Wednesday, December 29, 2010

forget your age - act your wheel size

Specialized Bikes hosted a Test Ride day recently down at the You Yangs. On offer for demo were examples from the current MTB and Road range, but the road range was a little over-shadowed by the mountain bikes and the trails of the You Yangs. Epics and Stumpjumpers were generating the most interest, with the new 29er range of each getting the real focus.

The venue provides some of the best all-round types of mountain bike terrain with flowing single track, rocky climbs, longer access road climbs, and plenty of downhill of varying technical challenge. It is very easy to cover all of these elements by tailoring yourself a 5 or 6 km loop which is exactly what kept the masses amused. With the day's weather at a perfect mid-20's quite a few folk were inspired to get amongst the outdoors, making it like a theme park of kids trying to get onto the next ride, slide or jumping castle. People were doing their best to try as many different bikes on offer, riding until their legs had nothing left. The biggest objective seemed to be to get some first hand experience on a 29er, the wheel size that has been appearing more and more often on bikes over the past few years.

I joined a couple of different groups of riders and rode several loops in various directions on my bike, but it wasn't until later in the afternoon that i got the opportunity to get on board one of the test bikes. I was starting to feel a little fatigued from the fun on-tap but was re-energised by jumping on the new 29er Epic. First thing that was hard not to notice was the amount of front wheel extending forward. That gave a very different perspective in terms of what the rider sees. As many would quickly point out, I'm no towering giant, in fact I might almost reach 168cm (5'7"ish) if I wore the right shoes, so I'd guess the bigger wheels portrayed a pretty amusing scene of this kid out on a big kid's dad's bike! Be that as it may, I was interested in testing the equipment.

Acceleration was the first thing I noticed. The dart off the line wasn't as rapid as a 26" wheel but very soon it was more obvious that the system held speed longer so seemed to take less crank revs to get back up to pace after free wheeling. A longer, steep climb lay before us as the first stage, so here I got to find out if there were any noticeable gaps in the 2x10 gearing combination. The same climb on my 26" (3x9 with 11-32 cassette) would see me either using the 32 front and 32 rear combination and using every last bit of power so as not to run out of go or to use the granny and be a little more free to use the rear cassette. The 2x10 had plenty left on offer by the time I crested the climb.

Next came a fast, bermed, and in places, quite rocky descent. This was easily consumed in a very sure-footed manner. Any step-ups were hardly noticed and a few left-right flip-flop corners were no more difficult to manoeuvre than the 26" wheel. From here it was easy to maintain a steady pace across some flatter single trails that lead to a climb that would originally have been intended as a descent. Now came the chance to try the whole package; the bigger wheels to climb through rocky, technical terrain, the 2x10 to tackle some very steep step-ups into corners and switchbacks. Having previously that day taken on the same climb on my 26" I knew there were some points that would demand taking the right line and to keep forward motion without breaking traction. Not only that, I was starting to feel a bit stuffed. The first couple of obstacles seemed marginally easier than the 26", popping out the other side and maintaining focus on what other tests lay ahead. There were a couple of loose gravel approaches to some rock corners that were easily cleaned using the right gearing and just pointing the bike in the right direction. The 29" wheels rolled on over the top as the climb increased and by keeping constant pressure through the drive train there was no loss of traction. Yet to come was the most testing section of the climb that had a few larger clusters of rocks. A good line was a must on the 26" as the speed was extremely low making it easy to stall the front wheel then lose traction with the rear - putting the end to any momentum needed during a technical climb... The 29" option once again just smoothed all this out. The line needed wasn't nearly as important and the diameter of the wheel was able to ramp over the higher steps without stalling or spinning. I still hadn't found any disappointing gaps in the 2x10 gear combination.

With the technical climbing box ticked it was onward across the ridge access road before another fast, flowing descent. This was a blast. An unevenly cobbled section became much less treacherous than on the 26", a couple of drop-offs were easily cleared and speed held through berms was amazing, taking me to the bottom of the run in what seemed like a fraction of any previous times.

It would seem with a 29" wheel you can point and shoot, and it will deliver! and the You Yangs are a great facility to test any mountain bike's capabilities and rider's skills.



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