Dumgoyne loop this morning.

At the longer end of travel I’d be very tempted with a Rallon given all the customisation options you get on their site. Custom paint!

However I also love my Hightower, so maybe an LT. If you don’t need all that travel the regular HT is very nice – mine is 150mm up front on 29 wheels. Kinda half way house. More travel than my bimbling needs.

That’s the best colour Bronson! Keep it and upgrade it. :D

Another SC vote here. I was interested in the 5010 and the Bronson initially, but after reading and YouTube viewing, I ended up with the Hightower at the top of my list. I decided the bigger wheels would give me more confidence and stability. They do. I’d probably be just as happy with the 5010 or the Bronson, but I figured the Bronson had more travel than I needed.

Mine oddly came with 150mm forks, but I’ve not found it an impact on climbing. It has made me faster and more confident on the descents than my Trigger did. I’m still a wuss as my recent trip to Comrie Croft showed.

Shop around – SC do some deals towards end of season. I got almost 30% off mine from Bike Treks – they maybe wanted to shift the XL though.

Wheels mfg threaded pf. Put one in my Giant when it started to creak.

I went with Fulcrum Quattro Carbon Discs. I almost went for a pair of Campag Zonda Discs which I’d probably have been just as happy with.

Edit: not tubeless ready though. At least not the Fulcrums.

My son got a Pinnacle Kauri 26 when he was 9. Fitted OK. He’s 10 now and it fits just fine. 24 would have been way too small.

Cheers

@matbee

You could try Rudy Project. I’ve had a pair of Rydons with an RX insert from RXSport for several years and prescriptions. No issues with optics, fogging, comfort, or weight.

I like the look of the Rydons and love my growing collection of lenses, which would be much more expensive glazed.

I even use mine on vacation.

How often does this need to be done. My Hightower is 4 or 5 months old, 600km. I’ve got no symptoms or problems I need to resolve. Should I be doing this regressing now or wait a bit?

I still disagree.

If any of you have ever cycled along the WHW at the weekend you’ll know it’s always super busy. Constantly slowing for dog walkers. Often stuck behind folk with earphones who can’t hear your bell. And of course there’s plenty of hikers walking the WHW proper, full length. In short, you have to reign in your riding. Which is fine.

This weekend, with 800 runners added to the mix, I can’t see that being any fun to ride through. It’s not the widest of trails, so slowing to squeeze past packs of runners every couple of minutes just sounds like a pain. I may well go anyway given the weather doesn’t lend itself to a longer ride elsewhere. Still, I appreciated the heads-up.

I’m still of the opinion he was merely saying heads up – trail traffic this weekend, you might enjoy riding someplace else more, otherwise be warned your ride may be slower and less fun. Once the internet jumped down his throat he was merely saying, look I’m an MTBer too, and I don’t just take part in running events trying to ruin your riding day.

I did this twice. Sort of.

First went to 1×10 using a 32T oval up front and an 11-42 at the rear. I used a Sunrace cassette, XT long body, and a goat link. Ran without the goat link at first then upgraded to that for a slightly smoother shift and less B tension.

Then I decided to go 1×11, still with the 32T but with an 11-46 out back, Again I went sunrace, Another XT long body, and pretty sure a goat link (but maybe not). Move the 1×10 to my youngest sons bike to give him more range as it was very very limited.

About a week or so later I sold my bike and bought a new one with GX 1×11 on a 30T with 10-42. As my fitness is out I’ve stuck a 28T oval up front. I’ll switch back to the 30T or maybe another oval in the summer. I feel like the 10 at the back lets me get away with a smaller up front without losing the top end.

The goat link is a benefit regardless of what cassette you use. It improves the chain wrap at the rear derailleur. It’s main purpose was to allow you to use a medium cage on a larger cassette. But it helps with the long cage too. Whether you use Shimano or Sunrace cassettes is irrelevant.

Google says this.

Inserts are the best. Get a nice collection of lenses in different colours and only need to change one prescription. I don’t have the Oakley by the way.

I’ve read and reread the op. I don’t see this tone you lot are seeing. It was a perfectly reasonable heads-up that some folk just want to read differently.

Check your front ring for a bent tooth. I had that, kept kicking my chain up, but only in certain gears. At the time I had a front derailleur so it didn’t come off.

Looks great. Enjoy.

Yeah. That’s what I appreciate a lot – sitting down spinning hard down a rocky but not particularly technical descent that you be standing through on a hardtail or battering your ass.

I have two bikes right now. If I could have three I’d love a fatbike for a bit of fun. I can’t have three!

In fairness, aging or modern doesn’t change the back end rattling your ass off over rough stuff. I had a more modern hard tail for the record fairly recently, in fact several between that old P7 and my current ride.

If you’ve never ridden one, go hire one at a trail centre and get a feel for it. Most folk find the FS much more comfortable, controlled, and ultimately faster. It’s really hard to go back. And we are now at the point where you can get a great FS from Calibre or Boardman for less than 1k. Unheard of a few years back.

Just read the rest of the thread! Nice choice. Enjoy.

I love my Hightower CS 29er – excels going down so I think maybe the bike you were on needed better setup for your weight. I got it with a massive discount as it was last of the 2017 bikes.

Had I not gone for the Hightower I’d have paid a bit more to get a Jeffsy or FlareMax. Probably the Jeffsy,

My 2p.

