[Closed] When MTB was gravel

I love the bit with the ladder and the climbing angles!

And all the hopping around trying to make those forest trails look exciting.

Ich liebe mein Fahrrad 😁

I got my first MTB 3 years after that. We sought out every bit of singletrack, and we used to winch ourselves up to the top of the hills so we could bomb down it as fast as possible. The twistier the better. And the steep bits too. Definitely wasn't gravel riding, it was exactly what people do now but we were on shit bikes.

That ^^^ was not typial, they are the same bimblers you get on leisure family rides now, but in (much) worse clothes.

Ah, maybe the best advantage of really narrow bars was that you could jump over the bars easily as often was needed.

Edit. Guys in last minutes of video riding had properly wide bars though.

I got m first MTB 2 years before that and it was nothing like I did. I had just come from 8 years of riding BMX a lot so I was pretty good on a bike if I do say so myself. I was 17 so thought I should get a grown up bike that I may hurt myself less on. Found it a bit boring after BMX but at least I could go out for longer rides.

Surely they could have found some singletrack

In Germany, MTB has always been gravel

I first ride a mountain bike in that year.
My first ride was Penrith to Glenridding, via Ullswater path.
Second ride was up High Street.
Third was up and around Whinlatter on new fangled mini-paths, aka singletrack.

I didn't wear flouro, but did wear Ron Hill's and a purple fleece...

I love those jackets.deffo a lack of cornering skill lol

In Germany, MTB has always been gravel

Not entirely true.  Only for the non-locals that don't know where the singletrack is hidden. 😉

In England, MTB XC racing was grass track Cyclocross but without the obstacles 😉

Crikey @ that fashion though.

Pretty sure I didn't wear stuff like that.

It needs overdubbing a la Eurotrash!

There's even log stacks. Was that Phil Liggett commentating at Crsytal Palace?

The real difference is that back then, you had a road bike or a mountain bike (plus tourers etc). In a way it's nice to have a choice of bikes for the ride you're doing, but it doesn't really help when you do a variety of riding, and can be tempted to have hundreds of bikes. (I have 7 and don't even have a gravel bike currently - working on getting rid of one and converting another to gravel though.)

Isn't that a Bogtrotters group ride?

Those early MTB's had the same geometry and stand over hight as a road bike. Thats what made them so sketchy, but not too bad on gravel type stuff.

I got my first MTB the year before that - my Dad had been going to California for work and came back all excited about these new off-road bikes. We got one each and had a very nice time riding around the muddy fields of Northamptonshire. They’d still be good at that sort of riding now but they’d be rubbish at normal modern MTBing.

Those early MTB’s had the same geometry and stand over hight as a road bike. Thats what made them so sketchy, but not too bad on gravel type stuff.

True that. My first (1990) ATB/MTB was a 21.5” seat tube. I remember mincing down parts of Leckhampton Hill with my arse on the rear wheel and my chest on the saddle with no exaggeration. Since 1993ish I have ridden mostly 17.5”. Going from 21” Dawes to 18” Rockhopper was revelatory. If only I’d known then to have wider-bars than

Which was stupid, because as a teenager in the 1980s I was successfully (mostly 🤣) riding a 26er small-framed road bike through big mud, gaps and jumps using bars like these:

Fashion is a fool, but even a stopped clock...

but did wear Ron Hill’s and a purple fleece…

The clothing of the gods in my eyes back then.

What about the first helmets either a pound of steak sausages strapped to your head , a tortoise shell on you heid or the brave ones bare no protection taking a chance

“Was it just fashion or did early MTBs copy the drop-bar widths? Daft idea whatever…”

It wasn’t early MTBs that had narrow bars, it was the second generation. The early bikes had wide riser bars, short stems and pretty long wheelbases. My first MTB was a 1988 Peugeot - I found some old pics of it (I was just about to turn 10 when I got it) and the bars were huge, especially for a child’s armspan. And I can picture the stem clearly, it was a short tall forged lump of alloy.

I don’t know the geometry but it doesn’t look all that short or steep in photos. Looking at other bikes of that era, my kids MTB was clearly already out of fashion.

My second MTB, my first adult size one, was a huge 21” frame (which I never grew into!) and had a very narrow flat bars, a long stem and was much harder to ride downhill.

I think the change happened because MTBs started out as DH bikes (Repack era) and then XC racing became big in the late ‘80s so it was all about uphill efficiency on non-technical terrain, like a road bike, and the consumer bikes followed.

It wasn’t early MTBs that had narrow bars, it was the second generation.

Thanks for the correction. Agreed. I think I for some (wrong) reason mentally refer to pre-1990 UK MTBs as ‘ATBs’

I think the change happened because MTBs started out as DH bikes (Repack era) and then XC racing became big in the late ‘80s so it was all about uphill efficiency on non-technical terrain, like a road bike, and the consumer bikes followed.

I do remember when ‘efficiency’ with regards to MTB specs became more about shedding lbs, which could have been the initial drive behind bar-chopping. Then of course it for a time became fashionable. Ironic really, as isn’t more leverage (to a point) up steep hills betterer, technical terrain or not? Although bar-ends (or hood-position on wider drop-bars) makes the biggest positive difference IME, as that (handshake-grip) position recruits more muscle-groups and assists control.

^ agreed. My Raleigh Maverick was very slack angled with wide bars and a stubby stem. My father kept telling me to cut the bars down as they were huge. Mine was a 1985 model bought reduced (trading my bmx in) in 1986.

My father waited till 1988 and got his first MTB with bull moose bars and immediately took a hacksaw to them 😬

It was 89/90 when bikes got steeper geometry iirc

The reason they’re hopping and swerving about trying to make a fire road look exciting is because they’re being filmed from the boot of a car - limits the options a little in terms of terrain.  🙂

Those races remind me of the early leisure Lakes ones. They were mainly flat fields with a few sandy bits and some very untechnical technical sections.

In England, MTB XC racing was grass track Cyclocross but without the obstacles

I did a few races in Shropshire in my first year or two of MTBing, so early 90s. They were forest singletrack and fire road, and damn hard work. No muddy fields.

I did a few races mid to late nineties in Yorkshire, there were bits that were maybe not as techy as you'd see in a modern XC race but certainly not riding round a field.
I guess it depends what venues were available.
On another note, I remember the more expensive bikes having "better" geometry which consisted of a bit more stretched out (probably a good idea) with a steeper head angle (perhaps not).

Don’t have knowledge of the definitive ‘first MTB’, but have used John Finley Scott’s 1953 creation as a starting point and just for fun have compared/overlaid it with a late 80’s Raleigh Maverick. Not a vast geometry difference in 35 years?

#lockdownprojects

Thanks, that was bloody brilliant 🙂