£5000 vs £2000 vs £500 ? Anyone ever done a test ?

weeksy59

Just wondering when people say about heavy/light bikes, AM bikes, XC bikes, etc etc has anyone or a Mag done a test over say a 20 mile terrain course on the above sort of value bikes and seen what the comparison in times/speeds were overall ?

I'd be really interested to see the results.

MacAndCheese

Never seen one, but I own/have owned bikes around the 2k mark and 500 mark, there's a big difference there, especially if both are full sus'. Not sure how much difference for 5K as I've never had the pleasure, but i'm guessing it wouldn't be as big a difference as from 2k to £500, probably just a lot lighter.

Justinjured

what mountain bike took entry level bikes to a xc race a while back. There were plenty of pictures showing the £500 rigs comfortably passing bikes costing 3K!

just goes to show its the rider that is the biggest performance factor!

weeksy59

Justinjured wrote:

what mountain bike took entry level bikes to a xc race a while back. There were plenty of pictures showing the £500 rigs comfortably passing bikes costing 3K!

just goes to show its the rider that is the biggest performance factor!

That's not really the question though mate.

Steve Peat could be on an Argos special and would beat me on a £5000 machine.

x-isle

weeksy59 wrote:

Justinjured wrote:

what mountain bike took entry level bikes to a xc race a while back. There were plenty of pictures showing the £500 rigs comfortably passing bikes costing 3K!

just goes to show its the rider that is the biggest performance factor!

That's not really the question though mate.

Steve Peat could be on an Argos special and would beat me on a £5000 machine.

I bet he wouldn't......... Peaty would destroy an Argos special within 20 Meters.....

weeksy59

x-isle wrote:

weeksy59 wrote:

Justinjured wrote:

what mountain bike took entry level bikes to a xc race a while back. There were plenty of pictures showing the £500 rigs comfortably passing bikes costing 3K!

just goes to show its the rider that is the biggest performance factor!

That's not really the question though mate.

Steve Peat could be on an Argos special and would beat me on a £5000 machine.

I bet he wouldn't......... Peaty would destroy an Argos special within 20 Meters.....

Then throw it on his shoulder, jog past me as i'm screaming with fear on the downhill

Beardface

Ok, my bike was £2k new (Marin Mount Vision '08 ), my friend has a Whyte-E120, with all the gubbins (chris king hubs, BB & headset, thomson seat/stem, carbon bars, pushed shocks etc.. I'm very jealous BTW ). His build comes to just over £4k, and another friend has a Carrera Banshee (can't quite remember which one, it's green), which IIRC he paid approx £700 for.

I've ridden all three over the same trails, and can safely say that the biggest difference was, obviously, between the £500 and the £4k bike. IMHO, I didn't notice too much difference between my bike and the Whyte, except for acceleration, coasting and weight (ok, so a fair bit of difference!)

Essentially though, the Marin and Whyte have the same quad linkage system, so they both felt quite similar, whereas the Carrera has a different linkage (akin to Konas.. faux-bar, is it?), so did feel completely different (it's also considered a freeride bike, as opposed to an XC/Trail bike)

Times etc, I was quickest on my bike (probably because I'm used to my bike, how it handles etc), closely followed by the Whyte. I was slowest on the Carrera, but did feel pretty confident on it, and I was a bit scared of breaking my mates Whyte to give it a true thrashing!!

Anyway, not sure if that helps at all, but there you go

weeksy59

Excellent, thanks...

How much quicker/slower and over what distance/time ?

supersonic

If we take a typical off the peg XC bike, and weights, then at £500 you can expect 30lbs, at £1000 25lbs, at £2000 22lbs and at £5000 you will dip below 20lbs.

Beardface

It probably was over about 20 miles thinking about it, over the Surrey Hills.

I can't remember exact times, but I know the Marin and the Whyte were pretty similar, 5 or 10 minutes difference over the same hills/runs (but, as above, I was a bit worried about pushing it on the Whyte, I don't have a spare few grand kicking about to pay for his broken bike!!)

The Carerra was slower, I didn't time myself, but everything felt slower, I felt more worn out afterwards etc (but that could be due to a number of things!) But, it's still a great bike for the price! Pretty confidence inspiring too.

Also, the Carrera is a different bike altogether compared to the Marin or Whyte, so it would be an unfair comparison to be honest. If it was a £500-£700 XC bike, it could have been a different story!

saltyman

i have a carbon s-works £4k-5k when new and it blows away anything i have owned previously, my past bikes in recent years all come within the £600-£1300 area.

comfort, reliability and lightness are obvious, but when it comes to speed and times etc, thats all down to the rider.

also, a new £600 isnt far off a £1300 bike in my experience, fancy names and build quality the main thing apart from the slight difference in weight.

weeksy59

saltyman wrote:

comfort, reliability and lightness are obvious, but when it comes to speed and times etc, thats all down to the rider..

So same rider, 3 different bikes ?

scotto

aren't whyte designed by the one of the founders of marin?

neil²

Someone's got to say it.... it might as well be me! 8) 8)

I am very willing to take anyone's £2000 or £5000 MTB and compare it with my £500 (albeit upgraded) one.



but seriously...

I think that it's about the next limiting thing in the system. If the rider's not fit, it doesn't matter what they're riding... if they are fit and have no confidence they'll take things more slowly... a better bike should inspire confidence, even if it's a placebo effect, and result in a better performance... climbing is power / weight ratio (+ friction) so lighter and smoother running = quicker OR less power needed.

What's limiting you which is the easiest to fix - focus on that.

bluechair84

As I can best remember, Jon whyte wanted to design a crazy linkage driven front end for a Marin but they weren't best impressed with the idea so he started his own company. The bonds with Marin were kept though and most of his ideas such as the TARA, then the quad links all started life on Whyte bikes before being put into use on Marins, the exception being the PRST-1 linkage fork.

I'd love to know how his old PRST-1 fork would handle with a contemporary anti bob shock against the current batch of Foxs...

And with regards to the question, I think laws of diminishing returns reigns here. £1000 could be twice as good as a £500. £2000 not 2x as good as a £1000 bike. £5000 bike DEFINATELY not twice as good as a £2500 bike!!!

The Spiderman

Rode a new £3k 2010 carbon Epic at the Bike show today.Yes it felt very good,but I think you hit the law of diminshing retrurns once you get past the 2k mark.

SDK2007

The current problem is £2k bikes from 2008 now cost £3k

supersonic

The price for a decent entry level HT has certainly risen. Cut throat market at this end of the spectrum too.

ride_whenever

one of the mags did old banger (steel gt rigid) vs. allrounder bike (some 1 grand FS IIRC) and 3k super bike then tested them over various disciplines with various riders.

really good article

supersonic

Did the GT win?!

Whytepeak

ride_whenever wrote:

one of the mags did old banger (steel gt rigid) vs. allrounder bike (some 1 grand FS IIRC) and 3k super bike then tested them over various disciplines with various riders.

really good article

that was in MBUK a while back, was a good article.

The rigid bike nearly won the climb IIRC. I'll have to find them mag.