FREE U.S. SHIPPING ON EVERYTHING! HELP / FAQ'S

Riding Bikes In Italy, The State Of The MTB Industry, Pros & Cons of High Pivot & More... Ep. 120 [Podcast]

On today's episode of the MTB Podcast, we reminisce about our bucket list MTB trip to the Dolomites in Italy before discussing Liam's new Revel Ranger build and the state of the industry. Then we jump into a classic array of listener questions ranging from how to train for MTB on the road bike to pros and cons of high pivot bikes and everything in between.

Submit any and all questions to podcast@worldwidecyclery.com

Episode 91 w/Neko Mulally: https://www.worldwidecyclery.com/blogs/worldwide-cyclery-blog/high-pivot-everything-we-interview-pro-racer-neko-mulally-about-it-all-mtb-podcast-episode-91-podcast

MTB Podcast YouTube Channel

Worldwide Cyclery YouTube Channel

Worldwide Cyclery Instagram

MTB Podcast Instagram

MTB Podcast Website

If you are one strange human that would like to read a transcript of the podcast above, continue reading below!

[Music] ladies and gentlemen welcome to episode

120 of the MTB podcast presented and hosted by worldwide Cyclery hi I'm Jared

the man with the olive oil voice I'm Jeff and I'm Liam

Olive Oil voice in this episode we will discuss our incredible bucket list

trip to the dolomites in Italy where Jared was given the nickname the man with the olive oil voice we're going to

also talk about Liam's new custom painted Revel Ranger the current state of the bicycle industry and of course

listener questions ranging from cross-training techniques to pros and cons of high pivot bikes and everything

in between everything in between so Mr olive oil voice

can we talk about something can we fit everything in between within an hour podcast you know we're gonna do our best

okay I'm gonna do our best everything we possibly can fit in between say something yeah something something uh we

flew into Venice Italy we drove three hours North into the dolomites it's a portion I guess the Eastern portion of

the Swiss slash Italian Alps and unbelievably dramatic scenery in

mountains and rocks and cliffs and jaggedy rocks on more rocks and wow even

bigger I had no idea and the most insane lift Network yeah Cable Car Network yeah

I've ever seen there's just in all of these valleys there's canyons and lifts and cable cars and Gondola is all

connected it's unbelievable truly yeah yeah spectacular it is Paradise breathtaking stunning so we went out

there with all Mountain rides which is a mountain bike tour company um let's see who runs it Phil Borman

Phil Borman so Phil Borman Supreme pandemic he ran New Zealand mountain biking and I did that trip with him in

December of 2019 which was amazing and then I had full faith that he could execute on another epic trip and he did

and it was Italy in the dolomites he was living there for I think two or three years um Cortina yeah doing a lot of

Consulting with different tour companies out there and stuff and that's when he came up with the idea for the mountain bike trip there and wow that went off

amazing so he toured us around along with his partner tour guide Marco besol

yes did I say Martin's last name no clue the soul I think I saw some guy going

like it was oh [Laughter]

his entire life runs a hotel there and uh yeah we went on so many local hidden

weird things a few times he goes we're going on a farmer's land and

they might yell at you just ride fast you don't have to be the fastest you

just don't want to be the slowest man yeah yeah he goes so much closer this

this Rancher always stops me I think he'll be extra pissed when I have 15 people too

oh man yeah we had a decent sized group um really good Riders really good group

that meshes well these these trips there's always a little bit of a wild card is are people going to like each other and get along and all right at a

relatively similar speed so we can all have fun together and yeah it all worked perfectly which was really cool

um and we didn't have to do much climbing we did two pretty minimal climbing for I mean we were putting in

days doing well over 20 25 miles with like a thousand feet of climbing yeah and like 10 to 13 000 feet of descending

yeah yeah unreal yeah I think some of the days were even like 500 feet of climbing and like 13 000 feet at the

same yeah not even a noticeable amount of climate yeah I think the first day is the biggest day to 2000 feet yeah yeah

and that's kind of like the break-in tour kind of you know feel out ride ShakeOut ride so yeah yeah yeah what an

incredible place I would highly recommend it for a mountain bike trip it's probably incredible in the winter too totally um I can't even imagine

although it would be wild to be up there if that place was covered in snow so cool super windy roads unbelievable

scenery some of the most beautiful portions of the world I've ever seen in my life and just a lot of stuff to do

and obviously endless amounts of killer single track and riding back there so agreed um what was your favorite place

to take a vacation what's your favorite riding portion I know it's pretty hard that's a hard question

because you know we wrote obviously some purpose-built mountain bike trails some kind of hiking type trails that were

also weird janky yeah incredibly easy trails there is just a little mix of

everything I really liked uh was it called well there was that one ews Trail

um or the other one yeah I thought Infinity was pretty cool animal house I

like that and lower Animal House was sick yeah yeah everything involved the fossa was so fun yeah yeah because they

had they had the huge well it's not called ews anymore but when it was called ews it was out there and DVR EDR

