Let's offroad / mountain bike / mtb / ride dirt

Ever since my 2020 incident my wrist hasn't been good.

MRI showed I tore a small ligament in the wrist and I went through hand therapy and saw a surgeon about it while the insurance claim was ongoing.

The guy went "where does it hurt exactly, left or right side" and I went "what are you on about? The whole damn wrist hurts" ... His answer to that was that one side was the ligament but the rest was "just your ordinary arthritis" ... FML

To bring this back on topic, the sqlab 12deg bars and ESI grips made a positive difference, as did fiddling with bar roll and lever angle. But I also don't ride MTB north of 2hrs very often, so I don't have that long exposure to discomfort on MTB.
On the roadie and gravel bikes I seem to be okay with the wrist and struggle with nerve issues and numb hands more, especially since the arm break and nerve transposition in March. Ironically that seems to affect the opposite side more, maybe because I unconsciously keep weight off of the side that was broken.

Summer holiday advice needed for next year- looking for a family holiday where me and the kids can ride Mtb- some blue, some green and a bit of harder stuff, uplift or lifts.
Nice pool, lakes, running trails and quiet road riding.
Drive from uk ferries.
Not bothered about night life, restaurants as long as we can get a pizza and there’s a shop.
Never been to alps or anywhere like that so keen to find the right place without lots of drama!

alps

Morzine ticks basically all those boxes, by the sounds of it

+1

I am planning exactly the same.

Would you stay in morzine itself so you can ride/ walk everywhere or outside and drive in when needed? I’ve no idea how big it is and what it’s like in summer

It depends what funds are like but I usually stay in the centre of Morzine but that's for ease of access to the uplifts and is a houseful of blokes rather than a family.

If you are looking to save money I think that Montriond (where I stayed with @chez_jay waaay back in 2005/6) can be had for more reasonable rates.

But hard agree with others above; Morzine is the answer to all your questions. It will be reasonably busy in the summer but not painfully so and mostly will be northern blokes heading for the uplifts so the town centre is more quiet during the day.

Yeah, I'm sure at least some of mine is riding a flat bar again for long periods of time which I haven't done since the BMX years in my teens and early twenties. Drop bar bikes don't cause me any problems at all.

Forest of Dean and saves the cost of a ferry. New green trail is being built right now.

Another thing crossed my mind last night - what's the name of the electronic shifter that mounts to the chainstay and winds cable? That would be a cool thing to use

Would have been a cool thing to use...

https://www.pinkbike.com/news/archer-components-announces-transition-to-limited-operations.html

Selling my size 56 Kona Rove for £295. A good bit of gear for mixed terrain UK cycling in my opinion. Not as good as a hardtail for dedicated gnarly off road riding, but if you're interested in 'gravel' touring which has a mix of off road and paved I hope you might think it's good for it. Annoyingly I don't have any photos of me with it 'in action' but the last ride I did on it was the supposedly 33% offroad 'a spot of surrey gravel' (using this route) which it acquitted itself very well on.

Thread here https://www.lfgss.com/conversations/398601/

I'd really recommend that route btw, starts/ends at G!ro cafe in Esher.

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Yeah, it was a cool idea, but this is why I tend to avoid most niche stuff and as much as I dislike SRAM, at least AXS will exist for a while.

Is anyone going to buy this, so I can immediately post it in the GC thread?

https://www.pinkbike.com/news/review-fox-transfer-neo-wireless-dropper-post.html

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"With wireless dropper posts becoming increasingly common"

Fucking news to me.

€1100 for a dropper. I'm definitely putting one on the Surly, and the Stanton, and Scott but not the Avanti. That would be overkill.

Is it still brand x or equivalent for cheap droppers? Son wants one for riding back up at our local bike park

I’m probably going to replace my AXS Reverb with a 200mm cable dropper, as the 170mm Reverb is annoyingly short and this new Transfer post is insanely expensive.

€1100 for a dropper

Apparently that's before VAT

If you don't mind giving Mike Ashley money, they're definitely the cheapest option. You'll struggle getting spares for them later down the line though.
Personally, I'd stump up for a better one with better spares support which means he could use it for longer on other bikes as he grows

Does anyone want or need a Charger RC damper for a Zeb? Its had maybe 15hrs ride time on it from new, but I've swapped it out to experiment with an MRP damper, so I'm not going to use it anymore. £60?

Is it still brand x or equivalent for cheap droppers? Son wants one for riding back up at our local bike park

Depending on size and how much you want to spend, I have a very good one here for sale

https://www.lfgss.com/conversations/398826/

I have a one up dropper that's really nice. My brandx ones shit themselves quite quick.

OneUp's customer service is absolutely outstanding

The Brand X posts I own/have owned have always been fine.

I thought the one on my Honzo was shooting the bed but it was real easy to dismantle, clean and regrease/reassemble and with no parts replaced it felt like new again.

A lot of OE posts are rebranded Brand X so if you’re willing to gamble on fitment, spares can be found.

Anyone using a Redshift on their MTB care to comment about the elastomers and if you're using their body weight scale?

Presumably there's less elastomer resistance in flat bars because you're more upright. Asking because I set it up for drop bars and didn't even realise there's a flat bar chart. I'm not riding for at least another 3 weeks so no biggie.

I'd not considered body position. When I saw the two charts, I assumed it was to cater for the difference in reach between flat bars and being on the hoods or drops.