The Setup

As far as first rides go, this one couldn’t have gone much worse. I dug a crankarm into a rock on a relatively benign little section of chunk within the first five minutes. Hard enough to stop me dead, somehow jamming my own elbow into my stomach in the process. Hmmm, I thought, that must be one helluva low bottom bracket to catch there. Probably just a fluke…

I had been really looking forward to this bike. 130mm travel, right in my wheelhouse, but long and low and a little overbuilt and definitely a different look at the class than the previous few bikes. This might be that Goldilocks bike, I mused, that would rekindle the crush I’d had on this brand since about forever. In my mind, the blown out descents across the bridge from town were cowering fearfully in anticipation of the absolute shredding I was about to lay down on their sorry asses. Instead, the trails were owning me. I was digging pedals into rocks I had previously not even noticed, blowing every single corner entry wide by whole feet, pushing the front sloppily every time I tried to lean the bike into a turn, pinning my heart rate as I labored mushily uphill wondering if maybe I had the flu. It started bad, then got worse, then really began to suck.

Attempting to discern whether it was me - that maybe I was just too damn useless as a rider to unlock the obvious, widely praised and acclaimed potential of the bike - led me into a pit of self loathing that far surpassed my usual “bad day” flagellation. But even in the depths of my misery, the bike was giving off seriously hateful vibes. It was a couple pounds heavier than the previous test bike, sure, and it had notably chunkier tires, but still, the thing felt like it was dragging cinder blocks whenever the trail tilted upward. Then, no matter how much I tried to get suitably assertive on the downs, it would respond with some combination of sluggishness and total unpredictability. It was stable in a straight line, but it absolutely sucked everywhere else. Okay, fine, it was plush too. But it was a zombie dead kind of plush that almost made me wish for a hardtail. Two and a half miserable hours later I pedaled lumpily back across the bridge, attempted to ride no hands for a few seconds to unknot my screaming back and veered drunkenly into a curb. Fuck this bike. Fuck the dipshits who designed it. What the fuck were those idiots thinking? Who the fuck would ever want to ride such an abusive pile?

Much as I wish I could muster a tenth the speed that Ben Cruz was running when he pedal clipped his way into one of the gnarliest yard sales ever, 'tis beyond my ken. But still, the whole ride felt like a super slow motion low consequence version of that.

It was a hot day. I was dehydrated. Maybe I really was coming down with something. Or maybe, just maybe, they’d screwed the pooch with this one, and I’d been spoiled by the legitimately good bikes that had rotated through in the previous couple months.

The next morning, legs feeling like bags of cement, I slowly wobbled the hateful bike over to Simon’s to watch the Tour stage. As we watched Tadej put the wood to the best cyclists in the world, I related the horrors of the previous day. Simon glanced out the window at the offending bike. ‘Mate, I LOVED riding that! You sure you didn’t just set the sag wrong?”

Pfffft. I’m a professional. OF COURSE I DIDN’T SET THE DAMN SAG WRONG. The nerve. Did I set the sag wrong? What is this, amateur hour? I spent the entire remaining span of time that it took Tadej to crush the hopes of Jonas Vingegaard and everyone else on the way up the Plateau de Beille explaining to Simon that even if I had somehow maybe got the sag wrong by a millimeter or two, there’s no way a little discrepancy like that would render the bike so completely shitty to ride. Not a chance. And anyway, I set the sag right. No, it has to be the bike. It’s a turd.

That afternoon, back home, chores done for the day, getting the gear sorted for an outing in the proper high country, I began to unscrew my pedals so I could swap them onto a bike that wouldn’t make me feel like a barely reanimated corpse. The tape measure and shock pump were right there on the kitchen counter, where they had been since I ABOSLUTELY CORRECTLY SET THE SAG two days prior. What the hell, I thought, may as well do some due diligence.

50mm shaft travel, 130mm total travel, sag should be right around 15mm WHERE I SET IT THE OTHER DAY for 30%. The incredibly good riders who make this bike say that it rides pretty well everywhere from 25% all the way to 35% if you want to go full plow. Sit on the bike, wiffle up and down a few times, pull the o-ring up the shock shaft, sit in again, lean over and gently unweight, measure.

20mm sag. 40%. Commence eating crow.

This is indefensible. It’s not like this is my first rodeo. 40psi later and the sag was 13mm and suddenly the rebound adjusters made sense again, and I had realized the seat was about an inch too low as well.

I do not consider myself the kind of rider who can discern the nuances of damping tunes with anywhere near the sensitivity that some of my princess/pea peers can feel. But, jeez, I’m supposed to be better than this. Normally, I am pedantic about sag and seat height. I am borderline obsessive about tire pressure. Just to make sure I hadn’t lost the plot completely, I checked the tire pressure again. 24psi. Phew. Then I checked that the handlebar and stem bolts were all tight. Then I went through the pivot bolts. Followed that up by making sure the axles were both tight. And the pedals that I had just started to remove. I mean, If I can screw up the out of the box sag by that much, who knows what else I wasn’t paying attention to. Fortunately, everything else looked and felt as if it had been assembled by a sentient being.

My guess is that in my rush to get out the door on the maiden voyage, I didn’t cycle the shock carefully enough, or enough times, to equalize the pressure between the positive and negative chambers. Rookie mistake. So, somewhere between the first click of shoes into pedals and the end of the little whoop section a block from my house, 25% sag turned into Slouchy McLayback and instead of taking a quick lap then doubling home to check things again, I just kept on mashing ineptly into my own little hell.

Amateur hour, defined.

The next day I pedaled easily and smoothly a couple thousand vertical feet up into the Aspen zone. My legs didn’t feel like cement. Then after a traverse through the dappled shade of the green room, that hateful bike and I shredded and danced (shreddanced?) a long, chunky, loose, fast, sketchy as all getout descent like we had been riding together our whole lives. It was sublime. It was the kind of first ride that a guy might really look forward to. The kind of first ride he might come away thinking that maybe this is one of them Goldilocks bikes. We’ll just strike that other first ride from the record, pretend it never happened. Maybe make a mental note to self to pack a shock pump on those first rides. Just in case.