EDR what does that even means but I don't see how they get eat maybe

you know UCI and racism this year A lot of people are unhappy about the format

changes name changes rule changes yeah yeah this yeah yeah [Music]

it's like a perfect representation of what like you know kind of like a

diplomatic or like autocratic I guess like this higher body of people that are just totally dissociated from what's

actually happening like what the writers are saying and like what the fans are saying like there's so much

disconnection between the governing body for sure and the people who are actually like boots on the ground yep it's like

how is there such a big disconnect is the UCI as despised in the road cycling side of things do you know very

similarly yeah yeah like they don't love them and like they can't everyone Force rule no rules like like they're pretty

much only enforce like a rule in a race is if a crash happens and usually an

injury from a crash so like there's a big some guy basically tried to move up on

the road on the side of the road it went super viral shouldn't say that's funny because it was not funny and he crashed

out the entire field he basically went through like and crash himself and it looks back like oh man 100 people but

the thing is people do that in these classic style races in Belgium all the time it just happened to be a little bit

more bunched up at that time and it happened to cause a massive it was obviously an accident yeah massive pile

up and it was on video and it was at the front of the race on video right like perfectly and uh so they enforced a you

know a suspension or when there's a Sprint line deviation and you know the

final of a Tour de France stage and someone crashes they enforce the rule this year Jasper Phillips and DVD of

like three out of his five Sprint wins and they were like nope clean no one crashed so yeah no one really loves UC I

don't think anywhere like I don't think UC has ever loved no yeah not that I've ever heard of when they feel like it it seems like

yeah yeah so regardless yeah that was a hard tangent off of Italy back when

there was uh the Enduro World Series formerly or no that yeah formally into

our World Series yeah uh they built these Trails or those Trails I guess were already there but they raced these trails and they're pretty iconic just

super well-built mountain bike trails they did race them this year in the EDR oh they did okay cool

um so yeah getting to ride that stuff was awesome and it was just such good well-built mountain bike trails so made

for mountain bikes um yeah really cool technically challenging a lot of line Choice uh I

really enjoyed all that I also really enjoyed uh I think it was called W which was a nothing oh yeah nothing special

just random fun trail but it was just fun riding that and a huge train with

everyone and then that crashed in front of me there was there's there's like a big S turn and there's a you can

basically go off of one of the berms and GAP to the next berm and he's on the

lower berm and he's looking up he's like oh I saw that jump and down below looking at the jump and then crashes

while he's looking at the jump right I was like what happened she was looking

at the gym you're riding a berm don't look anywhere else the day before so

funny managed to crash following Jared and I and he broke his brake lever and

his dropper post remote on different sides on different sides and he doesn't he's not sure how he broke the right

brake lever and the left drop a poster at the same time everyone's heard about Matt on this podcast he runs the B team

which is an amateur endure race team on the east coast of the US and uh he was

on his trip and he took a number of Falls he's probably gonna be like what we're talking about that but you know I

don't know they were giving the B Teams impressed though yeah the B team was represented by Matt on this trip and you

know he did it um also his rival team I guess you call it rival team will fire MTB which is run

by Shelley which is a female racing team um she was there with her husband having an amazing time so hearing them banter

back and forth about racing was pretty funny oh that's great um yeah it was a lot of good good people and good fun on

that trip so and a number of crashes but nobody got hurt yeah that's true yeah just minor stuff which is good because

some of the train was pretty

that's like kind of a crash you just couldn't really turn yeah I mean I just

yeah it was all like pine needles and like super loose yeah there's no no grip

yeah I couldn't even stop couldn't change direction yeah you know yeah there's definitely some seriously

challenging gnarly so steep skill levels there's stuff really steep stuff and then there's bike park stuff and yeah

closest I got to crashing was filming cows in my right hand holding the front brake

down a sketchy ass Fire Road Jeff was behind me and was like oh God

Willy what are you doing just thinking I was just thinking of that influencers in the wild Instagram account yeah gotta

gotta get it on Instagram and you're gonna just sack yourself on this brutally Rock covered Fire Road just to

film some cows yeah that was pretty funny what about you Liam what was your favorite riding portion um I got two I

liked uh why like fast and fossa or fossil faster yeah

I don't know yeah Nacho's sick they run me a lot of Santa Cruz is pretty fun and

then 999 was yeah probably my favorite Trail as far as like shredding goes yeah

but I think experience of riding bikes riding down from the Refugio Rosetta uh which was like this

moonscape you're descending like yeah that was cool over a thousand feet at least probably like two or three

thousand feet the Palo de San Martin yeah um on this moonscape like it was literally

some way above once you get a little bit further down you get some Shrubbery but like it's way above tree line it's just

rocks and moonscape and you're basically just like flying on the moon and it was super cool

experience like not necessarily the sickest shredding but like I've never ridden my bike on that kind of stuff and

yeah I don't know where you ever can really I know yeah that's yeah that's really cool yeah so that was and just

that whole day was sick like yeah start from the top and you you went all the way down to the valley

um it was a long day just for basically one main descent yeah yeah you can take cable cars up we started that about 10