Having ridden a full susser for years I had the chance to ride my old hard tail (that I’d sold to a friend) – Orange P7 (the original one). This was about 18 months ago when I was riding my old SC Superlight. Over smooth single track and hard pack fire roads it was totally fine. As soon as things got bumpy – lots of loose rock across the fire road for example, or roots and rocky ground, it was brutal. My mate had never ridden a full susser and planned to get another (more modern) hard tail – until we swapped bikes that day for 10 mins. He bought a full-suss a couple of weeks later.

It really depends on the terrain you ride. I’d never go back to a hardtail and I always feel sorry for my son when he joins me on his Rockrider.

Thanks for the heads-up @highlandman. That’s my local trail and I weekly ride it either up to Rosies Road or along to the Distillery. I’ll go somewhere else this weekend as a quiet day on the WHW is often like Sauchiehall Street, so I can imagine this weekend being particularly problematic.

Fastest Follower (Rival, I think they call it) is the default but on Garmin you can also choose between PR/KOM/goal time!

On the 520? Not that I could find (unless you have to toggle it actually on the segment screen mid segment)? There’s been a lengthy thread or two about this in the Garmin (and/or Strava) forums. In the end I gave up waiting.

edit: on the 520 you can change it on an individual segment basis, not as a default. So you need to update every single segment. If someone you follow gets a faster time then the segment is re-synced, reset, and you need to go back in and change it again. That’s just not useful at all.

I sold my Edge 520 for the larger sized Wahoo Elemnt. Very happy with it. I liked the 520, but it had a couple of issues that bothered me.

– I like to use Strava live segments to measure myself against myself. With the Wahoo, it shows you your PR. With Garmin, it shows the fastest rider you follow, which I found demoralising rather than encouraging.

– You can load good maps into the 520 (it ships with crap, but DC Rainmaker has a good guide).

– Wahoo has maps preloaded and space for most of the world. It has better turn by turn navigation, but neither work too well if you drift off course. Garmin can show your route further zoomed out that Wahoo, but I didn’t need that.

– Wahoo better integrates with everything through a nifty app on your phone. No need to USB sync a GPX from your desktop to the GPS like the 520, instead you can link ridewithgps, komoot, etc directly to the app one your phone and any route that’s there is automatically on the Wahoo without user input.

– You can also fire up the maps app in Wahoo and choose a new destination, it’ll route you there on the fly (though that works best on road than mtb).

Honestly the two features I wanted most were the personal segments rather than who I follow, and the bigger screen for my ageing eyes. I also enjoy the ability to toggle between multiple segments during a ride if they overlap.

Looks like any other collar, but in a fancy shape. Interference fit over the seat tube. Looks like it pulls up.

Doesn’t look integrated, just looks a bit different. As Dez suggests, just order a replacement?

I wear a pair of Funkier Bid Shorts under my baggies. Got them from CRC. Pretty cheap, and the XL size fits my 6’1″ frame with 34 waist just fine. I also have a pair of XL Castelli bibs (which are a bit tighter – the Funkier fit better) and for the crap weather I wear Castelli bib tights under my baggies.

I can’t go back to non bibs – always feel like they want to slip down a bit.

Mine do it for a short while if they’ve been wet and are subsequently dry. After a few squeezes they generally silence down again.  My rear did it horrifically last month but just needed realigned.

It’s funny you say that – I met a couple of riders on the way up who said the same – keep your speed up on the descent. By the time I reached the second ragged drop into a tight landing that I really wanted to roll instead, I was off and walking. :) So much for keeping my speed up.

I enjoyed the climb the most. :) I was totally out of my depth everywhere else. I think I need some mid-life-skills-lessons. :D

I think I saw that same father and son and just assumed they knew what they were doing.

Comrie. Ridden poorly on my Hightower. Turns out I’m not as capable as I thought.  😄

Yeah, I finished up on the blue. That was a blast.

My biggest issue with Comrie was the regular steep rocky sections. Especially the one near the start of the top red descent. One thing I’m not confident with is large drops or steeps.

I think part of the problem was my fork which was setup great for the West Highland Way. I’ve stuck another token in now to make it less wallowy. Also I think my XL Hightower is too big for me so as an experiment post ride I’ve now whacked on my son’s spare 40mm Hussefelt stem in place of my 50mm Renthal. Looks ugly but maybe livens the front end and makes moving around the bike easier. Will need to wait until next weekend to try it.

I stopped off at Carron Valley on the way home. Rude not to.

That was the hardest red I’ve ridden. I say ridden, but I walked parts of it and bottled the red descent half way down. Seems a lot tougher than Glentress. I’m a big scaredy cat.

It’ll probably steepen the head angle by half a degree. You could get some offset bushings for the rear to slacken it out again or just live with it.

Edit: ignore. The zero is a hard tail init? 😳

My Easton Arcs are fine with Novatech hubs so far. However there’s a whole bunch of folk reporting failures in the Hightower thread on mtbr – seems the pawls in the rear hub are made of cheese. Several owners have had several replacements before SC moved to a different hub. Hopefully all the broken hubs were ridden by heavy riders.

Anyone have a gpx for the turret loop please? If I have time.

Thanks nobeer.

Matt / Ceept

Been looking at the route around Comrie on Trailforks. I think what you are saying is to go up and do the Euans Excuses loop passing the top red descent, then as you start second lap, take the descent? Is the blue worth a lap too? Or just do the red again if I have time?