regress to progress
Dudes, thought I'd share some changes that I've made in the past few weeks that have given me some really nice benefits with SS.
The reason for tweaking was a mate bought a bigger bike (s-works enduro... a lot bigger than his hardtail) and was pushing the pace downhill and we were spending more time on harder trails.. I was losing traction and struggling to keep 32:!7 going in the techy pinches. I'm too tight to buy another bike just now, so I needed to try to charge a bit harder on the ss hardtail.
First, I put grippier tyres on, changing from a classic Canberran Ardent race front crossmark rear (ok, thats 2007 style, but thats what I was running) to 2.25 ardents front and rear. To counter that rolling resistance, and to better cope with lack of momentum on harder xc trails, I went back to 32:18 (thats the regress in the title), and I also put flats on to try to eek out one last pedal push before baling out of an effort as I think I was getting a bit soft and giving up the grunt a bit early.
All of that made a massive difference, climbing with flats was a big change, the rip and flick method took on a whole new meaning without being able to pull up. The traction from the tyres was a big positive difference when cornering a bit faster, and the gear felt about the same with the heavier/draggier tyres. I was crapping it pretty often in the first few rides with flats, but got some advice off gnardog mates about how to better deal with trail chatter and unexpected thumping with flats. I noticed that I was putting my foot much further forward on the pedal than I could with my cleat set up, and also noticed I was much more comfortable jumping like this. Eventually I was also climbing almost as well too, pushing over top dead centre by dropping my heel and positioning my body further behind the bb. So much changed! And finally, I was definitely going deeper into the grunt territory before baling out on a climb, lots of vocalisation which felt (and feels) rad.
So, the experimentation worked... I put spds back on this weekend, slammed my cleats as far back as they go in my shoes and went out and rode harder stuff than I've ever been able to before. I'm clearing stuff I've never even been confident to try before, and really, really enjoying riding a lot. I cleared doubles that I've never been able to clear in the past without even thinking about it. I'm going to keep the 32:18 going, for sure. I'll keep the ardents on til its dry.
I don't really have a point other than to say stuffing around with my set up sometimes works for me, and going back to an easier gear has proven sometimes faster and sometimes more fun. I haven't been so pumped to ride my bike in ages!