000 feet right and then went on all the way down to four yeah um yeah it's incredible the rides you

can link together out there so highly recommend it if uh a big Italian mountain bike Adventure is on your radar

should be it should be it should be it's a that was a bucket list trip for sure and yeah man the food the scenery the

trails yeah it was amazing there's also just a lot of other stuff to do there as well totally yeah kind of infinite yeah

a lot of the guy writers probably their wives that just you know had their own days fun hiking and yeah cool hiking and

exploring and museums and all sorts of good stuff up there so yeah they're Refugio at the top of Every Mountain

just yeah you can go relax and eat and drink a beer and or a spritz if that's more your flavor yep Europe is luxury

man is so cool it's very luxury yeah Scott Galloway says America is the best

place to make money and Europe's the best place to spend it he's absolutely right and I think he's right yeah I think he's right yeah yeah they're just

pretty good some things they do there are just so well thought out yeah and it's just everything's aesthetically

pleasing and well maintained and artsy and they also had a huge Head Start man yeah

that's true they uh they've been doing this a lot longer than the last we were in buildings that were longer than older

than the entire United States of America um speaking of spending money how about

your new ranger bro I don't spend any money on it I didn't spend any money

um yep I'm building a new ranger Revel Ranger V2 so the yeti SB 120 sold the

frame and fork to the part swap swapped out a few other bits and pieces

um and yeah building it up gotta custom paint them by technor uh Hydro dude yeah I had a hydro dip

white gray and black and I think it came out insane in my opinion yeah it looks

really good looks a lot better in person than in photos photos are just hard to see though yeah it looks crazy in photos

right like it kind of overwhelming almost but yeah yeah it's super cool it looks like marble and it's uh yeah I'm

very stoked on it I've never had a custom painted frame myself so figured why not

um and yeah I'm stoked uh got a few little bits and pieces I got the new Sid suspension on it front and

rear so that'd be cool to ride I have some new wheels that I can talk about in a month or so or the next podcast which

will be cool to ride so yeah wow wow it'll be cool I just weighed it

yeah transmission there's way to uh 27 flat with cages pedals hmm all that

so nice yeah pretty good now we're sliders and new said stuff from the old stuff a

little bit I don't know I need to re-way your bike though tiny bit I feel the same as a baguette

maybe ciabata roll I don't know man I don't know if there it's even that much lighter they should start measuring

things in in food items that's what I'm saying that's not I mean like our news

Americans will measure stuff in anything but yeah but a logical system biological

measurement like this dog-sized uh pothole or this you know this uh sinkhole can fit you know three

fire trucks or something like that 10 Toyota Camrys

yeah sounds all right yeah totally man I love my Ranger that's such a fun bike I realized in this little on this Italy

trip how little I've ridden an Enduro bike all year pretty much just rode that Banshee on the Whistler trip and then on

this trip and otherwise I just ride that Ranger yeah it's just such a fun good all-around mountain bike well and just

like you know if you're kind of riding from the front door where we live like there's no point to yeah ride anything

but basically a ranger uh you know SB 120 style bike you know yeah short

travel fun bike um yeah they're awesome around here I've been kind of I haven't had one

since I got back from downeyville I basically took the part of that bike so it's been

still almost two months now it has been two months basically So and I've just been around my Realty night or the rode

gravel bike and I'm kind of itching just to do some XC rides and get some some efficiency back in my life

yeah yeah those 120 mil travel 29ers of various Brands like that just that bike

has really come a long way with Geo and suspension and it's worked so good for so many things so

I miss having a short travel 29er yeah it's just such a fun bike fun fast what about your hardtail do you still have

that oh yeah I have my hardtail yeah it still doesn't you know yeah it's not scratch the same itch you know yeah

you could literally have I'm sure you'll swap it out like all your other underwear soon enough I don't know man I

don't think for a month and now I'm gonna Swap this out I love the hardtail man that it scratches how are the bike

packing adventures coming along particular itch it's actually getting right into beautiful bike packing season and I was gonna invite you along but I

don't know if I'm gonna invite you anymore because you're throwing shade right now and I don't like it

he was uh he was all saying he's gonna do all these bike packing trips and then oh no I'm gonna it turns out got around

that people were saying he wasn't gonna do it and uh it's been a little while and you haven't gone on one yet I might

have found 10 bucks down on that you got a bet on it yeah I'm not participating in the bed okay I

just laughed at the it's funny you guys talk how there's like an expiration you're like oh my God if I don't go bike packing by the end of September no no

the expiration date is you selling that bike which you were destined to do never said that on the record dude Never Gonna

sell it we're gonna sell it everything's for sale baby I'm gonna get buried with that bike oh my god oh man on record now yeah speaking of

getting buried with bikes oh would you like to hear the state of the bicycle industry I guess I don't know how in tune people

are uh with the bike industry I think at one point there was a lot of you know random people on YouTube making videos

about it and stuff we talked about it a little bit on on the podcast at some point very clickbaity YouTube videos oh

my God is cruising turmoil which you know to

some extent was was may be true it's true

the the latest which you've probably already heard or maybe not depending on how in tune you are with this stuff uh the bike industry boom during the

pandemic um so many more Brands than I had anticipated over ordered over

manufactured and just over forecasted like distributed and Distributors Brands

retailers everybody um and that's now resulted in you know the demand completely normalized went

straight back to pre-pandemic levels and uh yeah now everyone has way too much product and everything's on sale and if

inflation was measured in the bike industry it would be to the floor again um so it's it's a bit of a mess now is

definitely the year to buy a bike 100 yeah every bike you can think of every

pair of shoes and like you name it it's on sale we have a ton of stuff on sale

way more than we ever have in history which is unfortunate because it's just major margin deterioration and making it really hard to run a profitable business

that survives but you know that's my problem not yours but listen to the podcast and you're

you're in the market for a bike now is the time we're wheeling and dealing bikes everybody is it's it's just crazy

so the bike industry isn't a bit of a in a bit of a shenanigans of a situation right now no situation of a situation

there's a storm of Brewing Randy yeah so uh word of advice uh my my economic

forecast of the bike industry is that it will it will certainly clear up coming into next season I.E summer of 2024.

