All

Dont overthink it, run it till it blows

Cannondale was also moved from the Bethel train station to Wilton, literally up the street from the aerospace company that used to manufacture all the Cannondale tubes. You think the California coast is expensive? Try the CT coast! The Dutch would be doing Cannondale employees a favor by firing them all, it’s not exactly possible to make a living in the bike industry living in the same county as most of the hedge fund magnates. Pon has built a proper assembly factory outside the port of Savannah, GA(the 2nd most trafficked intermodal shipping port these days)… One would assume that...

Possibly.... but GT (owned by PON as well) just moved their headquarters TO California (from shared facilities with Cannondale in Connecticut).

i don't think it's getting into the weeds at all! it's a reality w/ downhill. different rider sizes, different track sections/conditions. the diversity is what keeps it exciting. the fact a jackson and a greg can be competitive on the same tracks is pretty awesome. i always fall back to a story told by friends racing sea otter DH. if anyone is familiar w/ the track, there's the upper section of track that ends up dropping into a steep (for the track) fast, straight line that levels out and goes uphill for a bit. in practice, a lighter rider entered...

Bike of the year is the bike already in your garage for most of us.

As much as I like Bruni, as a racer…that’s all he is; a DH MTB racer! I’m not trying to offend anyone here, but many pro athletes have no education, or real life experience outside of racing. For most people, professional racing is a short opportunity/window…it doesn’t pan out for most financially. I was around AMA Supercross and nationals in the 90’s; my brother was a pro, and had a few factory rides…it didn’t work out for him. He and his buddies sure were fun to hang with, but they didn’t know shit about anything but getting chicks!

if prototype bikes have to have a cloth diaper to conceal them on race day, i think we have a ways to go before F1 status. kidding...i love this discussion and the responses so far. i'm not too worried about downhill. the mainstream moon is always promised by some pitch-maker, it's never delivered, and yet the DH bikes keep smashing, and the privateers keep camping.

High level DH racing as a sport is more akin to world cup alpine downhill ski racing than all these other sports it's compared to (F1, moto-whatever) in my opinion, and can maybe get to that eventual level. It's not all that relatable to the public at a high level, requires a high level of technology, money and training, but you can still go by a lift pass and participate as a punter at the local hill. Does a successful end result mean DH gets the occasional in-season Saturday mid-day timeslot on your favorite mass sports market TV provider, like...

DH will never achieve mainstream viewership. It's more boring than baseball if you're not a dedicated fan. Anyone who tells you DH is about to "break through" is selling you a bridge. The Rampage broadcast could achieve mainstream viewership in theory, but the way they broadcast it live is SOOOOOO long and boring, and it's a just once-a-year event which makes it hard for people to attach to. As it sits, watching a live Rampage broadcast is a mix of boredom, white hot panic, and frustration.

I've been thinking a lot on this as well, especially after listening to Bruni's interview with Jackie. I agree that the lack of head2head racing is one of the major distinguishers from F1. This affects the sport in a variety of ways. It's also one of the things that athletes and fans list as a reason for loving the sport: you're not competing against each other, you're competing against yourself and the track. So the vibes and community are positive (countless MTB racers talk about the toxicity of the BMX scene in their interviews as a reason for falling in...

Dislike: Unsanctioned trails being tracked. Yeah, you can remove aggregated, etc, but just turn it off and get in that habit, and call out others that track it. Once someone posts it, it will blow it up and people continue to track it. I went to a Forest Service meeting this year and they had the heatmap printed out explaining what unsanctioned trails they were planning to remove. This also goes for Trailforks which has a heatmap that may be linked to other GPS systems besides strava. Most bikers don't realize how much time goes into building a trail (~200hrs...

For those who missed the link, on iOS: Settings (the little cog top right) > Privacy Controls > Aggregated Data Usage > turn the toggle off If you're riding unsanctioned trails you should also turn off flybys: Settings > Privacy Controls > Flybys > No one. Also consider setting your activity default visibility to "Only you". It's easy enough to make it visible when you save/upload the ride.

This is a great opportunity to mention the Strava global heatmap and its effect on illegal trails. If you're using Strava, even if you set your ride to "Private" so only you can see your map, your ride will contribute to Strava's global heatmap unless you go to your privacy settings and turn off "Aggregated Data Usage." Here's a link that shows how to do this. And if you think this isn't an issue, click this link and use the global heatmap to navigate to an illegal trail you enjoy. I bet you 10 to 1 that the trail is...

Super cool article, long live the privateers and Andrew good luck for the rest of the season!!!! Love the cost per lap analysis.

FSX doesn't even pull up in an internet search. How does one buy these tires? Are Hawley/BTI selling through dealers?