Some years ago I had Surly LHT which I used as a commuter and utility bike (miss it dearly). Since I also used it to grocery runs and such I installed some Shimano A530 hybrid pedals.

They were absolutely awful, the side I needed was never up, no predictability whatsoever which what you need the most on pedals. And this was only on road, paths and very light trails.

The thing is that the numbers you mention, specifically rear travel, often say very little about the bikes character. You can have a 170mm bike climb and pedal exceptionally well or a 150mm one feel like sofa. Start with >150mm of travel, throw in lots of anti squat and progression and you generally have a very good climber and “traily” feeling bike. My AM9 was a perfect example.
So when Norco says the Sight is an AM bike, and reviewers, when comparing with other long travel 29ers, say that it feels like a long legged trail bike, there might be some bases for that.
But who knows, I never tried one.

Now this reflects only my personal opinion, but I’m very skeptical of this new crop of trail bikes like the Optic. They have enduro bike builds, tyres, weight and geo, while being often described as climbing as good (or as bad) as enduro bikes but being handicapped downhill. So, a handicapped enduro bike. Doesn’t make much sense to me. I bet in an year or so lots of them will be for sale as owners realize what they needed was a good pedaling enduro or simply put lighter tyres

I’m also curious with the new Sight, geo seems to be dead on on the L for me, even if Norco curiously recommends the XL for my height (184cm). Also allows for a 170mm fork, and I’m all for long forks

Some reviews seem to suggest it doesn’t really feel like a long travel enduro, more like a long legged trail bike, which seems to make sense as it is marketed as an AM. Norco hinted that they are to release a full on enduro, maybe to replace the Range

I got myself a Stumpjumper Evo last year. Straight away I removed the shock spacer to get 155mm rear travel. Riding mostly natural rocky trails the rear end feels much more stable, comfortable and bottomless than my previous AM9 did. I guess most of the complaints about it going through travel would go away with this easy mod.
On the front I upped the travel to 160mm (approved by Specialized), together with the high setting the BB is at a good height and the geo feels perfect. The bike just feels so good as it is now.

The Slash is likely to be replaced this year, the Sentinel will be for sure.
A good deal of great concepts are to be available this year, Privateer, Propain Tyee, Banshee Titan, Norco Sight, etc.

In your position I’d either grab a Stumpy Evo (with the mods I’ve mentioned) or wait until may or June to see the new releases

“Like the look of this but why do all have decent steel frames seem to start at £550 these days?”

Likely because it’s easy to position yourself in the market for that price and also most of these frames are probably made at the same couple or so of factories for similar costs

Size 11.5 here, on 5 10 Impacts to make things worse. Currently using Nukeproof Horizons SH, I love them but they are on the verge of feeling small.

I think the main issue with pedals for big feet is that, even with a large platform, they tend to still have narrow Q factors and sit very close to the crank. You can have a huge platform, but if it is right next to the crank you’ll be wasting real estate.

I once tried some L Stamps and I wasn’t using a good portion of the inside of the pedal

I use an 8 year old SKS Injex Lite pump. It’s on the big side, quite unfashionable, but seems to be impervious to water, mud and dust and pumps really well.
I’ve tried some sleeker smaller pumps meanwhile, but they all seem to either be just awful at what they do or just fall apart from exposure.

My issue with the current crop of “trail bikes” is that they morphed more and more into shorter travel enduro bikes, to the point of having almost the same build, tyres, forks, geo and weight. Just having less rear travel wont make the bike magically pedal and climb better. You can have a 130mm frame climbing like sh!t and a 160mm one doing really well, it comes more from the kinematics of the suspension.

You then hear more and more (see Pinkbike’s last field test as an example) on how X trail bike is not climbing much, if any, better than an enduro bike, while being worse on the downhills.

There are obviously exceptions, but this seems to be the current trend. People liked what they got on the enduro sleds, but pursued shorter travels under the, sometimes, illusion that would automatically mean better pedaling.

If one is in between trail-enduro, I’d just pick an enduro bike that pedals well, and there are plenty: AM9, Strive, Ransom, Slash, Stage 6, just to name a few. Just using lighter tyres (EXO, EXO+ at most) without inserts will likely have a bigger impact on climbs and you’ll still have all the available travel should you want to get roudy or have a trip to the Alps.

