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[tunnie]

Biggest frustration I have with the mountain bike is that it's geared too short for the road. Plenty of downhill stuff near me and over 20MPH you just have to sit there and coast. On the racer I can push it up to 35MPH (then I start thinking about how old the bike is ). There's a lot more drag on the mountain bike, but then mine has knobbly tyres. Not such an issue for me as I'm cycling to get fit anyway, so effort is what I need, but for longer rides (I probably do 10-20 miles on average) the racer is much less effort.

Yeah I'm annoyed by that, going flat out and Road bikes still go zooming past. With my long legs I could easily achieve a higher cruising speed.

My other thoughts are get a road bike for the commute & fix up the current one when I'm looking to go off road. 

[tunnie]

One for sale on Scumtree,all the details should be there.Im pretty sure they are all the same,as they were a limited edition thing for Mazda.I dont believe they were actually available to be bought retail, although the value at the time was put at around £650 iirc.

http://www.gumtree.com/p/for-sale/bianchi-mazda-zoom-zoom-mountain-bike/106159232

If I'm reading that right, its 54cm frame 

[feeutfo]

Biggest frustration I have with the mountain bike is that it's geared too short for the road. Plenty of downhill stuff near me and over 20MPH you just have to sit there and coast. On the racer I can push it up to 35MPH (then I start thinking about how old the bike is ). There's a lot more drag on the mountain bike, but then mine has knobbly tyres. Not such an issue for me as I'm cycling to get fit anyway, so effort is what I need, but for longer rides (I probably do 10-20 miles on average) the racer is much less effort.

Yeah I'm annoyed by that, going flat out and Road bikes still go zooming past. With my long legs I could easily achieve a higher cruising speed.

My other thoughts are get a road bike for the commute & fix up the current one when I'm looking to go off road. 

guess a third chain ring on the front is needed...?

[albitz]

One for sale on Scumtree,all the details should be there.Im pretty sure they are all the same,as they were a limited edition thing for Mazda.I dont believe they were actually available to be bought retail, although the value at the time was put at around £650 iirc.

http://www.gumtree.com/p/for-sale/bianchi-mazda-zoom-zoom-mountain-bike/106159232

If I'm reading that right, its 54cm frame 

No idea tbh. Cushion on the seat ? 

[tunnie]

Biggest frustration I have with the mountain bike is that it's geared too short for the road. Plenty of downhill stuff near me and over 20MPH you just have to sit there and coast. On the racer I can push it up to 35MPH (then I start thinking about how old the bike is ). There's a lot more drag on the mountain bike, but then mine has knobbly tyres. Not such an issue for me as I'm cycling to get fit anyway, so effort is what I need, but for longer rides (I probably do 10-20 miles on average) the racer is much less effort.

Yeah I'm annoyed by that, going flat out and Road bikes still go zooming past. With my long legs I could easily achieve a higher cruising speed.

My other thoughts are get a road bike for the commute & fix up the current one when I'm looking to go off road. 

guess a third chain ring on the front is needed...?

Yeah, or a Road Bike.

Just been crunching the numbers on the Cycle to Work Schemes they do, big savings to be had. Take a salary reduction for 12 months, saving on NI & Tax.

£600 voucher, net cost in the end is around £390

[Weds]

I know a friend of mine - who rides a lot (40+ mile trips are her 'Sunday ride') was told by a bike shop not to get a CF frame as they're easily damaged, can't be put on a bike rack on a car and are only designed to last a season; not sure if that follows with just CF forks but it'd be a sod to buy them and have them collapse on you over a pothole!

Carbon fibre framed bikes certainly last more than one season. I have a CF road and MTB, the MTB is from about 2006 and has been around the trails in Wales and Down Hill courses in the Alps its still in one piece. The CF road bikes survives riding the potholes in Kent and hasn't broken yet. Both bikes have been on bike racks without any problems.

[Rods2]

Gearing should be considered as part of buying the bike. My mountain bike has three front chain wheels, with quite high gearing for the road and well as low gearing for off road hill climbing on dirt surfaces. My racing bike has high top gearing for speed.

My racing bike big ring and top gear is 52 / 13 and good for up to 45mph and I can't remember what my mountain bike is, but is is good for about 35mph.

