STAY FROSTY OUT THERE
Hello, a little story for you. I am a 65-year-old mtb rider. I ride a Specialized Enduro Comp 29er which I have owned for
7.5 years. It was one of the first 29ers to be made. On Saturday morning, 18 September, I set off from my home in Chorley as usual, went into Brinscall, then through the woods over to White Coppice, then onto Rivington, and then onto Adlington, and onto Leeds & Liverpool canal at Adlington – about 15 miles in total.
While heading back home on the canal I got about half a mile from home coming up to the top lock at Wheelton and spotted some lads at the top of the slope. Didn’t think anything about it, but as I got up to them one rammed his bike into the side of me, knocking me into the
With the advent of this technology, do you think this will become less of a consideration? Can we now, as riders, have our cake and eat it? I wonder if this now means there will be bikes on the market that are true one bike quivers, excelling in all-day pedalling while still maintaining suspension performance to allow downhill and enduro-style riding (and modern geometry helps a lot with this already).
Are there any current bikes on the market you feel would benefit greatly from the addition of Flight Attendant? Those bikes that when tested were excellent when pointed downhill but maybe too laborious to pedal for long periods of time? It would appear to me they may well suddenly excel as allrounders and maybe score much more highly if fitted with this technology.
I’ve been mountain biking for over 20 years now and have seen a rapid rate of development in bike technology and capability. It never ceases to amaze me how much better bikes keep getting. Hopefully this is just another step along the road to more fun and enjoyment for us all!
Keep up the excellent articles!
Ed – All good points, Alex. To answer your first query, I don’t think Flight Attendant will dramatically change the compromise designers face when developing a bike, since the technology is pretty expensive right now and likely to remain so for a good few years yet. So every frame design must be able to work with more basic suspension at much cheaper price points. In terms of which bikes will most benefit from Flight Attendant’s ‘have your cake and eat it’ ability, enduro bikes are the obvious answer, particularly those being raced, as you can potentially save energy (or time) on every little pedal section on every single stage, let alone a liaison climb. The same could be said for DH racing, where bikes have to be set up to feel stiff and supportive through jump sections and sprints, but supple and grippy in rough parts of the track. Something like Flight Attendant (or Fox’s Live Valve) could allow racers to switch between two set-ups mid-run.
ALL AT SEA
I have been religiously visiting the Chain Reaction and Wiggle websites almost daily for the last eight months. Not once have I come across any availability for a large Escarpe CRX or CRS in either 29in or 27.5in. I have asked for stock availability notifications on the Chain Reaction site, yet nothing. I now do it every day just to see if someone, somewhere is actually monitoring it, or if I can make the website tell me to go away and stop wasting their time.
I appreciate there has been a global pandemic, that everyone wants to own a £3k mountain bike and that the factories are doing their best to fulfill demand.
I’m also aware that even if they did have the parts to finish a bike there are no sea containers available to ship it here.
What I don’t appreciate is zero communication from the manufacturer as to the likely wait for their product or news as to if they are in fact manufacturing it any more. I gave up on a YT Jeffsy last year for a similar reason.
They were publicising their new ‘brand centre’ in the Surrey Hills in the press which fired me up enough to write to mbr bemoaning the fact they were able to launch a fancy new centre, but weren’t able to manage a supply chain. mbr published my letter and a long rambling response from YT.
All I want as a consumer is either a firm, “no, the bike is no longer available”, or a date, however far that is in the future, as to when it might be. YT now does this – currently they are quoting February 2022.
So what should I do, am I likely to get the Jeffsy first or a Vitus? I have had a Trek Remedy 8 on order since June, my local bike shop had been pre-ordering them on a monthly basis and I was promised a late August delivery, then late September and now a 20 December delivery date – should I gamble on them actually keeping a promise?
However, I see they have now launched a 2022 Remedy! They can’t seem to make their 2021 model, yet they are launching an updated model that presumably they can’t deliver either. I wish I could get away with something similar in my own job.
Ed – the truth is, Alex, and this probably won’t help your predicament, is that nobody really knows which bikes will turn up or when. There will be rough schedules, but these are as fluid as the water that most of these bikes