Sussex-MTB

I’d been looking forward to riding the 2010 Genesis Alpitude, I rode last year’s and loved it so I was keen to see if this year’s model was as fun to ride.

The Alpitude differentiates itself from the Altitude by it’s slacker angles, beefier tubing and longer travel fork. When you first lay eyes on this bike the low slung frame and long fork make it look mean as hell and you know it means business.

The top tube is dropped with a neat gusset linking it to the seat tube, not unlike the Pace hardtail frames. The main triangle tubes are made from Reynolds excellent 853 steel and are oversized (although still skinny when compared to an aluminium frame), the compact rear triangle is made from much more slender tubing and the overall result is a very pleasing looking frame. It also has the nice (almost essential) UK friendly addition of crud catcher bosses on the underside of the downtube, which proved very handy on my two test rides! It also has chain guide mounts should you want to fit a chain retention device or perhaps a Hammerschmidt crank.

Genesis Alpitude

It’s kitted out with pretty much an entire SLX groupset, the only differences being the rear mech (upgraded to XT) and the shifters (downgraded to Deore). As is usual with a full Shimano build it all works together faultlessley, with the light action of the shifting a real pleasure to use. The highlight though is the buttery smooth Rock Shox Revelation fork, but more on that later.

After a bit of fiddling with the set up I finally arrived at what seemed to be a good compromise on the tyre pressure, it was very muddy and 25psi seemed to stike a good comfort / grip balance.

One of the unique features of this bike is despite the slack head angle the seat angle is quite steep, this makes it an exceptionally well mannered climber, there’s little in the way of front wheel wander when climbing, except on all but hte steepest climbs, and even this can be dialled out by dropping the fork down to a shorter travel temporarily.

Genesis Alpitude

So how does it ride? Well in a word fun. It wants you to ride quick, it needs you to ride quick. When you really start to push it the bike comes to life, the ‘twang’ of the steel frame is really enjoyable as you speed your way through the singletrack. The compact back end makes manualling over roots and obstacles a piece of cake.

Turn the terrain steep and gnarly and it excells. It’s easy to get your weight off the back and the fork does a great job of keeping everything tracking smoothly in the direction you want to go. Popping of jumps and drops with ease is the name of the game, again the fork saves you if you get it a bit wrong.

You can push it as hard as you like on the downhills and it just laughs back at you, it’s a bike for scaring your mates who have paid significantly more on a full suspention bike as you buzz their rear tyres and then overtake with a grin on your face!

Genesis Alpitude

The only real downside would say is maybe it would climb a bit better if it was a bit lighter. But that said it would probably be at the expense of it’s bombproof descending ability, so perhaps it’s just that I need to get a bit fitter.

For the price this is an amzing bike for riding round these parts, South or North downs singletrack will be hammered with ease and in all likelyhood the only limitation will be your ability to hang on when it encourages you to really go for it.

Hummerlicious

Ice Bike 2010 – Saracen Kili Flyer Ti

Originally uploaded by 18bikes

A lot of you guys out there probably see Saracen from their ‘Ur bike iz saracen’ Halfords days, but some of us can just about cast our minds back to the first explosion of popularity this MTB’ing thing we love so much had.

Saracen were there and their steel frames were something to aspire to, the top end models were sweet. Well Madison have set out to rejuvenate the brand and they have some pretty nice looking bikes too.

But here we have the Saracen Kili Flyer in Ti. Will it get made in 2011? Well I hope so, it makes me go all misty eyed and nostalgic!!

It’s taken me a while to get round to writing this review, mainly because I was hoping to get another go on this bike. But it’s popularity has proved such that’s it’s been pretty much booked out from Quest since it came in.

I’ve managed to get two good rides in on this bike, one on the last month’s Quest ride on the south downs and one on a Sussex-MTB ride on the north downs. Also I did the SD ride with the chainstays on long and the ND ride with them short just to see the difference.

Unfortunately though the weather was pretty appaling for both so I’ve not really had a chance to fully let rip on the 19, hopefully I’ll get it again some time in the future though, I certainly hope so as it’s great fun to ride!

