Do you mean 26" wheels and tapered headtubes?
Tapered headtubes were on Trek's Remedy bikes in 2008 (shipping in 2007 for 2008 model year) and were adopted by most players almost immediately.
I'd peg the starting point of 29'er mass curiosity as happening somewhere between the 2012 Kona Honzo and 2013 Specialized Enduro 29'er and 650b (27") mountain bikes didn't really start kicking ass on 26" until the 2014 model year.
That's a healthy amount of time that 26" and tapered headtubes existed. There are some brilliant bikes in there too. For example, I could absolutely rat rod a 2012 Specialized Enduro S-Works into being a full suspension daily driver. Convert the stock CCDB DB Air shock into a coil, install an angleset, run a 27" fork/front wheel combination. Good times!
Nov. 25, 2021, 11:42 p.m. - Andrew Major
Do you mean 26" wheels and tapered headtubes? Tapered headtubes were on Trek's Remedy bikes in 2008 (shipping in 2007 for 2008 model year) and were adopted by most players almost immediately. I'd peg the starting point of 29'er mass curiosity as happening somewhere between the 2012 Kona Honzo and 2013 Specialized Enduro 29'er and 650b (27") mountain bikes didn't really start kicking ass on 26" until the 2014 model year. That's a healthy amount of time that 26" and tapered headtubes existed. There are some brilliant bikes in there too. For example, I could absolutely rat rod a 2012 Specialized Enduro S-Works into being a full suspension daily driver. Convert the stock CCDB DB Air shock into a coil, install an angleset, run a 27" fork/front wheel combination. Good times!