petertronica
Likes Dirt
"Are Downhill riders just lazy-arsed xc riders?"
Why don't you go post that in the DH forum..
Are AM riders just washed up DHers?
- Thread starter dirtpig
- Start date
"Are Downhill riders just lazy-arsed xc riders?"
Why don't you go post that in the DH forum..
santacruznomad
Likes Bikes
AM is for people who realized that going down hill is more fun, but have a lack of DH tracks/shuttles or want to be fit but have fun too.
socksandsandles
Squid
DH for the adrenalin and for shuttles when you have a crew to share the driving and a trailer.
AM for fitness, keeping up your techo skills and getting to new and different places without having to bother with the full face, neck brace and the rest of it.
I’m always frothin for either as long as there are some frosty friends to be had in the carpark.
AM for fitness, keeping up your techo skills and getting to new and different places without having to bother with the full face, neck brace and the rest of it.
I’m always frothin for either as long as there are some frosty friends to be had in the carpark.
Dreggsy
Likes Bikes and Dirt
SouthYarraSage
Likes Dirt
Personally, I fall into the category of aging wannabe downhiller without the skills, balls or time.
Nerf Herder
Wheel size expert
or DHér that don't need 8" front and rear
or XCérs that don't walk the rough bits
or DJérs that like knobby tires
- or enduros with lots of rocks
or trials riders that like to ride in the bush
- that like suspension and disc brakes (or not)
or explorers on bikes that want to ride everything both up and down
or 4xérs and Xc whippets that like to go in elbows out, at the gate on MD
or National Parks lovers that know they'll never DH legally on the lands that they adore likely any time soon, so will take what they can and AM to get what they need for their descending pleasures (even though its the bloody same thing IMO)
So ...
I might be old, but I don't need some unknown on the interweb to call me washed up just because of the type of riding I sometimes enjoy, usually more, at certain periods of life, then other types of riding that I also attempt as best I can.
So to talk about me, which I love to do ... I'm entering my first DH race at 42. I've progressed faster in the last year then I did in the previous 10. I'm actually not as fit as I use to be when I was younger or at least it takes me longer to recover, so I'd consider that I was more a failing XCer before I'd say I was a washed up DHér. I am also the oldest in my crew of DH mates, I'm more then double some of them.
Skillz remain far longer then fitness IMO.
And finally you got me during a mid life crisis ... I've also joined the Colong Foundation ... so F#@k you young punk (I'll insert a
for those that don't know me and obviously missed the quick witted humour first time around) ...
p.s
Wish I could ride my bike more though, but don't think its possible at present
p.s.s
angry XCér was in tribute to the current national bar tugger award winner ... the people I ride with would prefer sticks or rear buzzing or overtaking through the air
or XCérs that don't walk the rough bits
or DJérs that like knobby tires
- or enduros with lots of rocks
or trials riders that like to ride in the bush
- that like suspension and disc brakes (or not)
or explorers on bikes that want to ride everything both up and down
or 4xérs and Xc whippets that like to go in elbows out, at the gate on MD
or National Parks lovers that know they'll never DH legally on the lands that they adore likely any time soon, so will take what they can and AM to get what they need for their descending pleasures (even though its the bloody same thing IMO)
So ...
I might be old, but I don't need some unknown on the interweb to call me washed up just because of the type of riding I sometimes enjoy, usually more, at certain periods of life, then other types of riding that I also attempt as best I can.
So to talk about me, which I love to do ... I'm entering my first DH race at 42. I've progressed faster in the last year then I did in the previous 10. I'm actually not as fit as I use to be when I was younger or at least it takes me longer to recover, so I'd consider that I was more a failing XCer before I'd say I was a washed up DHér. I am also the oldest in my crew of DH mates, I'm more then double some of them.
Skillz remain far longer then fitness IMO.
And finally you got me during a mid life crisis ... I've also joined the Colong Foundation ... so F#@k you young punk (I'll insert a
for those that don't know me and obviously missed the quick witted humour first time around) ... p.s
Wish I could ride my bike more though, but don't think its possible at present
p.s.s
angry XCér was in tribute to the current national bar tugger award winner ... the people I ride with would prefer sticks or rear buzzing or overtaking through the air
4dabush
Likes Dirt
I can relate to Nerf. I'm older than the entire DH crew i ride with (old enought to be their Dad in a lot of cases). Being married and a Dad, DH days can be a pain - point in case, left at 6.30am to ride 1 hr away. 7am and first crews house, 7.30 second stop for seconsd crew. Had to stop to get breaky on the way for the guys who couldnt get up early enough to eat. 8.30, wait for 30 mins for the final crew. 40min shuttle to do 10minutes riding, 2nd ride, called it and got home at 1pm... (I am not knocking the camraderie, fun, etc, and see how its addictive when you have no other responsibilities).
Whereas, i can ride up the shuttle road at a couple of tracks, riding distance from home, 15minutes up, 1minute down, 4-6 loops and i'm done, for fitness and kicks...and the young guys think i'm nuts 'cause i ride up hill. And i can be home before the family misses me.
I love my DH bike, and the DH adrenaline rush, just not the waiting around. The AM bike reminds me how much better (not that i am any good) i have to ride the DH tracks - i cant just plough... some days i take out the AM bike with the XC helmet and do xc loops and bits of other stuff, sometimes i pack the kneepads in the camelback and fullface and go and do DH loops, and then sometimes the big bike comes out for shuttles...