The only reason I got a “trail bike”, my Stumpy Evo, was for it’s capacity to bump up travel and become a full blown enduro bike.

Belt and suspenders for me: 100% of the time I carry a reasonable pump, a tube and CO2

This applies to any specialized tool purchase:
A) attribute yourself an hourly rate (everyone should do this, we should know how much we think an hour of our time is worth)
B) estimate how much longer it takes to build a pair of wheels by improvising Vs by using the jig
C) define for how long you expect to keep that tool or hobby. Let’s say 5 years
D) estimate how many times in that period you expect to build wheels
E) multiply you hourly rate by the wastes time at B) by the number of times at D)
F) compare the result with the cost of a jig

I guess for 99% of people the jig will be more expensive than the time they waste by improvising. So then you can just say “that jig looks like fun, screw it I’m going to buy it anyway”

Really the best way to address that, imo, is a vice.

When that happens to me, I press that section on a big(ish) vice. This is usually enough for the rim to hold air

Worth mentioning that the 2.299€ price being published doesn’t include the shock

I think the stock steel chainring is the only thing I really like about my NX Eagle group and the only part I actually prefer over Shimano.
It seems to last forever and takes a beating to the point of me foregoing the bashguard

How much are you budgeting for the Mega?

Anyone knows if the PMBIA coaching certifications have any validity in the UK?

That’s true as well, I agree.

I’m a big fan of the Athertons, Rachel is by far my favourite in the woman’s field and Gee easily in my top 5.
But I’m not very optimistic about the bike brand endeavour.

Let me quote myself from my post at the controversial cycling opinions thread:

“An year passed since the big “next big thing” announcement and nothing happened.

Either:
– they announced the bikes way too early into development
– they faced unexpected issues
– the Bikepark thing was much more work than anticipated
– turns out there’s not much interest in the product

They keep saying “we are still fine tuning the geometry or kinematics or whatever”, but often when you fine tune a product too much you end up tuning it specifically for yourself. It’s not rocket science (unless they are into problems).

Maybe Gee’s sub standard season (for what he’s capable) also didn’t help. On WC footage I recal him on a seemingly quite nervous and unstable bike, compared to both the competition and what I remember from his Trek”

Sometimes the issue is that we are all talking about wildly different kinds and levels of riding without realizing it. There will be someone commenting on how something works or doesn’t and he’s thinking about full fledged DH tracks or crazy technical climbs and someone on commenting on the same theme who only rides channel paths.

I don’t want to sound judgmental prejudiced, but someone o says that pulling up the bike works and it’s easy is likely to be referring to very small jumps. I might be wrong here, but that’s generally the case. As soon as you hit the bigger stuff, pulling the bike by the pedals won’t get you nor far or high, you wont have much control or stability and you’ll soon pay a visit to nose-dive-ville.

Anyway, to each it’s own, what matters is that people are happy and riding bikes.
The only reason some people get passionate about this topic (me included) is that you feel a huge number of riders are missing a world of riding potential, convenience, fun and safety with little downsides

Not to turn this into a flats Vs clipless debate, but it’s worth mentioning that other studies found closer results between the two systems.

And that GCN test it’s stupid to the bones. Put a couple of guys who never ride flats on crappy trainer shoes and go for a ride. That should do it, right?

If you ride rowdy enough things a pedal to the shin eventually happens to everyone, sooner or later.

Half an year or so ago I was sending a 6′ or 7′ drop to flat which I’ve done a million times. Its quite a pedestrian one once you loose the anxiety and learn to squash it properly. The thing was, that day the drop’s edge had a couple of stones, which caused the rear wheel to lift and hit my arse when I was squashing. The wheel rebounded off me arse and the bike suddenly dropped under me, causing my left foot to loose the pedal. Landed right foot on pedal, left pedal right on shin. 1″ long slice to the shin bone. Dense as I am, never got stitches, that one left a proper scar there

julians, I agree, attitudes have changed, but so did the bikes, the kind of riding most people are doing and the technology.

Looking back at most of the flat pedals available at the time I can see how people disliked them, as did the few and far between quality shoes.

Thin(ish), concave, large area and properly pinned flat pedals, together with good flat specific shoes and dropper posts are almost mandatory to make it work.

And totally anecdotal personal experience, almost all the best riders I personally know are on flat pedals

True, but it’s nonetheless a good skill to be able to place your foot in the right spot on the go.
Specially if you have big feet, even with large pedals you don’t have that much real estate. If you foot is off it feels weird quickly.

