Does full suss lead to poor skills?

BullFreerider

Yeh best to ride a hardtail for a few years of proper mtb to get used to how the bike reacts underneath you. the longer you do that for the better a rider you become. i started riding full-suss after 10 years of riding hardtail (and that was on some pretty harsh trails!!)

Anonymous

BullFreerider wrote:

Yeh best to ride a hardtail for a few years of proper mtb to get used to how the bike reacts underneath you. the longer you do that for the better a rider you become. i started riding full-suss after 10 years of riding hardtail (and that was on some pretty harsh trails!!)

Give it a rest. If someone's first bike is a hardtail, great. If someone's first bike is a full suss, great. It's crap that "everyone should start on a hardtail", complete bollorkcs.
Start (and stick to) whatever YOU prefer, whether that's boingy or rattly.

Jedi

its totally irellevent what bike you ride.
skilld and techniques are what make the difference. susp[ension allows a degree of comfort and get out of jail free ness

themanfromdelmonte

Jedi wrote:

its totally irellevent what bike you ride.
skilld and techniques are what make the difference. susp[ension allows a degree of comfort and get out of jail free ness

And you learn from your mistakes, If the bike is letting you get away with errors, you're less likely to learn from them.

Northwind

Jedi wrote:

its totally irellevent what bike you ride.
skilld and techniques are what make the difference. susp[ension allows a degree of comfort and get out of jail free ness

Buuuut, it's that "get out of jail free" card that can mean you can ride the same thing with less skill/finesse. Note, CAN, not will.

I was thinking about this again out riding today, I took my full suss out just since I've not used it for a while, and ended up coming down a section locally called Chocolate Chute, which is basically just slopey rooty chaos, with added leaf mould compost and a small sheen of ice just now. Bit silly really but it's fun. Doing that on the Soul (same front travel, same tyres) it's an exercise in balance and weight control and occasional little half pedals to keep the rear wheel moving (there's sections of scooped out roots where the rear will hang up if you let it, pitching you forward and, if you're unlucky, over). And you need to be careful where the rear goes as well due to the number of diagonal roots, it's very inclined to track the roots instead of going over.

On the GT, it's still not easy due to the lack of grip but all I need to worry about is balance and finding the front traction, and picking the right line for the front- I just forgot about the rear entirely and basically banged through the hardest bits. But then, I pushed back up and did it again but trying to ride like I would on the Soul, and lo and behold- smoother, faster and in much more control. And more down to me than to my bike, which is always nice.

But, I think if I'd not ridden it before on a HT, I wouldn't have even considered that, I'd have thought "Got down that nicely, no moments, pleased with that" and ridden on. I didn't use a single skill which you couldn't learn on a full suss, but I did use skills which I didn't need on the full suss, and which I've learned on the HT specifically because I had to. And I know I used the exact same tricks constantly trying to convince my HT that it really could ride down bits of the fort william world cup DH I'm fairly sure that my full suss could do the same there as it did today.

Now, ymmv of course but situations like that are exactly where I'm coming from. Like I say, absolutely no skills used that I couldn't have learned on the GT, the only thing that makes the difference is asking, would I have learned them? TBH I doubt it.


Buuuut, thing is, I could say the same about other things. Like, maybe if I'd kept the Kraken instead of getting the Soul, its poorer descending manners would be teaching me higher skills at that. Maybe if I had an Anthem I'd be doing the same. If I had a Glory or something I'd be riding stuff I don't dare currently, I expect, and learning yet more different skills. So it's not one type of bike's better, I think all bikes can teach you their own tricks.

Jedi

if you dont want to learn from your mistakes you dont have too.

it's bike riding not war!

Northwind

Jedi wrote:

it's bike riding not war!

It is! War to the knife between the hated enemies The FS Coalition and the Nation of Hardtails.

fcumok

Not read all of this thread but I was having a long think about this today as I took the full susser out which I haven't used for a while. Some of the loop was the same that I did on a hardtail the other night.

I can really push the full susser over the rough stuff which means I get through it faster. The hardtail will kill climbs like nothing and I 'feel' the ride more. The full susser doesn't ruin what skills I need it just makes the ride smoother. I still need to pick the correct lines and make sure the winter mud doesn't send me surfing on my face.

If I was to pick one bike out of the two to have fun on it'd be the hardtail every time. If I wanted to push myself over a long distance the full susser wins.

But that's just my opinion and I wouldn't argue with someone who thought different. At the end of the day it's about enjoying yourself on the bike that feels right for you and stuff everyone else :P

Dick Scruttock

I started life on a rigid, then went for front suspension, gave up, started again on a stumpjumper fsr, then a heckler. Then i ended up with a Malt 4 and a Blur LT2. At this moment in time i am disliking the Malt more and more with each ride. I think its more about where i ride but from riding the FS bikes and having no more than 2 punctures on the Malt everytime i have ridden it has resulted in a puncture. Now i put this down to the way i am riding it and the lines i am taking, I dont intend to change the way i ride now really to compensate for the HT so i can see it going up for sale soon.

joshtp

Northwind wrote:

Jedi wrote:

it's bike riding not war!