So what about the bike? Well the first thing I really noticed was the weight. This bike weighs around 24lbs and as such is nearly 4lbs lighter than my Hummer! My god you notice the difference, though most of that is probably down to the fact I have a coil Pike on the Hummer and that does make it rather lardy.

Whyte 19 trail - excuse my fence!

So back to the Whyte, it’s really nicely specced, to be honest the same sort of spec that any of the Sussex-MTB boyz (or indeed lots of other riders) would actually choose themselves; Fox forks, SRAM X0 gears, Thomson seatpost and stem, Easton carbon bars and of course the lovely new Hope brakes which look like lush machined jewels!!

Hope brakes

So really there’s nothing there that you would want to change from the off, except maybe the crank, but that really depends how much of a tart you are. Truvativ have come a long way with their styling now and the Stylo chainset fitted not only looks good but goes with the styling of the bike very nicely.

Bling!

The ride? In a word nippy! They say “light enough to race, tough enough for trails”. I certainly wouldn’t argue with that. Point this bike uphill and it’s like having an invisible hand pushing you, it’s so light it flies, the balance is great with the 120mm fork long enough to soak up the bumps, but not so long you struggle to keep the front end down the the steep climbs.

Adjustable drop outs - in 'short' mode

The bike is super stable descending, especially with the chainstays on their ‘long’ setting. However I enjoyed it the most with them as short as you could run it. It gave the bike a more playful feel and made it a piece of cake to manual off roots and drops. Initially I struggled to bond with it on the more technical trails of the north downs, however I stopped for a while and took the time to adjust the fork more for my riding ’style’ (I use the word loosely). Speeding up the rebound made all the difference to me as the fork was packing down a bit over multiple root sections. With the rebound adjusted though it was more to my taste and I was able to forget that I wasn’t on someone else’s bike and really let rip on it and just enjoy the ride. Most notably when Michael shouted “Come on grandad” to me at the top of ‘Barry know’s best’. He was forced to eat his words as I overtook him into the first big berm and beat him to the bottom

So what do I think? This bike is a lightweight trail mashing monster. You’d be hard pressed to find something as light and as durable for blasting around these parts. Thoroughly recommended.

Now I’m looking forward to trying the next demo, the new Genesis that’s in the shop.

Don’t forget you can swing your leg over the Whyte or indeed any of the other bikes that are lined up for the 2010 DEMO DAY which is on March the 20th. Contact the shop for more details………

Hummerlicious

Excuse my fence!

This weekend I’ve had the new Marin Attack Trail 6.8 for company. I’ve been looking forward to riding this bike since I saw the new catalogue. I was a big fan of last year’s Attack Trail and I wondered how the new one would compare. There have been a few changes and some weight shed too, so it all looked promising. The travel has been pushed up to 150mm and last year’s Pikes have been replaced with Revelations, the rear shock is a Monarch. Gone is the large plate gusset on the front end, replaced by a much more pleasing looking tube.  The headtube is tapered and the downtube has been beefed up a bit too. The shock links have also been machined out and lightened up too.

New links

Tapered headtube

It would also seem that finally Truvativ have managed to make an attractive set of cranks with the Stylos, very nice. Not bad in the weight stakes either, hopefully the black will stay on the sides and wear well. Amazingly I am well known for my rather cack footed pedalling style but despite all the mud I never scratched it up with my heels.

Stylo cranks

Speaking of which on last years bike I caught my heels once or twice on the swing arm and on the links too, but it didn’t happen at all on this bike, maybe it has been slimmed down a bit?

So how does it ride?

Well I think my companions on the Swinley ride will tell you I was loving this bike from the off. I’m not quite sure how my ’style’ of riding is best described, but this bike fits me like a glove. I never once even thought about how it was preforming, I just rode it with a grin on my face.

Tweakage

The Attack Trail is well at home on the singletrack, but you do have to keep an eye on your pedals as sometimes you can clout them on trail obstacles. But it’s the downhill sections where it really announces it’s intentions, somewhere along the lines of “Is that the best you can do?”. It’s really stable, flickable, and unusually it manuals at the drop of a hat. Those last minute hucks off trail obstacles are easily accomplished and the 150mm of travel are a real get out of jail free during those awkward moments!