um so if you are planning on getting a bike um or really anything especially the more expensive now would be a fantastic

time to do it um yeah because next year inventory levels won't be as bad and people won't

be in such Dire Straits Hawking things for so cheap so how can I'm not Hocking

them up wanna hakalui yeah Finding Nemo yeah yeah

I was the first one or the second one first one first one I haven't seen it in ages I almost had a bike on the Haka and

I think it was yeah so it's not like their gravel bike or

something like that they had a bike or have a bike maybe yes they do are they still Oh I thought you said you had one

no Ibis oh yeah all right not super up to date on ibis's line yeah

well that's the state of the bike industry there you go um yeah I don't know that's it that's it

let's answer one quick listener question before we hop into the best legitimate

advertisement yet let's do it listener question number one when it's time to degrease and to

generally scrub your drivetrain there's a point in time where you need to add a bit of water to rinse all the

contaminants and solution away from said drivetrain my question is once this is done what is the best way to eliminate

all the water from the nooks and crannies of said drivetrain uh it's a also bike in general to keep things from

rusting ah let me finish dude you went too fast

Jeff I've heard people mention compressed air Jeff but to me that is

just going to potentially drive that water deeper into things like the cassette bearings possibly put pressure

on seals and O-rings that may negatively affect them would something like WD-40 work well in lieu of compressed air if

so do you simply spray it with WD40 light dry completely and then leave your chain it's got a point there

um but yes and no Degreaser good Degreaser is slightly alcohol-based and

it often will evaporate um so you decrease your chain with some

water and some Degreaser if you really need it but I also am on the side of like I don't use Degreaser unless it's

needed it's not really that necessary unless you already incorrectly lubed your chain to begin with I'm I am a fan

of degreasing the stock Lube of a chain for my sake Jeff likes it on because he likes inefficiency you get a quiet drive

chain so quiet it's so quiet but it's so so inefficient stock grease yeah it's not even lubish Grease

the shipping grease so it doesn't rust and it makes it quiet yeah yeah

everything after that and then use a proper Lube yeah but uh yeah I don't actually use Degreaser that much

um and if you use a dry lube and you use it properly you really shouldn't need that

much but say I do need it or I'm cleaning my bike I did wash my bike today use a little bit of uh more like

dish soap on kind of chain and cassette just get some stuff off um I use air compressed air to blow

everything out and I don't point it directly at the Hub I usually point it in between basically the two poiler

wheels on the derailleur and point it directly at the chain link the links

yeah and uh like on the rollers yeah I do that too compressed air is exactly like compressed water I.E pressure

washer hose high pressure you just can't point it directly at something that needs to be sealed so don't make that

mistake with water or air so just go easy yeah don't blast bearings and seals

and O-rings and things like that with water or air just go light with that stuff and you're not going to damage it if you're trying to get everything out

of the rollers in your chain you can blast it with that and then re-lube it very well

yeah also not recommended to use a air compressor

on any brake parts right because there's machine oil technically in that air and

it's not like pure air yeah you can risk it for the brisket oh don't get me

started on brisket you can do it a little light light like you know yeah some stuff out of there I want to like

yeah force it in there for a long time but you know yeah sometimes those air compressor tanks can get a little condensation with the tank and stuff

like that have some water in there pretty marginal um but I would not add WD-40 to anything on my bike ever

personally yeah it'd be 40. at least original w40 WD-40 is a brand yeah

that's a license they make all these different products but the OG WD-40 formulas

and it's aerosol so it can spray and you know your chains near your rotors and

contamination yeah so yep yep good degrees are a good chain lube and a good

process is your friend a little bit of being gentle with all these things helps the bike yeah yeah

speaking of being gentle I think it's time for an ad perfect and now a word from our sponsors

introducing Mike's magical mix of ketones and kegels we want to boost your

step and strength down below Mike's got secret folks come on let's go do your energy levels wobble Wayne or a waiver

hop Mike's Ketone supplements for flavor and favor brain foggy Menace life

seeming quite Bleak take a ketone from Mike and reach your brain's Peak but

wait there's more this isn't just about that mental might Mike's also got Kegel

courses to set things down there just right for strength control in the pelvic

floor oh so tight Mike's gecko classes are truly out of sight special offer buy a bottle of ketones

and get killed the courses for free Mike's special deal as Whimsical as can be and now back to the show and Jared

the man with the olive oil voice and we're back read this next question I sure will on the last episode I heard

Jared has been riding a druid V2 by forbidden and it got me wondering first

what are the ups and downs of high pivot Witchcraft and B I ride Bellingham two to four days a week and I'm in the

market for a new frame so I'm looking for recommendations so far I'm considering a carbon Patrol or Insurgent

thoughts well I'd say you should also control or you should also consider a druid V2

because it's awesome um ups and downs of high pivot witchcraft

uh in my experience there is only really two very minor

downsides well one of which is the very marginal amount of efficiency loss with the idler

pulley which is super marginal and after riding the bike for a little while I don't even notice it anymore yeah and

you're talking because you wrote that deviate as well which TV did you ride uh

play more or play more yeah and now you're on the Forbidden

Druid V2 yes both High pivot bikes yep um the only other thing I noticed after

going like from my Yeti esp140 to the Druid was it wasn't quite as like poppy jumping off of rocks and stuff like on

