I start on xc hardtails when I start mountain biking. After about a year I have bent the one frame and cracked another. This made me realize I need to go full suspension and my first attempt at versatile bike.
I got a Trek Fuel Ex8. Going from a hardtail to full suspension made a big difference. It boost the confidence so much. For two and a half years I rode this and it served me well until some idiot decide he wanted it more and stole it. Being 120mm travel bike I had some awesome fun on it but on bigger stuff I was always was afraid I could hurt it if pushed to far. I chickened out on some stuff the bike could possibly handle but if I got it wrong badly I could damage something. Another other side of the requirements, it did well too but was a little heavy at 13.5kg for a long distance bike. That said I did a W2W and Sani2C on it and came out alive.
When the FuelEx got stolen I really want its big brother, the Trek Remedy Carbon but with the bad distributor trek had in past meant there was very very few in the country. After dealing with the new distributor for Trek, The Bicycle Company which was very help full, I found that it fell in bad time. It was in the cross over time between 2012 and 2013 stocks for new bikes.
After a while I spotted a good Ibis Mojo SL (140mm) deal( post while back on blog). Its a great bike. Out of the gate I was doing bigger jumps I did before. On reviews of the FuelEx, people said the bikes suspension felt bottomless and bigger than it is and never understood as it was my first bike. With the Ibis I started to understand. Ibis is very capable but when you take a hard hit you can feel the bottom of the travel. The build of the Ibis is very solid, heavy(12.9kg) but solid with mavic 729 DH rims en rockshox pike fork it can take a good beating.
I always keep an eye out on the classifieds and on last day of 2012 I spotted a Trek Remedy 9.9 for sale. My head said no and my heart screamed YES. On 1 Jan 2013 I went to have a look and took it home with me. The Remedy is a light and tip the scale at 11.9kg for a 150mm all mountain bike. The rims are ztr 355 which is bit light duty for an AM bike but till now the have lasted. I will ride them till something go wrong. The fox Talas on the front is also not to great.
The remedy feels so solid through the ruff stuff, and pedals well too. Taking flat landings I can again feel what some reviews say about treks suspension design. It feels bottomless. It feels like the bike go sits down in soft butter, its just so smooth.
In February I did a downhill race on the Remedy. It handle well. Yes I skip some of the jumps and stuff as I did not want to hurt myself but the bike can do it. The light weight meant that I could accelerate much quicker and in the end I have beaten a few DH bikes and came 26/34 in open men class. If I took some of the jumps I would have gain another few spots.
Past weekend was my first time that I attempted the anual big road event, The Argus Cycle Tour. I have always push away from it as I dont like massive amounts of people stuff in small area, but people say the atmosfeer of it is great. I decide to give it a go. Did BurgerCycleTour in december on the Ibis to get seeding for the argus. That gave me a nice 7h00 start on the argus in group S.
Race day. I decide to do it with my Remedy with 2.2 Geax saguaro knobbly's and a crank with big blade. Soon after my start we encounter the first stupid roadie for the day. Being in the middel of the road decide he must go the side and just went for it, no matter the few hundred people around him. People screaming, cursing at him quickly paused him in his track but now the bunch already pulled a gap. From there on it was chaos till top of edinburgh drive dropping down on blue route. A group of about 8 of us form and cruised until muizenberg, collect more and more people along the way. One roadie commenting that I sound like a 18-wheeler coming down the road with my knobbly's.
Along the sea there was bit of a headwind. Here a lady cut me off that my handle poke in her ribs, all sorry sorry but then it's too late and lost my slip. I had to work hard myself into the wind up too St James where i got some people going a good pace for me and between the building was much less wind. Prior the the race lots of people made it sound like smutswinkel hill is so bad. Getting there I started passing people going up, feeling strong. The part that got me was going down other side. Is not flat and not steep down. I was struggle to keep with anyone. Just past ocean view the wind was an angled headwind again somehow. Suspect the mountains channeled it. There was no hiding behind anyone here people were weaving all over so riding too close to anyone could be risky.
Next was Chappies. Here I was not pulling so strong anymore. Having had to work so much myself and trying not too losing to much time has taken its toll. I made it up chapmans peak but not at the pace I would have liked. Going down I had to navigate around people as I was much more confident in the turns at speed. Maybe the big fat tires was a factor.
Hello Houtbay. Now I knew the big one everyone always suffer on was close. In houtbay still there is a little up and with no warnign at all my hamstring decide to cramp. I use my gears and start spinning to help the cramp out. This meant that I took suikerbossie easy. I want to give it horna but at the risk of a cramp I decided against it. Going down the other side I found a rider going a good pace for me and I slipped him all the way to Seapoint at the big left right turns. Here he was cornering to slow. I past him on the outside and knew we are close to the end. I put the hammer down as much as the legs allowed me. Not sure if he hanged on but I was not looking back. Head down, home stretch. At the finish I was tired and I did not had a feeling of accomplishment. The atmosfeer for me was not great. Did not see anyone that look very glad or excited. Every one is just a number. I guess that is the result when you so many people and with so many people that have done it so many times. Part of it might have ben also that road riding is boring, all you do is head down and pedal pedal pedal.
Now I have done it and not sure that I would want to do it again. Final result was 03:46:46 overall position 6900/31473. Not a bad result for a mountain bike on knobbly's.
I believe I'm done with road races forever unless someone convince me for something , which is not going to be easy. I have done the big 3 road events of the Cape on a mountain bike with knobbly's, Double Century (203km), Argus (109), Burger(92) and after each I had same reason why I did not enjoy is much, its BORING.
Now back the the title. The definition of versatile:
ver·sa·tile (vûrs-tl, -tl)
adj.
1. Capable of doing many things competently.
2. Having varied uses or serving many functions: "The most versatile o vegetables is the tomato" (Craig Claiborne).
3. Variable or inconstant; changeable: a versatile temperament.
4. Biology Capable of moving freely in all directions, as the antenna of an insect, the toe of an owl, or the loosely attached anther of a flower.
Now having done from downhill race to 109km road race to long day in the mountain I fairly sure a Trek Remedy 9.9 can be described as versatile with definition #1 in mind.
But the Ibis mojo is shortly on the Remedy's heals. The "problem" with Ibis at the moment is the weight and that can be easy fix with lighter wheel set and fork but then my current problem I have owning this two bike is even more so. They very close to the same class of bike. Ibis has a little longer top tube length which might make it beter for the longer distances. To sell one of the two would be very hard as I love the Trek suspension design and the Mojo as been a dream bike for so long and is so beautiful, now that I have it I dont want to let it go.... but I'm also itching to get a single speed bike and the Ibis Tranny has caught my eye.....
Till next time
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