Friday 4 November 2011

Converted?

5 years ago i'd of told you it was just a fad and it would pass but  it looks like 29ers are here to stay, with big companies spending more time designing them and pushing them more and more i decided it was time for me to give one a go. I sold the trek top fuel and bought myself a trek garyfisher superfly al to use as my winter bike, a hardtail with 100mm of fork travel, 30 speed and of course 29 inch wheels.
So here i am now with a few 100 miles on the clock and all i can say is i love it. I was expecting it to be sluggish,slow at cornering and have more toe overlap(some of the bad comments you here about 29er's) but gary fisher seems to have got these bikes right, i have no problems with accelerating and its fine on tight twisty singletrack. The bike seems to glide up the cobbled road of rooley moor  with ounces of comfort compared to a standard 26" hardtail. I did notice i was using a slightly lower gear than usual but this had no effect on speed due to the wheels. The bike has slightly longer chainstays and it is a tiny bit harder to pull the bike into manual or a bunny hop but i got use to it straight away and now cant tell the difference. I can see i'm going to enjoy this bike more and more as time goes by for long distance xc rides as well as my usual after work jaunts.
I can see 29er hardtails taking over 26" hardtail  bikes in the higher price brackets over the next few years, so with that said does anyone want to buy a lapierre pro race 700 frame, fork and industry 9 wheels?









todays off road ride on it

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