Berm fun

The downside? Well I guess if there is one it would be this bike is never going to win any uphill races. However that said it does seem to be lighter than the previous model and you don’t really notice the weight that much. Coming from a bike that is a few pounds lighter than this I can’t say I really felt handicapped. There is an unexpected bonus though, on a steep climb when the bike is in the granny ring the quad link system seems to seek out every last bit of grip there is, providing you can get forward on the saddle and get low you’ll still be riding when your fellow riders are off and walking. It shouldn’t be possible on a bike like this, but it is

Verdict:

So what do I think? I love it. Is this much travel really necessary on a bike round here? Well I ride a hardtail, so clearly no! But if you want a really comfy bike that climbs well, descends like a mini downhill bike, is quick and nimble through the singletrack this is the daddy. You can ride the Attack Trail all day and not feel beaten up. It really is a hoot to ride. It encourages you to ride like a loony and rewards you by getting you to the end in one piece with a big grin on your face, you can’t ask for more than that!

Hummerlicious

I’d ridden various versions of the Mount Vision in the past, right back to the very original one, in more recent times as I’ve become a convert to the slack angled, long forked hardtail way of life and as such have found the Mount Vision a bit steep and nervous for the way I ride these days. My XC racing is largely behind me and I prefer to just ride what’s in front of me and enjoy it all a bit more.

The 2010 Mount Vision is a bit slacker in the head angle, a bit steeper in the seat angle and is meant to offer a better all round trail appeal for everyone. A bike that will still munch the miles if you want it too but will handle the singletrack and the techy bits in a bit more of a sure footed, friendly fashion.

2010 Marin Mount Vision

I’ve got to start with the looks, Marin can often be a bit of a ‘Marmite’ design, usually polarising opinion in the group, but they’ve really gone to town on the new model and made some nice design tweaks over previous incarnations. Gone is the nasty little step in the top tube that the headset sat in. The swingarm has been mad more swoopy to take it well out the way of your heels, which works really nicely now. Most noticably though a lot of the welds on the front triangle have been ground smooth leaving lots of people asking if the frame is carbon, it’s a sweet loking frame.

I have had the benefit of riding this bike a few times now, so I’ve had a chance to get to know it quite well. It’s no secret I’m a big fan of Marin’s suspension system and indeed both Deadly and Tatts both have quad link 140 frames which they seem to get on with. But as mentioned above I’ve always found the Mount Vision a bit nervous for my taste so I was keen to see what difference the geometry changes had made.

Mount Vision

I’ll be honest my first ride out I was a bit underwhelmed. It had 2.1″ High Rollers on and it felt nervous and twitchy and I just felt too stretched out and skitty on it. Playing with the rear shock settings out on the trailed helped, but I didn’t really feel happy on it. On my return I mentioned it to JP and he made a few changes. He loves it and he was keen for me to try again and see if my opinion had changed.

The stem had been swapped for a shorter one and the tyres were swapped out for some wider Maxxis Ardents, a bit like a lighter High Roller in a way. The difference was immediately noticeable, I no longer felt so stretched out and as a result felt a lot more at home. I did a lot of familiar trails on that second ride and my speed through the singletrack was commented on, so it was obviously working better for me. In fact the singletrack round the top of Steyning I flew round and did feel a bit like I was cheating

Mount Vision

So it just goes to show that if you have your mind set on a certain bike but it doesn’t feel right you can get the cockpit feel sorted out to your taste with a bit of minor tweaking. On the trail the bike is fast and fluid. It’s only about half a pound heavier than my Hummer so I didn’t notice the extra weight of having rear suspension. The quad link suspension works well helping you search out grip on the climbs, and is as usual super smooth on the downs.

The revised geometry works well, it doesn’t feel steep and nervous although it is a bit steeper than what I’m used to with my Hummer. It whips through the singletrack nicely as well. So who is this bike for? Well I reckon if you’re looking for an all rounder, reasonably light weight, that is suitable for blasting around on the south or indeed the north downs it’s well worthing booking a test ride. The faster you make it go the more fun it is

The funny thing is although we didn’t get on to well on our first outing together I can’t help but ask if it’s free whenever I’m nipping out now which obviously means something!

