So you are ready to buy your first, second or upgrade mountain bike. You have read all of the industry rags, listened to all of your friends and maybe even read this site in your journey to find your next perfect mountain bike to carry you through singletrack bliss. Once you find your perfect ride, you find a local dealer that carries it…walk in the front door and say “I want that one!”
I just moved into a new work area (she got a new house), so it is time to setup my man hole where all of the bike related activities take place. With multiple bikes making their way in and out of this area for review purposes…and my personal rides…there is a great need for something efficient and useable in the bike racking system arena.
On the University of Mississippi campus (technically), this miles long trail has almost everything for the trail rider, from race-pace riders to weekend warriors, even to first-timers out on their brand new hybrids. Loops can be put together that will take half a day and rarely cover the same ground twice. Expert trail building (trained by IMBA) yields excellent use of topography and fun use of sustainable features.
The 2009 Intense Uzzi now carries the sames design ques as the new 2009 Intense Tracer with curved lines and adjustable suspension travel settings, but that is not all that is new with this redesigned bike out of Intense Cycles.
There are many mountain biking styles out there. While some like to sit and spin, others like to stand and hammer. I have done a lot of looking at how I ride a bike lately in my quest to become a better mountain biker. Through searching through my own mountain biking technique…I have come to several conclusions.
Before we get back to our regularly scheduled programming and start looking forward into 2009, lets take a second to look at some of the changes that took place in 2008. Over the course of the year, a lot changed in the mountain biking industry that was good and bad. Here are my winners and losers of 2008.
But it was late November, hunters still a week away didn’t pose any real danger now. Tom started slowly to reel in track on his wheel. The area looked different than he was used to. Autumn grabbed whole area into it’s hands, turning green into brown and hiding trails from the eye under deep layer of fallen leaves.
A year end summary of Mountain Biking by 198. It has been a huge first year for MTB by 198 and here are some of the highlights.
A really good set of glasses is a must while riding a mountain bike. Dirt and debris are constantly trying to make their way to those precious white balls that allow us to ride the trails we love. In my case, they also provide protection for my contacts that make seeing the trail possible.
And that’s how it was for many years. Pack up the bike come November, get out the skis, and grin and bear it until the spring thaw. Until recently. I’ve found a way to keep the ‘endless summer’ going, like the surfer-dudes in the 1966 silver screen classic of the same name. I now travel the world every winter, mountain bike in tow, in search of the perfect ride, the two-wheeled equivalent of the perfect wave.