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You have to be a lot more dynamic on the bike when riding SS MTB, it's a lot about putting down power when you know you'll have traction and shifting your body weight around to muscle the bike over things like roots where you can't really pedal.
Obviously with a 24/36 bottom gear and suspension you can just sit down and twiddle over all the obstacles, but where's the fun in that?
umop3pisdn
What kind of riding are you guys doing at 2:1? That's what I have an using it winter commuting and messing about on gravel/fire roads, but some mates dragged me out 'mountain biking' a couple of weeks ago. It was single track but boggy, covered in roots and rocks and with steep parts and I found it completely unridable. I'll be the first to admit that I have no MTB skill or experience whatsoever, but I'm stronger and fitter than those I was riding with on the road. They were spinning away at walking pace fighting over the lumps, bumps and obstacles at 24:36 and I was grinding like crazy barely turning the pedals and as soon as I hit any resistance at all in the form of roots, rocks or ramps I just had no torque at all to push the bike over and I'd come to a dead stop and would have real trouble just getting going again. Even once we got out of the hard stuff onto a long, shallow, snow covered rocky incline I was out of the saddle the entire way grinding at maybe 35-40rpm with the back wheel spinning up now and again.
I can't figure out if I'm just missing something, using the bike in a way that's inappropriate for SS or other. These guys I've been riding with have been racing MTB, some at a fairly high level, for the last 20 years and if they're chosing ~1:2 for the trails, I don't see how it's possible to do the same at 2:1. But if I geared to 1:2 or thereabouts, it'd be useless for any mixed terrain ride where there may be flat/smooth riding.