Hard tail or full suss for a newbie?

rdbcam

Hello.

I've been reading this forum for a while and have found it a really useful source of info while I've been looking at buying a bike and I was hoping some of you could help me out with some final considerations.

I live in Cambridge, and have reasonable Trek and Specialized dealers nearby. I had been looking for a hardtail, with a budget of up £1k and will be taking some test rides on a rockhopper and a trek 6700 soon.

However, I noticed today that a Specialized FSRxc Comp is about the same price as the Rockhopper pro - would a full suspension bike be wasted on a newbie such as me (whose only cycling experience so far is the daily thrash to work and back - all on a hybrid)?

I'll mainly be riding fairly light xc, some trails when I can get to them, eg at Thetford.

One final consideration - I tip the scales at a fairly hefty 100kg. The FSR comes with a Tora coil fork - is this likely to have a problem with my weight in comparison with the better fork on the Rockhopper pro?

Thanks in advance for your help!

Dan67

At Thetford you wont need a full susser hardtails are just as fast, if not faster. You will also get better components with a hardtail as they have more money to go on the parts as the frame is cheaper to make and design.

Have you had a look at cubes as they have a great spec and Ride really well from the ones I have ridden

As for the fork- before you leave the shop with the bike get them to change the spring if you cant get the amount of sag you want. Fishersoutdoor (rockshox distributor) are selling them for about £30 (from your lBS of course)

dave_hill

As a noob, I'd go for the hardtail every time. They encourage better riding technique where a full susser can hide poor form and mask mistakes which a hardtail won't let you get away with.

Learn to ride on an HT then move up to FS if you feel like it.

topo

Depends what riding you are doing. if its general trail riding XC stuff then it doesn't make much difference. Hardtail will roll better but ful sus will give you a smoother ride if it gets a bit rougher. Im assuming your doing light XC though.

GT Destroyer

Hardtail to start with - I quite like the Cube bikes mentioned already. Once you are super smooth with the H/T then usually the upgrade to F/S is the way to go.

streako

Yep, deffo a hardtail. Especially living in Cambridge.

Better for learning how to ride off road, plus much less in terms of maintainance as full sussers can require new shock bushings every 6 months or so, not to mention shock servicing costs.

streako

I would recommend a Rockshox Reba fork. I have been running one for about 18 months, with numerous enduros, races, and other crappy riding abuse. Its still lovely apart from plenty of scratches.