Is a rigid bike more ‘real’ than a suspension bike? That’s a lot of old tosh, reckons Benji. Up to date is where it’s at.
Last Friday I took my Klein Attitude to the tip. I lobbed it into the ‘scrap metal’ bay. I had loved that bike like no other before, or even since. It was easily the prettiest bike that I have ever owned. Even though it was ‘only’ a Trek-era Klein the construction was beautiful. The green-navy flip-flop metallic paint job was outrageously lovely. It wasn’t lovely anymore. It was dented, gouged and covered in an odd white fungus that had collected over the past few years of neglect.
The final decision to get rid of the Klein was swift. And the moment of flinging into the tip was painless. In fact, the moment was quite joyful. I imagine it felt like a monk burning all his worldly possessions before entering monastic life. I felt cleansed.
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The infuriating arbitrariness of what the snobbish, mocking, hardtail zealot ‘purist’ brigade deem as unacceptable or ‘skill compensatory’ needs to be called out and shot down. There are too many people falling for it. It’s too easy to sneer through fear.
Hardtails are great. They’re mountain bikes so they’re self evidently great. But they aren’t ‘more real’ than full suspension bikes. I for one am glad to see the back of them in my life. Just as I was glad to see the back of amber wall tyres, cantilever brakes, rigid forks, eight-speed drivetrains and Flexstems. Good is good but better is better.
good one, but I would like a hardtail…..
Sounds like a rant of a man who’s just been left for dead by a singlespeeder whilst trying to rationalize the spend on his latest full suss floating carpet :p
garny rings are amazing, full sus is garte nothing like slowly grinding past some guy pushing a rigid single speed up a tecy clime 🙂
I’m not amazed that people ride hard tails
I am surprised that on the forum people still say very odd things about hard tails. Suggesting that a preference for a a squiggey back end is the result of a lack of skills or gnarr
I’ve probably still ridden more miles off road on a rigid bike than any other type. Because I was fitter back then and had more time to go biking.
Some times ridding a rigid bike is miserable. Say downhill over rocks, some times I have had to stop just because of how much it hurt. Some times on a flat but rough bit of wide trail o get fed up with being jiggles around. There are no skills to stop it being uncomfortable
I don’t know if me riding “needs” a FS . But riding an FS is comfy so why not, I enjoy it
Progress is great. Who’d ditch disk brakes! Rapid fire shifters are better than juggling thumb shifters and even on a hard tail, suspension makes life comfier, faster, safer. An expensive cutting edge fork is better than a cheep, simple unit. After riding wide bars, short stem, slack angle….who’d go back. And why did it take so long for bigger wheels to become popular. But after ten years on a full sus I’m back on a hard tail and loving it. And after years of using SPD’s I’m on flats. Occasionally I miss a full sus and occasionally wish I had spd’s on, but not very often. I enjoy riding the trails on my HT and that’s what matters, and my mates enjoy riding the trails on their full sussers and that’s what matters.
I think full-suss is diversity not progress.
Sometimes it’s just great to ride a light, simple, rigid bike.
I still go faster down hills on my suss bike than my rigid hardtail… But then I bemoan the hardtail while replacing bushes/bearings/pivots.
Maybe I should get another Five as an ‘only’ bike?
Variety etcetera..
Fully rigid, fully suspended. Contrast= fun. Like being able to ski and snowboard.