But this is something that comes naturally with practice

I know what you mean there, I felt the same for some time. In all my clipless era I never had a problem to quickly unclip or dab, like in a technical situation. That was never a reason for me to leave SPDs. Even today I can jump on a SPD bike and have zero issues with that. On the other hand, got hurt while crashing hand having the bike making my ankles or knees to do wrong moves, like having a feet stuck on the pedal underneath the bike with me on top, but that’s a different story.

I don’t know if it’s the case with the Specialized shoes you mention, but I would argue that there are some shoes too sticky for flat pedal introduction. The Shimano GR7s I had were perfect for this, sticky enough to be more than safe but still allowing you to feel the pedal and correct foot position.

I would never recommend my current Impacts to a novice. They have so much grip that some of the usual flat pedal technique can be overlooked and also you can’t correct your foot position once you step in the pedal. You need to have the mechanics internalised of place your feet systematically in the right place

I dislike the “pedaling in circles” term as it is more a smoothing of the pedal stroke rather than a push-pull action as more recent studies show. But yes, you can do that with flat pedals, I do it almost constantly.
I can’t imagine clearing a step, slippery climb just stomping on the pedals.

I guess is comes a lot to do with the pedal-shoe combo quality

To the OP, by all means try it and stick with it for some months.

Like many, I was a SPD user for about a decade. My technique was crap, had lots of arm pump, knee and ankle pain were normal things. But SPD were the “serious mtber” way, so be it.

I ride everything from longer trail days with lots of elevation to proper DH shuttle runs.

Year and a half ago I decided to try flat pedals. Completely changed the way i ride, for the better. First 2 or 3 months were awful but then everything started to click and now I can’t imagine going back. It was a step back, 2 steps forward (or 3, or 4, 5 maybe?)
What this meant to me:
– good pedals and shoes are paramount
– My knees, ankles and feet stopped hurting
– Having my feet free made get my sh!t together in terms of technique and body positioning
– It provides you with a ton of cues, if your feet start rattling then you´re doing something wrong
– They keep me honest about my skills envelope. With clipless I would often completely loose composure but stayed attached to the bike and dodged bullets. With flat pedals if you start stepping outside your abilities your feet will let you know
– Because you´re riding with “heavier feet” you relieve your hands and get much less arm pump
– It feels so much healthier for your knees, your feet will land in their natural position and keep everything smooth for your body
– To my surprise I much prefer to climb on flat pedals. You can still pull the pedal with a scrapping motion, I do this all the time. And I like it so much more to put down power and stamp on a proper platform rather than on a clipping mechanism that feels like a ball bearing. Never understood the efficiency loss thing, unless 0,5% means something for you
– I always had the habit of rotating my hips, knees and feet in corners and certain jumps. With clipless this lead to either lots of unwanted unclipping or to max out the clipping tension. Not an issue on flats
– You’ll be much less injury prone in falls and spills
– Flat pedal shoes are just awesome for walking around, driving, hitting the pub
– I like bikepacking sometimes, this way you’ll only carry 1 pair of shoes

I could carry on with this, but I think you get the point.
The only scenarios I could imagine to use clipless would be if I was racing XC for that tiny marginal Watt gain or being a Pro DH racer for the balls to the wall, composure out of the window moments.

Shimano shoes are great for general trail riding and even “enduro” riding. They’re reasonably priced, dry fast, are durable and have good grip. Because of the aggressive shuttle days I wanted something with even more grip so got a pair of Five Ten Sam Hills, it’s like riding SPDs on the rought stuff, I forget about my feet.

I used a cheap double ring spacer one for a while. It’s bloody awful. You can put some superglue drops to attach the spacers to the hub or frame, but they eventually fall off, generally into the overgrown black hole. I think it’s a waste for such a nice hub.

I now use the Wolftooth Boostinator. Is not that much expensive and does things the proper way. It replaces the stock left cup and puts a spacer on the disc. You need to dish your rim some mm to the left but even a wheel building dummy like me could do it, it’s just a matter of tightening the non driveside spokes a quarter turn per pass.
You also end up with a stronger wheels as the rim gets more centered between the hub flanges

I used one at the rear for about 3 months last year, I slashed my rear DHRII and had a spare front DHF lying around.
Cornering grip – same as the DHRII, maybe a tiny touch better
Climbing grip – in between the Aggressor and the DHRII, but not that great
Braking grip – on par with the Aggressor, which is to say none
Rolling resistance – felt the same as the DHRII

I thing they work reasonably well in the rear for park and trail center use, but even there I don’t think there’s a significant advantage over the DHRII
For general use, DHRII every day

I generalised a bit because that’s a story I heard several times.