the trailer routes but after riding it for a little bit longer now I've gotten more used to it and it feels

great just yeah I mean it's good so that's kind of the nature of a high pivot in general is right it's going to

eat up bumps more than it's gonna be poppy and kind of right hit hit that stuff but the Forbidden

team writers seem to not have an issue with that as they throw in yeah big 360s and yeah I know all kinds of crazy stuff

on the bins Instagram yeah like oh yeah no those bikes can do everything I can do and then like 9 000 times more yeah

just fine yeah so dude you were riding that bike so good in Italy following you on some of those Trails it just looked

like it was hovering and floating and I was just really envious I was like I want that bike thank you it's a guy I

would like that I appreciate that was like I want that he was quiet and it just floated and I was just so impressed

a bike looks watching that bike riding behind you it was wow that's a freaking

nice bike it is sick working really good I love it cool to see yeah and on the

you know extra pulley wheel inefficiency that causes it's pretty marginal if you

have a clean chain right set up like having someone with a gunked up nasty chain is going to cause more drag than

adding that one wheel if everything's running clean and yeah so the only time I ever really noticed it was when it was

brand new and like you were talking about with the factory grease yeah um that's the only time I really noticed

it and kind of like I said after I kind of got used to try to get you know degrees the Champions probably broken a

little bit too yeah yeah and also like the initially the bearing on that pulley wheel was pretty stiff and it spins much

more freely now um but those are really the only downsides and on the UPS it like you're

kind of saying it absolutely eats chunk rocks and Roots like there's no tomorrow like it eats like for 130 mil travel

bike it felt like it had so much more travel going down that like I felt like

it I felt no no limitations at all which it was just like yeah pushing punches

pretty hard above its weight it totally does um but it's still you know kind of Maneuvers and like is Nimble and you

know yeah movable like uh like a trail bike which is awesome um but yeah speaking of high pivot uh

you know High pivot everything we had Neko on the show several episodes back

episode 91. um so if you're very curious in going a deep dive on high pivot stuff that is

excellent episode to check out we're gonna have that in the show notes as well going to that episode link to that

episode in the show notes link to the episode and show now Neko is a very qualified person to talk about that because he's just a professional

mountain biker suspension nerd and Guru and also literally created two identical bikes of his own one being high pivot and

one not tested him back to back yeah and he landed many people with more credentials to talk on the topic than

that he landed on a almost mid pivot yeah yeah yeah true so I liked it a

little higher but not full High pivot so

uh he did ask the question so far I'm considering a carbon Patrol

or Insurgent isn't it Insurgent 27.5 yes well they might make a mullet one

um isn't most of the riding pedal up fire roads and then ride down to all these

deep stuff yeah yeah out of those two bikes are probably lean Patrol as I think the suspension action would work

better on the super steep stuff that Bellingham has um [Music]

and put another bike you might want to consider would be a forbidden Dreadnought in the mullet setup with a

ziggy link nice yeah you can also get Druid and mullet too yeah but he's talking about some bigger travel bikes

yeah um I see where this guy's going he is riding in Bellingham and these are brands that are from Bellingham

local but for business not too far away that's true forbidden isn't just too far away up and over the Border in fact you

could take a little ferry over there Vancouver Island across the pond across

the leader Pond how is there a bike company on Vancouver Island oh God more than one two

maybe maybe not just seems funny well you know the riding is there is riding

there certainly you know caters to I mean I mean yeah designing a bike like the

Druid right yeah true absolutely I guess you can sit on your CAD software and design a bike from anywhere

you can make a good one right I mean they're making bikes in freaking Kamloops we are one right I mean yeah

they're manufacturing them there actually I mean that's yeah yeah so there you go you can do just

about anything you want anywhere you want I think I'm gonna buy forbidden do it custom paint it do it

do it nice sweet uh how about the next question

the woods up here in the Northeast have been soaked with rain and extra swampy

this year so some of us have been throwing in Road rides for fitness and to get a little more airflow over our

sweaty selves with Liam being the Renaissance Man across all disciplines I'd love to hear a little more about his

setup and how he uses Road riding to cross-train for mountain biking

well I assume he's talking about like actual Road rides like on a road bike

and not just like riding his mountain bike on the road yeah I think so that's kind of what I got from that yeah considering he's talking about different

disciplines yeah um I mean it kind of all depends but just riding a road bike like once a week

does so much for your mountain biking yeah you're able to like constantly pedal and

get that kind of muscle memory base miles it's super easy to stay in zone two zone three uh heart rate zones power

zones in general as possible yeah yeah like you can't really do that on a mountain bike that easily like yeah you

might be able to you know back off or go hard but like sometimes there's a point where you have to be in zone four to get

up a single track climb yeah just it's the you could probably do a good Zone training on a mountain bike in Kansas yeah maybe yeah and at that point you

might as well just have a gravel bike with 45s um yeah I mean that's kind of what I you

know basically what I would do is just you know do a bit more Zone training stay in that zone two zone three and

just do we call it LSD long sustained distance

um which is kind of like the name of the game when I was training uh and then yeah I don't know it depends if

you're depending on what kind of like riding you're doing you can gear those rides towards it as well on the road

bike though find some hills find some repeats uh or where you lack right like

maybe you do you could do a lot of climbing and don't cramp it maybe you clamp on really you know long rides that

