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😂 If you thought dealing with becoming old was rough…add a little bit of becoming poor!

Or maybe it becomes like the car industry where leasing is one of the main forms of "ownership".

Just going off of 'site sponsors' for Vital and Pinkbike: Ari: Budget I guess? Cannondale: more road for PON Ibis: small, but maybe getting their lunch eaten by other 'small' brands. Intense: probably continues with USA focus. Seems like odd things going on there for the past while but they are still surviving. Kona: I would be concerned, but they were just bought back Mondraker: doesn't seem super big here in Canada Niner: RIP (pun intended) Norco: Oddly medium-sized, but they do own a distribution company in Canada so that may help with the budget Pivot: small enough Polygon: not...

mr Dave Weagle himself responded to a comment I left about the RMU Nighttrain, stating that the rear center does legitimately grow 30mm to 457.5mm at sag. I still don't believe it, especially because he's claiming it's "poppy and playful" but my range grows almost 30mm bottomed out and is not "poppy and playful".

Big if true

I'm saying that it's too early to tell from that result and that the Frameworks brand was built with the frame development in part as a marketing tool because it was covered and promoted explicitly from the very beginning for social media. I'm not criticizing it but it's just a fact that if you want to stand out as a racer today you're either competing for top 5 or 10 or you have to stand out in some other way via social media. And bike brands use racing as promo for their products so racers starting bike brands and promoting...

I can't speak for other countries, but I think distribution was the reason nobody bought GT bikes in the US, not the product. Everyone I knew who had a GT bike for the last six or so years seemed pretty stoked with it, but IIRC the only place you could buy one in most metro areas was through Dicks Sporting Goods, which is a great place to get an exercise ball but not a great place to buy a $5000+ mountain bike.

For context. Reece finished 7.3 seconds behind Hatton's winning time. Both are highly accomplished at Fort William. But Hatton's average World Cup finishing position in 2025 (when he made finals) was 16th. So 7 seconds slower than a racer who's at best a solid top 20 racer is not a great advertisement for Stemgate. Although, Fort William being flat compared to other tracks, I'd assume it's a track where the reverse stem would have more drawbacks than benefits. Very competitive time for Harnden compared to the men. But she had no competition for the win in her category. With Mille...

I’d love to see a shoot out of trail bikes using the same linkage designs. It would really interesting to start to dig a bit deeper as to what sets them apart - quality control, kinematics, maintenance, etc etc.

visual summary

Doping is always a step ahead, only the dumb dopers get caught

Its similar to Neko winning Sea Otter on 32 inch. Neko also used to be a top 10 contender but he knows he's not able to ride at that level anymore. The thing is also those riders know they only can keep their careers/business flourishing if they get attention via social media and tinkering like that will get them attention. But its hard to say from those two results if this is really a big advantage or not. Like for that they would have to have a sudden much better result on a real dh track against the top dogs...

My prediction of super enduro bikes with dual crowns has yet to pay out, but it will. Mark my words.