Frames built with exotic materials are basically a marketing fad to get you to part with more money, unless you are a professional or serious amateur racer, then the extra 1-2% performance is important. Much more important is the quality of the groupset (wheel hubs, gears, chain set, bottom bracket bearings, gear changer, brakes and pedals). The higher the groupset the better the quality, the better the precision engineering, the more maintenance free they will be and especially how long they will last. With wheels the deeper the aluminium extrusion the more robust they will be on our pot hole strewn roads and the much less often they will need truing up.

By far the biggest factor for speed is: Your strength and fitness after that the type of bike / gearing / saddle and handle bar height are correctly set up / tyre type and width.

My mountain bike has knobbly tyres so there is much more road friction than my racing bike that I used to use for time trialing which has 20mm width, racing tyres and the riding position is much more upright on the mountain bike, so there is more wind resistance.

[tunnie]

Thanks for everyones comments, my fitness on the bike is reasonable.

I've tried a few halfrauds bikes (be it just sitting on them) they felt very cheap and not really that cheap.

So strongly considering this now:

http://www.evanscycles.com/products/specialized/hardrock-disc-2012-mountain-bike-ec030131

Upgrading tyres to Road based if I need more go 

Leaves Mountain tyres spare for when its taken off road at the weekend 

[Gaffers]

I have been looking for a new bike in preparation for a couple of half Ironmans next year and the Ribble TT carbon bikes impressed me a lot for the price.

That said I have decided to wait and see whats about close to christmas after the hype of this summer and everyone selling the unused bikes in their garages 



Tunnie, if you want to get faster on the bike then you need to get in the gym and do some deadlift, squats, cleans and jerks  a couple of months concentrating on those and your legs will be so powerful you'll breeze along on the bike.  Couple it with some fast-twitch exercises to get even more benefit.  On the DL start with half your body weight and build up from there with 4 sets of 4 reps.  Keep adjusting your weight until you max out at the end of a session.  I did that starting at 60kg and I am now on 220kg yet still sprinting 400m in 1m20s. Plus my distance runnng has become a lot easier as I ue less energy to run now thanks to the increased strength.

I cant wait to do a Triathlon wen I get back

[feeutfo]

Maybe. But if the bike is geared wrong or geared too short, you can be as fit as you like , you'll be spinning away getting nowhere.

[GastronomicKleptomaniac]

... of course, the great thing about riding a tatty old bike is that when you leave it somewhere, it's still there when you get back.

Pfft, try one of my local town centres. You daren't stop the wheels rotating...

I have two bikes, ones my posh Specialised Secteur which is my "it isn't going to rain in the next 3 days, and I can lock it up at work" one. And an old... I can't even remember the make... mountain bike that gets used and abused for everything. Both have their ups and downs.

 The biggest complaint for me is that road bikes and potholes don't make great friends - on the old'un, I can be a little less careful.

[TheBoy]

Gave my bikes to my little bro last summer, as I went to all the effort to bring them to Brackley when I moved here, and they never left the premises

TBH, not much opportunity to use them here, without driving somewhere first.

[Elite Pete]

Jesus, I thought a bike was a bike. My old butchers bike has taken me on and off road without a hitch

[tunnie]

Tunnie, if you want to get faster on the bike then you need to get in the gym and do some deadlift, squats, cleans and jerks  a couple of months concentrating on those and your legs will be so powerful you'll breeze along on the bike.  Couple it with some fast-twitch exercises to get even more benefit.  On the DL start with half your body weight and build up from there with 4 sets of 4 reps.  Keep adjusting your weight until you max out at the end of a session.  I did that starting at 60kg and I am now on 220kg yet still sprinting 400m in 1m20s. Plus my distance runnng has become a lot easier as I ue less energy to run now thanks to the increased strength.

I cant wait to do a Triathlon wen I get back

That sounds like an awful lot of work! 

When I did cycle into Uni few years ago, I noticed the improvements day by day, little quicker, hills easier and easier, average speed always going up.

I took the plunge and bought that one I linked above, if I want it to go faster I'll prepare myself better, then fit thinner tyres and lock in shoe pedals if needed.

Looking forward to picking it up and doing some trips on it 

[aaronjb]

Bumping an old thread..

Tunnie, in your searching, did you see if anyone is still making mountain bikes with no suspension? Everywhere I look they have at least soft front forks - which would be no use with me on it, it'd be down on it's bump stops!

[edit] Specifically not kids bikes, of course - I can find those with no suspension although they all have 'lightweight' rims that I imagine would buckle under my weight!

[edit edit] There I was, looking on all sorts of specialist websites.. Halfords have loads