have more flat terrain so ride the road bike on more flat stuff and you know just kind of do it like that yeah or you

could do it the way Jared does and he picks a delicious restaurant 50 miles away and that's his motivation to ride

the road bike there and you're thinking about it the whole time he actually picks it more like 80 miles away there's

like a loop around Meander's over there and then has his girlfriend meet him there yeah I'm so

excited about the food I love making it a event an occasion you know um but you're set up in the weekend

you're set up you have a gravel bike that you have multiple Wheel sets yep I have a open wide technical road bike

yeah no it's open wide right now which is a gravel bike it is a more uh uh what'd you say

conservative gravel bike compared to where some going these days um I definitely have it set up very much

like a road bike I have two Wheel sets I have Envy or the AG 25s I think AG

that sounds right AG 25s uh for my gravel Wheels with some usually Rambler

Maxis Rambler 45s that live on there um and then my road wheels are the NV

Foundation 45s that I run a gravel clean gravel King 35 slick on there so that's

kind of what I use for like Road stuff so um yeah I never read anything it's more

than 35 and I ride just fine in groups those are my setups nice all one bye one

by twelve one by twelve yes cool you haven't opened two don't you I haven't opened up open up it's gonna open up in

the Open Wide one's wider clearance than the up so you have more of a road bike

ah that you ride to the brewery um mine fits 45 says fits 40s mine is

like one degree slacker head tube angle and a touch lower bottom bracket and those are all the differences yeah I

have uh Easton oh my gosh ec90 Carbon wheels with the

Vault hubs and the pan eraser gravel King 38 38 maybe yeah

um which are kind of like 40s I have a rebel Rover frame that I haven't built up yeah yeah you do when you get on that

and we will send myself an email right now I wonder how many rides I'll get on that before I just

say I'm over drop bars make it a demo bike or put flat bars on it I just can't write drop bars I just don't want to

ride you never ever done it that was a thing you should build it up and you should do Nasco with us

oh no not gonna do that you won't come on

I have no interest in doing a ride like that oh a bunch of people and yeah you

love to test yourself physically all right road bikes around like that it doesn't sound fun at all it's for a good

cause it is fun I'll run it dude 80 miles eight thousand feet no I'll do dirt in Osco that I do

any day I think you would genuinely enjoy ripping down a descent like yerba buena yeah with no cars are on the road

I'm interested in dirt nosco how did that one work again that was like the backbone Trail yeah we did I don't think

we ended up doing it though it was unofficial though yeah of course it was unofficial we're just gonna like start with nosco and then peel off and hit a

bunch of like fire roads and single tracks but other people did it though didn't they yeah uh Dave zabriskie and

uh Robbie I think did it so that's appealing I'll do dirt in Osco yeah sick

there you go I pretty much answered that question didn't it yep now let's talk about jockey Wheels oh we're also known

as pulley Wheels pulleys you'd be a good jockey Jeff yeah I was just thinking that dude no okay somebody told me that

before somebody told me that and I was like they're like five three they're tiny yeah they're like 110 pounds yeah

someone told me that I was like really yeah I could race horses and I like look up jockeys and I was like I'm way too

big like double the size of a jockeys and 110 pounds but they are they

are small people just get a little bigger horse that's how it works and why

do they oh Rocky Wheels right that's the question the question is I was wondering why

stock spam or Shimano uh D derailers from Dior to XTR from SX to

xx1 the jockey wheels are made of nylon plastic material but aftermarket jockey

wheels are cnc'd or so is there a reason for it to be not alloy

except for weight um I think mainly it's probably for a

little forgiveness and also they run much quieter being nylon than they do uh

metal interesting some old SRAM what was that like maybe OG nine speed SRAM

X9 X XO stuff had metal wheels on it oh yeah at some point yeah oh gee like

first generation swam mountain bike stuff but it's but it's louder yeah it runs louder

um I've put some metal ones on my bike turn on Jeff's bikes yeah you can just kind of hear it when you're pedaling you

can hear it um they do look cool like those huge ceramic speed ones yeah I put some of those on one of my

gravel bikes ones but those are so big you don't hear the noise because they're bigger hmm the bearing is so smooth

um honestly I don't really know for that but my only guess would be for noise and

or it is a light it's just Pottery cost and it's cost and it's uh you're not getting

any more performance if anything you could argue less performance because of the noise but you're not really getting more performance and it's just more

expensive yeah but it is a great stylish upgrade it's definitely anodized yeah

holy Wheels yeah um and it's a wearable part so you know you are gonna have to

replace them it is cheaper to replace nylon than it is some seed metal yeah

probably one sixth of the cost yeah check this out the name jockey wheel comes from the similarity between the

placement of the wheel on a trailer and the position of a rider on a horse the wheel is designed to jockey or guide the

movement of trailers it allows you to position your trailer so it can be lifted and lowered onto a tow bar most jockey Wheels can be stowed away

securely to hide while the vehicle is moving so I guess the original jockey wheel is that little little crank thing the crank it has the crank right above

it yeah and then it says after that jockey wheels are also the little cogs on a rear driller of a bicycle they're known collectively as jockey wheels or

jockey pulleys the guide pulley is at the top yeah so so I guess that's where it

originated from hmm and then they got called that on the bicycle jockey wheels go figure

pulley Wheels definitely more called pulley wheels these days yeah yeah now that maybe it'll come jacket wheels or

just pull it Wheels I don't even know if it says jockey wheel on any of the product listings yeah Jackie