Shimano MT60 shoes

Features:

• Complete seam-sealed construction for optimal weather protection.
• Shimano developed lightweight trail sole with recessed cleat design enables easy walking with excellent traction if off the bike.
• Gusseted tongue helps to prevent water, dust, gravel, and other foreign objects from getting inside the shoe.
• Lace up closure system with lace holder ensures a secure and snug fit.
• Reflective detailing on the heel help keep you more visible in low light conditions.

One of the pitfalls of commuting by bike if you use SPD pedals is if you have a week of showers during your commute you tend to end up wearing damp shoes all the time. Although I now have three sets of SPD shoes I like to keep my MTB ones in reasonably good shape as I like a bit of comfort for my feet!

I have a pair of the excelent MW02 (I think that was the code) winter boots and I tend to use those off road during the cold and muddy winter months, unfortunately they are nearing the end of their life now, which I’m gutted about as they are the comfiest shoes I have ever owned

Anyway I got a pair of these MT60’s as they are goretex lined and so will be good for keeping my feet dry on my commute. They are a departure for me as I usually buy the more traditional racey SPD shoes and these look a bit more like a trainer crossed with a hiking boot.

I don’t find them quite as comfortable as a race shoe, but they certainly keep the elements out well and this is the part of my only real niggle with them. The sides of the tongue are gusseted, this helps keep them well sealed, however it means it is essential that you get everything comfy before you do the laces up or it can end up poking you in the top of the foot if you haven’t seated it properly. As long as you don’t pull the laces super tight they are OK, but I guess that could be said for most shoes!

However once you’ve got the hang of that they’re pretty good and don’t look quite as odd to non-cyclists as ‘proper’ SPD shoes. On top of that if you were riding somewhere that might involve a bit of hiking too they are quite a good sturdy boot with a very grippy sole, handy for getting up Snowdon perhaps Marko?

So a good weather proof all rounder and probably a bit more versatile than a race shoe if you want to walk around off the bike too.

Endura rebound jacket

Rebound rear

Features:

• Compact windstop stretch showerproof fabric with Teflon® water repellant treatment
• Low drag anatomic fit
• Extra strong flatlock stitching
• Folds into rear zip pocket
• Reflective visible through 360 degrees

My unfeasibly expensive Trek jacket I got from Evans finally bit the dust, well that and the fact I was fed up with being a Trek / VW advert (I got it for £12 but it was listed on the site for £60!!) and I was looking for another small packable windproof to fill the gap.

My old jacket did the job, but was a basic, no frills jacket. I like the Endura one for several reasons. It folds into it’s own pocket and is really small, you can easily put it into your rear jersey pocket without any fear of it coming out. Seeing as I spend a bit of time commuting to work and back on my bike I wanted something that had some reflective bits too. It has a smatter of reflective detailing and hopefully that will make me a bit more visible though the winter months.

It’s quoted as being shower proof and although it did keep me dry during a post work shower on the way home, it was only about ten minutes and I can’t see it would keep the rain out much longer. But then that’s not really what you are buying a jacket like this for, if you want properly waterproof buy a waterproof!!

So my criteria were keep the wind off me and not boil me in the bag whilst doing it and I’d say that it fits that description perfectly. Top that off with a really good price tag and I reckon it’s great value for money

This is a first impressions review of my new Lynskey manufactured 2009-2010 Ti Cove Hummer. I previously owned a 2008 Litespeed Cove Hummer which I absolutely loved, so this is also a bit of a comparison review too.

The new frame has undergone a few modifications, compared to the 2008 Litespeed frame.

At first glance, the most obvious change is that the frame now sports a shinier, raw Ti finish and a new Cove sticker design, which I prefer. But then I would say that.

The 2009 frame also has a new, solid Ti plate where the seat tube meets the chain stay on the drive side, this effectively eliminates any chainsuck the 2008 model used to suffer. The plate is also stamped with the Cove logo, which is nice touch.

Because of the huge and much appreciated tyre clearance on a Hummer, if the chain rings weren't in good condition and well adjusted, bang on the 50mm chain line, chainsuck was quite common. But this modification puts a stop to that 'mare of having your cranks jam to a stop when swapping down to the granny on a steep muddy climb!