Off topic by miles now i know, but the AM bike came before the DH, so i dont think i qualify as a washed up Dher!...who cares anyway? So long as you are having fun, who really cares?
Shit, we just did Gravitate up here on Kuranda DH track, and we were doing it on fully rigids, old GTs, Proflexes etc...and it was a blast - best fun in ages...i took more than double the time it normally takes me to ride that track - so what? didn't make it any less fun...and thats what we should all be encouraging - get out and have fun, and make sure you dont spoil others fun being a 'hater'...
Whereas, i can ride up the shuttle road at a couple of tracks, riding distance from home, 15minutes up, 1minute down, 4-6 loops and i'm done, for fitness and kicks...and the young guys think i'm nuts 'cause i ride up hill. And i can be home before the family misses me.
I love my DH bike, and the DH adrenaline rush, just not the waiting around. The AM bike reminds me how much better (not that i am any good) i have to ride the DH tracks - i cant just plough... some days i take out the AM bike with the XC helmet and do xc loops and bits of other stuff, sometimes i pack the kneepads in the camelback and fullface and go and do DH loops, and then sometimes the big bike comes out for shuttles...
Off topic by miles now i know, but the AM bike came before the DH, so i dont think i qualify as a washed up Dher!...who cares anyway? So long as you are having fun, who really cares?
Shit, we just did Gravitate up here on Kuranda DH track, and we were doing it on fully rigids, old GTs, Proflexes etc...and it was a blast - best fun in ages...i took more than double the time it normally takes me to ride that track - so what? didn't make it any less fun...and thats what we should all be encouraging - get out and have fun, and make sure you dont spoil others fun being a 'hater'...
mtb1611
Seymour
It did? Any specific examples you can provide here?
furry forester
Likes Dirt
Standing in the lift line at bike buller chatting to someguy who had a chainring on the outside of his cranks instead of a bashring (and who blew past me on the road!) Did the "I race dh", "oh I race xc" conversation swap, he asked "Is that the bike you race dh on?" when I replied "Nope, thats my xc bike". He nearly wet himself laughing to eventually reply "You DH guys have such a weird pespective - Fat tyres, big front disc, wide bars, dropper post hahahahahahhahahah......"
Never really thought I was an All mountain rider - but apparently you dont have a bike that can descend a dh track, launch a double or three (but still pedal around, up and over anything) and not be smashed in a week and call it xc riding!
Never really thought I was an All mountain rider - but apparently you dont have a bike that can descend a dh track, launch a double or three (but still pedal around, up and over anything) and not be smashed in a week and call it xc riding!
Great post mate. Exactly the kind of discussion I was hoping to generate.
I guess I figured that if I had have posted a thread asking "what motivates you to ride an all mountain style bike and what has your journey to get to this point in your riding been" I thought that I wouldn't get much of a reply, so Nerf sorry if I have come across as trying to pigeon hole things, that wasn't my intention.
For me, I have been riding bikes since i was a kid and I got my first mtb in 91 and haven't looked back since. I have had a crack at most styles of riding and never been particularly good at any of them! DH was definitely where most of my youthful exuberance was directed, over time my interests have changed and maybe partly for the reasons that 4dabush mentioned my riding now is less shuttles and more "going for a ride".
Riding bikes has provided me with most of my friends, holidays, life experiences, a few jobs and even a couple of girlfriends. AM riding isn’t so much a label to me as it being a point that the technology finally getting to the point that you actually can ride most everything on one bike and really enjoy it.
To me this is the absolute best time in the evolution of mountain biking.
floody
Wheel size expert
I think you'll find the first acknowledged mountain bikes were raced down big hills. Multiple chainrings and the ability to go uphill came later.
4dabush
Likes Dirt
Hi Floody and MTB1611,
I meant in MY case: I owned a AM bike before a DH bike, therefore, I think I hardly qualify as a washed up DH'er when i started riding the other way around...
and I've been riding a while - my first MTB (up and down) was a Bianchi fully rigid circa 1990... don't own that still, but its replacement, 1996 GT LTS3 is still 100% original and hanging on the wall
Oh, and for some ancient history (and seriously off topic), growing up BMX-ing in Adelaide in the 1980's, a bunch of us from Cross Keys BMX Club used to catch the train to Mt Lofty, then ride about 1/2hr to the summit on a sunday morning...we'd then flog down the firetrails back into town - about 20min DH...(Didnt some guy called Sam start out racing DH on a BMX???)
As for the history of MTBing -well thats even more off topic than I got before, and know even less about!
I meant in MY case: I owned a AM bike before a DH bike, therefore, I think I hardly qualify as a washed up DH'er when i started riding the other way around...
and I've been riding a while - my first MTB (up and down) was a Bianchi fully rigid circa 1990... don't own that still, but its replacement, 1996 GT LTS3 is still 100% original and hanging on the wall
Oh, and for some ancient history (and seriously off topic), growing up BMX-ing in Adelaide in the 1980's, a bunch of us from Cross Keys BMX Club used to catch the train to Mt Lofty, then ride about 1/2hr to the summit on a sunday morning...we'd then flog down the firetrails back into town - about 20min DH...(Didnt some guy called Sam start out racing DH on a BMX???)
As for the history of MTBing -well thats even more off topic than I got before, and know even less about!
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martinpb
Likes Dirt
speak for yourself ;-)
Nerf Herder
Wheel size expert
+1 ... I'll bring the Filo national dish ... BBQ pork ribs marinated in Black doctor / honey / soy ... honey and soy optional