Jackie how about this one Jeff you're gonna love this my trusty Garmin 4Runner 235 recently died on me and I've been

enjoying some trackless laps as well as getting rid of a horrific watch tan there's a lot of options on the market

and I was wondering if you guys go through what you have and what you like or don't like as well as any opinions on

any other watch or computer candidates you would entertain for mountain biking running and hiking

well this is right up Jeff Sally he's right up Jeff Sally I'm a big Garmin watch fan I think they make uh the only

problem with Garmin watches is they make too many watches and you can end up in full-blown decision paralysis to figure

out which ones to get I won't even do the research I just asked Jeff and go hey which one should I get I guess you want to buy mine

it mostly boils down to price point like if you're willing to spend a thousand bucks get the Phoenix series it's the

flagship series Garmin watch and it does all the things if you're not willing to spend that

um then the Forerunner series is kind of the next best thing it's a little bit lighter a little bit more tailored towards running slash triathlete so it

still has all the cycling features um but then of course there's like this guy the 235 which was missing a ton of

features when you compare it to the higher end forerunners even now it'd be a 255 which should probably have a ton

more features than that yeah so it does it does just kind of depend on price point for the most part and what other

activities you do I have the Phoenix 7s solar Sapphire how about sounds

five Gun commercial right yeah yeah kind of does or like a Marvel character

uh I just love Garmin watches I think it's they're so incredible not only

um with the GPS technology and tracking all of your rides and all of your activities and basically everything you do from a workout in the gym to trail

running hiking snowboarding skiing mountain biking Motocross like four by four like you can use it for anything it's really cool and track all of that

and then it also tracks all of your sleep your heart rate all that the battery lasts two weeks uh so just

incredible watches they just do so much so I don't really think anyone has a leg on them at all unless you prefer

miniature iPhone on your wrist then of course the Apple watch is the way to go

um and the Apple watch Ultra is like some better GPS tracking and stuff but

it's still just a little mini iPhone on your wrist and the battery lasts a day and a half so it's like it's just

not the thing so I don't know I'm a massive fan of of Garmin um out of the

Phoenix and yeah you guys both have forerunners yeah four runner nine four five LTE yeah and then you have a 11955

I thought four five oh I got mine right before the 55 came out well I have a 945 as well

yeah the only thing I wish it had was a specific downhill biking activity yeah

that's still a hole in the line so there there's not a bike park activity there was rumors of it it was in some beta or

something but it still doesn't exist on there really I thought it was on only a couple of watches I don't remember I'd

have to look back into it but yeah I don't think it's on anything the cheat with that is you can run a snowboard or

a skiing activity because it has on the higher end watches it has those activities it has all of the resort Maps built into it so it knows when you're on

the lift and then it doesn't count the lift as elevation gain because it knows you're on the lift um and then it tells you how many runs

you did it's all it's all figured does it count any elevation gain now and does it just take basically all elevated

it'll count elevation gain um if you're not on the list gotcha so like for example last uh last winter in

Park City I was running a snowboarding activity while snowboarding and then we did some stuff where we hiked up some

big thing and did some shoot and it counted all that yeah cool um so it does it does work like that and you can use

the snowboard activity at the bike park in the summer and it works perfect and then you just change the activity again and type later but yeah it should have a

bike park activity that's what I did a Whistler the snowboard activity and it worked and it worked yeah I was just

like I didn't want to do it when we were in Italy because see that's the weird case where I don't know if it would work

because we weren't necessarily just going up the lift and then down the lift right left and down left we're going

like uplift and then we would Traverse for 10 miles and then we'd go up another one I don't even know if it would work

in that case and I wasn't willing to test it so I was just pausing mine every time we got on a lift yeah and see I

don't I wasn't doing that because I have a tendency to forget to resume it yeah so I'm like I'm just gonna let it run

and just you know think of go for an Everest every day five or six days of riding I forgot two

or three times to start it or stop it yeah yeah it's pretty good for considering we did like 30 lifts yeah

pretty good ratio yeah it's pretty much the last thing which is a niche market but the last thing they really need is

to make a mountain bike activity that excludes lifts yeah um and if it has the lifts mapped in

there and or it can recognize with the software that you're on a lift it should just know how to exclude that Garmin are

you listening you better listen to this Garmin they're in Kansas City Missouri uh but yeah I'm a huge fan of gar

watches I just I just think they're the the best thing all around you know there's some other cool products out there

um you know again Apple watch works if you make phone calls and text messages and do that stuff and you want a little

iPhone on your wrist but otherwise it's not even comparable isn't there another like GPS or the other two cool Brands yeah sundo

used to be ahead of Garmin like years ago I had a Suunto Ambit 2 and they had a better watch than Garmin like by a lot

but they kind of just fell off and they got sold to some Excel partners and like big private Equity Firm and you still

have good products but they're they're way more focused on Europe because it's a finished company and that's their target market yeah so and they just they

just lost like they just they they lost competitiveness like they just don't have the same amount of features and

models and sizes and all those other things that Garmin has right now so nice I don't know that's my that's my

stick there you go if you uh want to talk more about it just DM me on Instagram I'll send you

back five minutes worth of voice messages but yeah Garb it is hard to figure out which Garmin watch to get but

you pretty much can't go wrong with the Forerunner or Phoenix and then just spend more if you want more features if

you need them nice well Jeff you are gonna love answering this next one too

because you have all the Intel can you provide some advice on how a first-time attendee can best enjoy going

to the 2023 Snowshoe World Cup Downhill Race For example the best area to watch

the race whether it's better to move around the track what to check out other than the actual races training the pits

