The World's Fattest Man with no bike! aka - find hippy a new bike aka - Just get ( fill in blank )

I'd use a sus fork if riding it again. Not so much for comfort, but more so I could relax and recover on the downhills, rather than having to concentrate so hard ALL the time.

From riding my trail bike vs the hard tail the big difference between the two is grip, rather than what the bike will go through/over in terms of gnar.

With rear suspension the rear tyre has simply got more grip more of the time - both climbing traction and braking for more of the time as the rear wheel isn't skipping over stuff.

I'd imagine for a 24 hour ride the impact of having more grip more of the time would do wonders for your mental health.

If I was one of those rare people that was actually racing for a podium spot, I would definitely use a full sus :-)

I'd settle for less chance of my front wheel disappearing from under me

Like I'm ever going to paint something to match. :D
I'd paint something to stop it rusting but that's about as far as I go.

It's going into storage for 2 months while I dust off the Shiv, so that can be arranged.

The only Norm I know anything about is this Norm...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nPLdmRmsytI

I crashed all the time but that's because I went straight from crits to racing MTB one weekend. I can't afford to do that shit now, I'm too fat and don't bounce as well any more. But, like I said, I've already done a hard (for me) 12hrs solo with no resupply on a loaner so I reckon, other than the tunnel vision of night riding, a 24hr, once this bike is more dialed will be a piece of piss (especially as I won't have a hope in hell of winning so I can enjoy more of it).

I like the Crank Bros Stamp pedals, but the cheaper Stamp 1 seem to have developed a click. The v7 versions have a lube port and an easily removable spindle for servicing so I think I'm going to stick the v1 on another bike and buy some v7 version. What horrid clashy colour should I get?