The new frame comes with replaceable mech hangers. Whether these are actually needed on a Titanium frame is debatable, but they're here now and I suppose it's good to know that I just need to replace the hanger if my mech gets smashed off at some point.

There is also a new, small, additional bracing strut between the seat stay and chain stay on the non-drive side by the rear axle. I suppose this is to help dissipate the loads & stress placed on the chainstay from the axle.

All cables are now routed under the top tube rather than on top, which I also prefer. But then I would say that too.

Gone is the Cove 'skull' head badge sticker, replaced by a lovely laser etched version.

But probably the most important addition to the new Cove 2009 frame, which was a serious omission from the 2008 frame, is a bottle opener on the rear brake mount! Oh yeah! It's Miller time!

So on to the ride characteristics: I loved the way my 2008 Hummer rode. Nothing else suited my riding style so perfectly. A possessed, singletrack animal. So quick to change direction at speed, it's as if it was hard-wired into my brain. The frame tracking the narrow line without fuss. Rooty steps and drops, sent and despatched with carefree, smile inducing, abandon. All the while the bike relaying every tiny message from the trail straight through my feet, legs, hands and arms. The Ti frame soaking up the worst of the hits, urging me to go faster and faster. But also letting me know, as if by premonition, that it's getting a bit sketchy, a quick dab on the brakes, release and pow! Instant acceleration into the next berm!

I was hoping the new frame would match these characteristics, but I needn't have worried. It's the same excellent frame it always was, after all the geometry has hardly changed, but the way it is produced has changed big style!

The old Litespeed frame was up-front, honest even, with simple and attractively clean lines, no mech hangers, or welded plates here. The new frame seems to have had the perfectionist touch, with the all the concerns about the old frame addressed using Lynskey's slick production values. The whole frame looks and feels much more professionally produced.

As I've said, I loved the old frame's trail attitude. It was a full on rock concert of a bike, every ride giving you that spine tingling, good all over vibe that left you wanting more when your legs couldn't give more. The new bike is just the same, just not quite so raw in it's attitude. The rear of the bike is slightly more compliant and has a drop more of that unmistakable Ti spring. The new larger Bi-Ovalised downtube adds more stiffness to the frame, making the bike more assured and unshakeable through the high speed twists and turns. So it's the same story, you know what you're getting with a Hummer. But although it's the same music, this time its production values have increased massively, giving a fuller, more rounded sound. Don't get me wrong, the edgy rock roughness is still there, just pushed further out to the edge. I'm definitely riding the trails quicker on this bike before it kicks and complains and I'm sure it's not just all down to 'that new bike feeling', but time will tell.

So sorry Jim, I do think this bike is better. But then I prefer Metallica as they are now, not the early years. But there are plenty of others that say the opposite, same goes for the Hummer.

Dobby

The idea of building a big wheeled freak first came to mind last year while my BlurLT was out of action and I was waiting for the warranty replacement to arrive. However, once the replacement frame arrived and wanting it up and running for a trip to Wales I put the idea on the back burner. Over the winter I kept reading on internet forums about tall riders who found riding a 29er beneficial to them for various reasons and so the idea kept niggling away at me. When the Blur broke again in February I started to feel that maybe full sussers weren’t for me and that I should go back to a hardtail so looked in to what frame options could be had cheaply. It was while looking around the internet for a cheap hardtail frame that I stumbled on the Viper 29er frame on the Chain Reaction Cycles website for £125 and before I knew it the Parcel Force lorry had pulled up outside my office and I was signing for the delivery.

The new frame sat in my shed for a few months as yet again I rebuilt the Blur for a trip to Wales but having ragged it round Afan etc over a long weekend I started to feel that something still wasn’t quite right with it and I wasn’t as confident as I really should have been on it. So, I priced up getting the 29er built which really only involved getting a set of forks and some wheels, tyres etc plus transferring some bits over from my unused Rockhopper. The forks where another bargain courtesy of Chain Reaction. I knew that I wanted a 100mm travel with a bolt through axle to help with wheel tracking up front so it wasn’t going to be cheap but £250 for a set of Manitou Minutes was a lot cheaper than I thought it would be and managing to snap up an almost new set of Halo Freedom wheels for £120 from a guy over in Brighton meant that before I knew it I was out early on a Friday morning for a quick spin on the new bike.