Etc non-racing activities and any other tips thanks so I went there last year

and it was a ton of fun it's a great rest race to spectate at there was a ton

of crazy fans and it was wild and awesome Snowshoe is very uh backwards in

the sense that the top of the race is where the pits are and where the whole

Resort is and it kind of goes down into this empty Valley and then they all lift

and take the lifts back up yeah it's super weird I've never really been to a race like that other than Snowshoe so this is a really good question

um I think the way to do it so the way we did it was we from the top we you

know during practice we walked down the track I don't know third of the way and then back up the track because everything's at the top all the

restaurants all the lodging 100 of everything is at the top the only thing that's not there is a finish obviously but on race day we went during the

women's finals we uh took the lift to the bottom and the plan was to basically

walk up the track the whole way and it's usually a bit muddy and steep in spots but you can do it and it's a ton of fun

and then you can go to all the cool spots there's a really awesome Rock Garden about 7 8 the way down the track

which is a great spectating spot yeah and then there's all these other good spots as you make your way back towards

the top so we just hiked all the way up the track during the finals which was great so I'd recommend doing that if you

really want to watch all the different sections of the track and whatnot you could a lot of people just hang out at

the bottom of every World Cup because there you have a big TV live TV board there and you can watch it but you can't

really see anything other than the last like 200 feet so uh yeah there you go the other problem

bought it for the last couple riders or the problem with being at the bottom for the last couple Riders is a lot of

people do that and there's only one way back up and it's that lift oh and so there's just like a while hour or two

hour lift back line to just get on the lift go back to the whole main Resort or

you got to walk up the course basically in silence and yeah no one on the course so wow it's not the best race for

spectating in that sense but that's the way I did it we went down there during the women's finals and then walked hiked

our way back up the course so you're going this year right Liam yeah you guys need a basically book a flight and yeah

figure out the last bit of details but I am gonna be there and it'll be fun

yep all right well if you go there this year look for Liam he'll be there look

for me no ask him a brake pad question say hi are you Liam can I ask you a

question about my MTX brake pads maybe buy me a beer dude there was that that race there was

so many people drinking and partying and there was a whole group of people dressed up as Oompa Loompas with drums

and trumpets and it was out of control it was it was so much fun it was such an awesome and that's what's also what was

cool about hiking up the track during the finals is that you got to see all of that Shenanigans

um yeah it was it was really fun so that that is I mean I think every World Cup is awesome to go and spectate and see

because you don't realize how fast those races are going until you see it in real life and it's mind-blowing

um it's really cool it also rains there a bit so make sure to bring yourself a little umbrella and a rain show but it's

gonna be the summer so you'll be warm so nice fall late summer so well I think

technically it is full yeah by the time that races when is it racism right yeah nice I feel nice out there I

got book flights yeah it's a beautiful area really cool Resort West Virginia

take me home well that's it that's all for this episode thank you very much for

listening we have our previous episode oh we also forgot our fun fact oh yeah

lobsters never stop growing that's Daniel's that's Daniel's fun fact of the week

they never stopped growing ladies and gentlemen well we can hit this one real quick how much time we have Jeff minute and a half minute half oh God all

right uh last episode we had Trevor on he had an sp-140 with Two Wheel sets a

lightweight bird set up and a more Burly downhill oriented setup said he runs heavy duty casing tires on some sort of

DT Swiss wheels so it makes a huge difference down home purposes why is that why not run Burly or bird Wheels

set up with double down casing and still save some weight um essentially

there's just a point to where having a steel spoke and a stronger Rim stronger

setup is just more confidence in spying in Rock Gardens over the bird setup I

think there's there's a point where you're going to push the birds a little too hard if you're doing proper Hard

Enduro riding and that's why keep flight casing on the birds run thick casings on

some DT Swiss I think he has five elevens front and rear um yeah yeah also

um thank you for everyone who gave Trevor positive comments so it's awesome that he filled in on that last episode and he'll be on yet again filling in for

Liam later this month so if you have any specific Trevor questions send them over to podcast worldwide cyclery.com boom

also if you give us a review on Spotify or apple podcast and screenshot it and

email that screenshot to podcast alwayscycler.com Jared will give you a little special surprise that's right

Jared specialist Jared special surprise special surprise also known as a 10 gift

card

if Jeff was really a weight weenie there would be a sort option on the website lightest to heaviest trust me I have 110

thought about that and wish we had that but the amount of data that would you

would need to make that work would be astronomical and uh it's uh if everyone was a weight weenie we would take the

time to do that but they aren't so we're not going to try and get a weight on an accurate weight on uh 18 000 products we

don't have all those products but one day if we do I will absolutely have that filter nice all right

that's it that's all thank you very much talk to you guys in the next one

September 20, 2023

MTB Podcast › Video ›

Riding Bikes In Italy, The State Of The MTB Industry, Pros & Cons of High Pivot & More... Ep. 120 [Podcast]

If you are one strange human that would like to read a transcript of the podcast above, continue reading below!

September 20, 2023

Top Products For You...

Recent Blogs

--- Shop Info ---

--- Stay In Touch ---

Newsletter Signup -