But I’m sure it’s still making plenty of people happy

I like to see these SS threads popping up from time to time, good to know some interest is still alive.

I was on SS exclusively from 2008 to around 2012. It was a combination of factors for me:
– I was a poor student
– I hated front derailleurs to my guts
– I tried a 29er and loved it
– xc/trailish suspension forks back then were, imo, cr@p

Circa ’08 or ’09, if you shared any of these conditions and spent too much time at the MTBR forums there was only one type of bike to have, a 29er SS steel rigid.
This fad was interesting as it arose from enthusiast interest rather than marketing.

I built myself a nice Singular Swift, one of the very first blue SS specific ones. It was a beautiful, elegant, efficient and comfortable bike. Back then fun for me was more akin to cram 2000m of gain in 50km than doing some road gap or hitting that rock garden at 40m/h.

The biggest issue for me with SS is that in order for it to be fun I needed to stay in great shape. I started back then to do other competitive sports and going back on the bike became a chore.

Fast forward to the last couple of years and 1x drivetrains are worlds better. And forks are unbelievable good. And now you have what’s essentially a shorter travel DH bike that’s reliable, comfortable and fun up and down. And along the definition of MTB fun shifts with it.
Sometimes I miss riding SS, but can’t really see the point anymore.

Talking to other people I heard this pattern several times. I guess SS was somewhat of a “protest” against the crappy bikes and components we were offered back then

As far as I understand, the Stage 5 has been updated with the new style geo, water bottle mount and metric shock, the Stage 4 was not.
That would settle it for me between the 2 models

Here I go:
Atherton Bikes is going to fail

An year passed since the big “next big thing” announcement and nothing happened.

Either:
– they announced the bikes way too early into development
– they faced unexpected issues
– the Bikepark thing was much more work than anticipated
– turns out there’s not much interest in the product

They keep saying “we are still fine tuning the geometry or kinematics or whatever”, but often when you fine tune a product too much you end up tuning it specifically for yourself. It’s not rocket science (unless they are into problems).

Maybe Gee’s sub standard season (for what he’s capable) also didn’t help. On WC footage I recal him on a seemingly quite nervous and unstable bike, compared to both the competition and what I remember from his Trek

That guy’s a riot.
I read his blog frequently, sometimes for something genuinely interesting, often for his tirades on how he’s only one o knows/does something right

Did the Camino this year on my full on enduro Stumpjumper Evo, including Double Down tyres and rear insert. Ultra comfortable and reliable, I was never afraid of something breaking. A little slower than the guys with more “conventional” bikes for the route, but not that much once you factor the packing load, the technical climbs and the sheer amount of recklessness allowed by the nearly DH grade build. Back home is my everyday bike.

Done it before more than once with more dedicated bikepacking bikes, which were great at that, commuting and not much else (and not even remotely as comfortable).

The thread title was obviously clickbaity and tong in cheek, so feel free to share your positive experiences.

I have no doubts the Aggressor will suit some people quite well.

Also, for sure there are many worse tyres than it. The thing is, looking at the DHRII, the , in my case, very few advantages of the Aggressor don’t make up for all the disadvantages, not even close.

Glad to know so many people get along with it, makes me think about selling it for a more grateful owner

Had a Minion SS about an year or so ago.
For what it was, a summer tyre, actually preferred it Vs the Aggressor. Had better cornering grip once you committed to properly lean the bike and was actually really fast rolling. Climbing grip was not that much worse than the Aggressor. Only lasted one month though

There’s the very distinct possibility that I just suck at riding and need to rely on a really grippy tyre to make it work.

I’m considering to get a set of Rimpact inserts to replace my current Huck Norris (useless, imo). That’ll likely allow for lower pressures and I’ll see how the Aggressor works like that

PS: sorry for the rant

Madeira?

First question, do you need/want DH rating?

Another week fighting the urge to build a killer Pipedream Moxie with 160mm 36s and ditch the FS, another thread making things harder for me