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I think you're overestimating the salaries of DH riders and support staff by quite a bit. The top 5 or 10 in the world might average $100k salary with a capped bonus structure but after that, the top 10-25 probably make $25k with good bonus structure or $40k with a small bonus structure. Outside the top 25 and juniors is probably $15k salary or less. Mechanics are probably paid at most what you're suggesting, but realistically a little lower. All that said, Neko's budget sounds lean, but very doable when you have smart minds like his and Martin's running things.

Too true. All the YouTuber trail narcs & Strava KOM lorders have to brag to the world for the clicks. Even if a team rig rolls up...without the narcs, you'd still have to find it, test it out and do work to get to and from. DH trails are dead now though. "Trinidad" and all the others are now the domain of the SurRon urban vape douches and their next IG reel featuring ASAP Rocky and their comments to outraged locals of "you seem turnt bruh. chill"

Just FYI - Someone who I will not name reached out to me from Scott suggesting the net margin numbers I was using are not correct. I'm going off a press release, so I'm not correcting anything I wrote until I see a correction elsewhere or similar. That said, I just wanted to be transparent here in the case someone is reading this stuff who actually makes decisions/cares/etc.

It's 95% the rider. Case in point: Jackson won World Cups his first-year Elite on the new V10, while Greg struggled all year to find a good setup. Or for you Moto fans: Chase Sexton battled with the Honda the past two years, while Jett Lawerence moved up to 450s over the summer and went 22-0. I've watched plenty of really talented riders hop on different bikes and go really fast. Shit, Dakotah beat me on a Morpheus multiple times. The sweet sauce is understanding setup, having resources (like the ability to evolve a bike to match one's style), and...

I think this forum (and industry in general) makes too much fuss about the frame design. I think the fork is as or more important than frame, your front wheel has to steer and do the majority of the braking. Id rather race a good fork over a good frame if I had to choose. But to answer the question- it’s 90% rider 10% bike. And any rig out on the circuit can get you 7-8% with proper setup and tuning.

totally agree. when the new uncaged capra came out the other day at $6500 with X0 transmission and ohlins, my initial reaction was "whoa, that's expensive." it's not really expensive, but it's not $4700 like the capra uncaged model being blown out a few weeks ago. def a grab-the-popcorn-and-watch year for the market!

I'm more interested in how the reaction to price increases will go for companies that have had year+ long firesales. It's one thing to discount a product even if it is 40-50% for a bit as that's how most 'sales' work, but how do you justify a price increase when your product has been even just 20% off for over a year?

The bike world’s lust for 3d printing is hilarious to me.

I finally got a DH bike last year. I don't know why I didn't do that years ago! Worth every penny.

This is a great question! UPCOMING ESSAY WARNING: I know I'm an outlier but, for me, getting a new bike is kinda the worst. For example, it takes me about 3-4 months to feel truly dialed on a new mountain bike. I can get any new bike feeling “rideable" pretty quickly, but I’m talking about getting the bike to fit like a glove to the point that riding it feels like second nature. "New bike day" requires tuning the bike's fit and suspension simultaneously, two parameters that affect each other. Not to mention that you’re pretty much guaranteed to need...

No idea how close scott was before taking real damage but having to take a loan of 150 mio francs sounds like quite some trouble: The North Face supplier Youngone lends $177 mn to Scott - KED Global

price of headset cable routing parts must be going up!

hey all, please discuss site issues here so they can be seen - https://www.vitalmtb.com/forums/about-vital-mtb-support/vital-mtb-site-… - no need to fill up tech or team rumors threads. thanks for looking out with it, too!!!

It's when it's unread. In the last several days, it behaves like a dead link. I've not managed to "wait it out" b/c I can click "FORUM" "The Hub" "Team Rumours" really quickly rather than see if it's ever going to load. But I just double checked and it takes roughly 10 seconds after clicking the drop down item for the site to react. And the number of respondents is sky high. I've always wondered why it showed me 70+ people were liking or replying. Screenshot:

Just announce the team at once, not this long drawn out process over a week with one rider at a time.

I am going to spell it out for everyone here that has less experience with Trolls. Someone is purposefully saying silly things to rile you up, just ignore it. Do not reply. Not even a little bit. Just let the stupid comment die in the wind. Then it wont be fun for them anymore and maybe, if we are lucky, we can move on with our lives

Just get some cascade parts on your bike, itll be great.

Someone else commented but it's really crazy how when you click this thread from your reminders/notifications tab, it won't load. But if you got to it via the Forums link, loads instantly.