The human factor is the most important parameter in designing and specing bikes. There’s a whole lot of Coke Pepsi , Ford Chevy, SRAM Shimano to consider. People have their favourites and they aren’t wrong. Having ridden mountain bikes since 1983 I can say todays bikes and components are light years better then they were in the 80s.
If you want a cross country race bike or a long travel enduro bike or something in between, you have plenty of choices. What I think Mike was getting at was people getting a trail bike with say a 130 fork and 120 frame trying to make that bike into something they could take into the bike park. Taking a bike too far from its designed purpose. Ride (or review) a bike in its intended environment. This xc race bike really sucks at the Whistler bike park. No guff eh! I may vomit if I read another reviewer stating that such and such an enduro bike with a 180 fork 170 travel rear DH tires with inserts climbs well. Finish the sentence bub: "for what it is". People I think expect a bike to be all things. That’s not realistic. Bikes in a given category sit in a small envelope of what they are good at. Sure you can make changes that will better suit conditions and the rider, but you don’t want to go too far. Going too far generally means you bought the wrong bike.
You’ll see riders sometimes with what look like wacky set ups and you’ll hear "it works for them". I always think maybe something else would work better for them.
There are certainly good bike designers out there as well as designers that simply follow trends without really understanding what they are doing. Long reach is good. Longer reach is more better. I think to some extent designers and consumers look at one or two parameters but not the whole. How does one change affect other things?
People like to be safe in their choices too. If design is too different from other things it’s a hard sell. Imagine when suspension forks were first out at 40 or 50mm travel if that travel was actually 120mm. Some riders would be all over it but most would say no. It’s too much. That was a constant argument back in the day. 80mm? For xc? That’s a DH fork. Even disc brakes were resisted by some.
March 25, 2024, 9:30 a.m. - Andy Eunson
The human factor is the most important parameter in designing and specing bikes. There’s a whole lot of Coke Pepsi , Ford Chevy, SRAM Shimano to consider. People have their favourites and they aren’t wrong. Having ridden mountain bikes since 1983 I can say todays bikes and components are light years better then they were in the 80s. If you want a cross country race bike or a long travel enduro bike or something in between, you have plenty of choices. What I think Mike was getting at was people getting a trail bike with say a 130 fork and 120 frame trying to make that bike into something they could take into the bike park. Taking a bike too far from its designed purpose. Ride (or review) a bike in its intended environment. This xc race bike really sucks at the Whistler bike park. No guff eh! I may vomit if I read another reviewer stating that such and such an enduro bike with a 180 fork 170 travel rear DH tires with inserts climbs well. Finish the sentence bub: "for what it is". People I think expect a bike to be all things. That’s not realistic. Bikes in a given category sit in a small envelope of what they are good at. Sure you can make changes that will better suit conditions and the rider, but you don’t want to go too far. Going too far generally means you bought the wrong bike. You’ll see riders sometimes with what look like wacky set ups and you’ll hear "it works for them". I always think maybe something else would work better for them. There are certainly good bike designers out there as well as designers that simply follow trends without really understanding what they are doing. Long reach is good. Longer reach is more better. I think to some extent designers and consumers look at one or two parameters but not the whole. How does one change affect other things? People like to be safe in their choices too. If design is too different from other things it’s a hard sell. Imagine when suspension forks were first out at 40 or 50mm travel if that travel was actually 120mm. Some riders would be all over it but most would say no. It’s too much. That was a constant argument back in the day. 80mm? For xc? That’s a DH fork. Even disc brakes were resisted by some.