticed that Scottish and Welsh people to had access to decent trails were generally pretty good riders, whereas English riders who have grown up driving to trail centres and riding Shyte 46s or whatever were fuhucking awful. But as already mentioned, these people tend to spend the most money so I guess trails have to be matched to them….Joy.

Hmmmm…..plastic seatposts….

[Waves gigantic d0ng]
XC ride around Squamish
[/Waves gigantic d0ng]

I’ve got a (Federal) cruiser built largely from scrap and stuff lying around and I commute 25km every day on it. It’s surprisingly fast and good fun to ride. Conversly, my wife’s BMX (Jay Miron’s company….can’t remember the name of it at the mo…) is shi’ite at doing anything other than it’s intended purpose (getting rAd). So unless you are planning on driving to a bowl / track then a cruiser might be a better option. A proper BMX will pish all over a cruiser if you just want something for trails / jumps etc.

He’s dead in Canada, so presumably he is everywhere else….

On the Saturday morning, lots of people had been complaining, either that it was too steep and technical

Muwahahahahaha it’s a field outside Malvern LOLOMGOLOLETC….

Ah, I thought you were taking the piss! It’s a Brodie Dissident. I’ve just had a look on the site but I can’t see anything similar (mine’s a 2007 model).

http://brodiebikes.com/2007/2007_bikes/dissident.php

dropoff – Member

walleater, you’ve just got to let us know what that frame is. i suppose it was obvious that the perfect UK bike would come from Canada

Who you are defines what the perfect bike is, not where you are. If I was back in the UK and was looking for a do-it-all bike then I’d chose something similar. It’s great on technical climbs due to being low and short (it’s easy to throw up and over rocks and roots), and is a blast on the downs for the same reasons plus is really stiff. I can’t think of anywhere in the UK that it’d be useless…well maybe Thetford but who the **** wants to ride there? ;-)

Heh heh…..

Although in all seriousness it got down Boundary fine last night which is beyond double black and that’s North Shore double black, not Llandingdong.

http://www.nsmba.bc.ca/maps/MapOfFromme.pdf

Mikey74 has already mentioned the Blur 4X, and I agree that a 4X bike is a surprisingly good all-round bike. The frames are stiff / strong enough to give a good beating, but the limited travel makes the bike easy to throw around and launch off stuff, like a hardtail. This is my only ride for ’09 and it gets ridden on the sickest trails on the planet, maybe even the universe (though the trails on Pluto are f*cking rad):

I’ve got a Labgear merino base layer and it’s lasted for years. I used to avoid the tumble dryer but now it gets thrown in with everything else and it’s stayed the same size (or I’ve got smaller too….).

1.25″ Specialized Fatboys and bar ends so you can OWN the road climb up to the top of Kadenwood. Show those guides what a riding god you are! ;-)

Needs a Dave Yates sticker.

Another mechanic here and I think SRAM blows goats. In my own personal experience, I’ve broken more SRAM mechs in a year or so than Shimano in around 20 years!

Awesome fireroad bike.

They definitely need bleeding. 110% of fact etc.

I did a whole season of XC guiding around Whistler and didn’t even bother with padded shorts let alone shave my arse. I’d slap some cream down there but I found that padded liners and the like just added to the sweating / irritation. Good fitting underpants stops stuff from bouncing about, and baggies allow everything to breathe. I guess my anal beard did it’s job admirably and my arse just got used to taking a good battering.

It’s a Giraffe.

weenie – Member

mmm how many of you guys have actually tried both systems? how can you say “X7 = Catalogue ‘mtb’
X9 = Tourney
X0 = Acera “
Have you really tried all these groupsets?

Yes, and I’d say that Acera and Alivio are about the best performing gear systems out there at the moment! Sure they’re heavier and probably won’t last as long but it always surprises me how well they work when I throw a bike in the stand. X7 is pretty basic stuff….’plasticy’ shifters (some have a positive click out of the box and others don’t….useless quality control) and the mechs are made of cheese.

I’ve gone with an Ultegra block, 105 mech and XT shifters and the shifting is pretty good, and I used to have good luck with road mechs in the past so fingers crossed….

When’s the last time you did a push up?!

X9=XTR

LOLOLOLOLOLOL……

The classic ‘all the gear and no idea’ bike. And the people who ride them properly break them.

It’s being removed to make way for the 2009 World House Of Cards Making Championships…..

The only thing more stupid than putting a ‘freeride’ park on top of an exposed hill!

What a stupid haircut!

Why the **** am I trying to even have a debate with people who obviously have never even ridden a dh bike never mind a dh track.

Heh heh….that brings back memories of someone climbing a Swiss mountain on an Orange 224….about a mile ahead of me.

Sell a load of stuff on the Classifieds but don’t send any goods?

Actually this place is really nice but it’s the wrong end of the city:

http://www.thewhitelioninn.com/thewhitelioninndomain/index.htm

But it’s not in the city so that is a huge bonus Ta ta a bit etc….

You’d be better off going to a country pub outside of the city, unless you both like curry or going down the urban hell that is Broad Street.

LOL at the pisstaking on this thread. But yeah, I just do them up gently and repeatedly try and rotate the grip. As soon as it won’t move then the bolts are tight enough. They undo really easily.

I can’t help with the particular query, but if you get the choice of Air Transat flights or Thomass Cock through CA, I’d choose the Transat flights! My wife and I flew to the UK with CA and the CK flight sucked, plus they lost our luggage and were generally useless at sorting the problem out. Transat on the other hand had a much nicer plane / crew and the food was actually edible.

The Super Tacky’s will last you a week of hard riding at most.

Skids are for kids! I used a 2.7 Slow Reezay Minnion on the front from late 2007 in the Park and I’ve still got it now. Granted it never got used every day but tyres last OK there if you are not too hamfisted with the brakes. I’d go with the softest / biggest tyres you can get and screw the weight.

2.3 Super tacky single ply Rollers with fairly beefy tubes would be my bet for XC, although I used Specialized Chunders which were heavier but lasted a whole season. Only use 60a compound tyres on the front if you are feeling suicidal.