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I think high stack and long rear center is kinda a no brainer for DH but... I thought this post was specifically going to be about 0mm or reversed stems, which is the more confusing narrative that definitely leads to different handling characteristics but... Still can't say if its simply better or not. Living near Bronson, I got to demo the RR stem for free, but on a normal bike. It did what I expected, but I am the most average rider ever. Lots of leverage, quite good handling, but made my normal bike feel 'too small' and ended up...

B Practice podcast from South Korea went up yesterday, YouTube vid is almost done uploading. Dak's travel home + driving to Mountain Creek delayed recording but we still love him. Sounds like he's playing a bit of catch up to find some comfort before the next major block of World Cups. https://www.vitalmtb.com/features/every-run-race-run-vitals-b-practice-…

“Why do these new grips feel like crap?” weeks pass “Why does my right grip have a big L on the end? … Oohhhhh” I also found myself the other day mistaking the ft-lb scale on my new torque wrench for the Nm scale so now I’m wondering what bolts on my bike are fighting for their lives rn.

Strength and stretching are both really important for bike handling and long-term durability as a rider. Duh. But sometimes trying to just be more tough isn't the best answer. I think a great test for whether it's a strength problem or an ergonomic problem has been "does it hurt all over, or does it hurt in one very specific place?" If it hurts all over, it probably means I'm too weak, and the pain I'm feeling is just part of the process of getting tougher, i.e. callouses, grip strength, sinew and soft tissue getting more resilient, etc. Lord knows I...

Nice to know I'm not the only one who visits both pages... I still think we need the PB guys on the Bikes Unaffiliated pod..

*tinfoil hat on* Big MTB paid an outrageous sum to Neko to show off 32” since they know everyone loves what he’s doing and simply can’t hate on him.

Cartert Bilawchuck is a 16-year old who made his own bike, it ended up looking incredibly polished - and rad ( it was a lock for Vital BOD of course too)! This deep dive edit is full of insights into the trials and tribulations behind pulling off such a project, I figure it should be of interest to the followers of this thread:

Remember folks we don't have to stand for this. We can report this inappropriate content. 😆

Eeww! I got a pretty good one for you. So I'm converting my old homemade 26" DH bike to 27.5" to give to a friend's son. (If the son ever gets it away from his father...) It's a second gen Santa Cruz Bullit swing arm on a steel front end. It's got modern geometry from before it's time. The drawing says "Atherton style." because they were the only ones doing long, low and slack at the time. I'm just making new bolt on dropouts to fit the bigger wheels and we'll put a 27.5" fork on it. So today I...

At least he got that loctite sponsorship.

neko doing laps at mtn creek with a 32" front wheel and cialis-sized FOX 40. pic by luca cometti the sniper.

How do we like this?

Had a real dumb one today. Had some noise somewhere on the front of the bike. Kept stopping trying to find it but couldn’t feel anything wrong and couldn’t get the sound to go off the bike. Turns out the cap for the air valve on the fork was a half turn loose. Boy did I feel stupid once I figured it out. And of course proceeded to destroy my derailleur next run so I actually had a problem then.

Race Cascadia thinking outside the box for race coverage.

@bizutch / re: littermag and "photo grom..." - i was almost 30 years old at the time HAHA.

If they're going to have a remote studio in the UK (which sucks) that at least means they could get Brits to commentate for way cheaper than having to fly them out to a race. Rob Warner, Rachel Atherton, Gee Atherton, Brendan Fairclough, Ratboy are all right there. They all either have way more commentating skill, have raced more recently than 1200 BC, or both. Ric wasn't that bad, but was definitely not "good", and whoever the new guy is was atrocious. He just repeated what Ric said, and said "when I was racing when the wheel was first invented"...