At this point I would like to say that I have never really felt 100% comfortable on either of the bikes I have owned or any that I have had a demo on but this was something different, I no longer felt perched on top of the bike but felt like it was part of me. Where as before I have felt on steep descents that I am going to land on my nose even with 130mm travel forks the 29er seems, even with 100mm forks, that it can handle whatever I point it down. The climbs in the past have always been a slog and I have quite often lost traction meaning a bit of a hike at times where as the longer wheelbase of a 29er allows for more traction on the climbs which also makes the climbs feel a bit easier than on a normal sized bike and I can now clear some climbs that I have failed to in 2 years of trying. A 29er also rolls a lot easier, I quite often sweep past riders at the bottom of descents on their 26ers without pedalling when they have started to turn the cranks or at least keep up with them where as before I would run out of momentum before them. It’s also a lot more stable when just riding along or at slow speed.

Ok that’s the pros so what about the cons. Well the main one that I was worried about was how it would handle in the singletrack and I have to say that for the first few rides it did feel a little odd but once you get used to the fact that it needs a little more space to turn, and I am only really talking about small amounts here, I feel its even quicker given that I feel more confident on it. So what is it like in the air? Well jumping has never really been high on my list of priorities and I would say that if you want to pop off everything the trail throws at you then you might want to think long and hard before investing in a normal 29er, although longer travel options are starting to appear with fork lengths up to 135mm available, but it will quite happily handle the small hits and kickers I’m likely to go off of and allows me to at least kid myself that I will one day be a freeride god ! The main drawback that I have found is the lack of information that there is on 29er specific items such a tyres, wheels, forks and frames because lets be honest they are the only bits that are different on these type of bikes. However, I have recently discovered that MTBR, which is a US website, have a rather useful 29er forum where riders and industry types can share info on the latest advances in everything 29er related including sneak previews of what the manufacturers have got planned for the coming year and most on-line bike shops have a range of 29er specific stuff, just don’t expect to be able to walk in to your local bike shop and get a choice of tyres, your lucky if they have any at all in some cases.

So to sum up I would say that if you are 5’10” or over it would be worth at least trying a 29er, even if you have previously tried one of the older style frames as they have apparently sorted out some of the issues that early 29ers suffered from. They roll well making them ideal for covering long distances, I loved riding mine at Mayhem and can’t wait to spend 12 hours on it this coming weekend at 24/12. They are stable even at low speed, have good traction when climbing and cornering allowing for quicker ups and downs and are not too shabby in the tighter stuff as well.
Try one, you never know you might like it!

BigSi

I like to get my mitts on shiny new bits of kits and for my birthday last october I was lucky enough to get some Lezyne bits and pieces. I’ve lived with it all for a while now and I must say I’m thouroughly impressed with the quality and functionality of it. So what bits did I get?

Lezyne mini pump

I went for this pump because it goes up to 130psi apparently, so good for the cross bike’s tyres as well as the MTB ones. Not only that but the connector unit fits both presta and schraeder valves without all that faffing about swapping bits round. It works really well and although you still have to work to get your tyres inflated it feels like it is high quality and will last forever.

Lezyne tyre levers

Lezyne puncture kit

A bit frivolous these two! But the tyre levers lever the tyres, I’ve not had a chance to try the puncture patches yet so I can’t comment on them.

Lezyne multi tool

This tool is a little gem. It’s so well made and a pleasure to use. I have the stainless steel version, but there are the super pimp carbon ones too if you feel that way inclined.

Lezyne track pump

Lezyne track pump

Lezyne track pump

Finally the track pump. I must say I’m slightly disappointed by the valve head of this pump, you have to unscrew it and swap the bits round if you want to switch from schraeder to presta, however that said it does work really well. A definite step up from the Blackburn one it has replaced.

So if you don’t mind paying a little extra I can say this stuff is well worth checking out, it’s quality, it looks good, but more importantly it all works well too

Hummerlicious