It is! War to the knife between the hated enemies The FS Coalition and the Nation of Hardtails.

there is a secret meeting of the Nation Of Hardtails at brechfa black car park next saterday, be there, or die. following is the secret code needed to be accepted. the decoded word should be written in big letters on ones bike.

glesxiew

Northwind

Cool, I'll bring the Idrive.

Northwind

Rick Draper wrote:

I think its more about where i ride but from riding the FS bikes and having no more than 2 punctures on the Malt everytime i have ridden it has resulted in a puncture. Now i put this down to the way i am riding it and the lines i am taking,

Nice case in point that

upinsmoke

Remember opinions are like ar5e holes and it's everyone elses that stink. Not mine.

You lot are worse than the guitar forum. It's not even healthy debate.

ChrisMidsUK

upinsmoke wrote:

Remember opinions are like ar5e holes and it's everyone elses that stink. Not mine.

You lot are worse than the guitar forum. It's not even healthy debate.

Funny you should mention guittars. I used to play a bit myself and my recent experiences in local bike stores remind me of that same atmosphere in certain guitar shops.

Almost like a western saloon bar scenario when I walk in, as if to say 'what the hell are you doing in here?'.
Loads of blokes milling around trying to seem important.

Nobody in the bike shop trying to play stairway to heaven though.

Anonymous

Actually, my local bike shop was, until very recently a guitar shop! I wonder how many people have walked in, looked at all the bikes, and said "so..... do you still sell gutiars?"

toasty

Does playing solely electric lead to poor acoustic skills?

Paulie W

When I first started MTBing I had a HT, 80mm travel. I crashed what seemed a lot because I tried to take things too fast or chose the wrong line. After about 12 months I bought a FS (100mm front and back). I stopped crashing (a) because I was growing in experience (b) because it let me get away with some stuff the HT didnt. After a couple of years I cracked the frame on the FS and recently bought myself a HT (mainly because I had a relatively limited budget and wanted a qood quality HT over a moderate FS). I didnt suddenly start crashing again because I'd learnt so much from just riding, but I did find myself a bit closer to cacking my pants when taking lines that i didnt think twice about on the FS. My point is that experience is the real key to skill - the more you ride the better you get, no matter what you ride - but HTs and FSussers do require, initially at least, different thinking as to how you attack a trail. I suspect that someone who started off on a FS then switched to a HT while relatively inexperienced might find that they intially came off quite a bit until they recognised this.

Northwind

I think just maybe, riding a full suss to start could mean you learn faster You can take on harder stuff earlier I reckon. Depends on how you try to learn but if you jump in 2 footed that might work.

(like, it would be very hard to learn how to ride mad steep rocky stuff like a DH course on a 100mm ht Mainly what you'll do is maim yourself. Wheres if you had a big hit, you'll still maim yourself but you might get over a couple of rocks first. Then again, if you had a big hit you'd never learn anything at a typical trail centre since you'll have a coronary halfway up the hill.

cee

Northwind wrote:

Wheres if you had a big hit, you'll still maim yourself but you might not get the bike completely out of the car...

there fixed that for you.

cee

Toasty wrote:

Does playing solely electric lead to poor acoustic skills?

yes.

I only play acoustic. when i try to play an electric guitar, i find that i have the touch of an epileptic ape.

joshtp

Northwind wrote:

(like, it would be very hard to learn how to ride mad steep rocky stuff like a DH course on a 100mm ht

errr, i did.....

Anonymous

joshtp/mbukman wrote:

Northwind wrote:

(like, it would be very hard to learn how to ride mad steep rocky stuff like a DH course on a 100mm ht

errr, i did.....

I think he means places like Chatel, or Garbanzo etc. They're certainly rideable on a HT, but are very much more suited to a DH bike.

biff55

Toasty wrote:

Does playing solely electric lead to poor acoustic skills?

class.

Northwind

yeehaamcgee wrote:

I think he means places like Chatel, or Garbanzo etc. They're certainly rideable on a HT, but are very much more suited to a DH bike.

Well, I had the fort william DH in mind when I wrote that, but yeah, probably those would work too.

joshtp

Northwind wrote:

yeehaamcgee wrote:

I think he means places like Chatel, or Garbanzo etc. They're certainly rideable on a HT, but are very much more suited to a DH bike.

Well, I had the fort william DH in mind when I wrote that, but yeah, probably those would work too.

i aint fort bill (althoug the nick name is "mini fort bill" but i learnt to ride on a Kona Fire Mountain, on Kilvey hill, wich is a national race level DH track.

GhallTN6

Going from full suss back to a hardtail is like anything you haven't done for a while, you'll be a bit rusty to start with but soon get back into it, the advantage being that you'll be more confident from riding a full suss and have a go at things you might not have if you'd just stayed with a hardtail.

Bit like Hamilton going back to carting, probably lose the first lap, but then once he's re-climatised, he'll trash the competition.

1995.. Muddyfox chromo, rigid, loved it.. until it got nicked..
2005.. GT Avalanche 1.0 Disk, HT.. Loved it, but wanted to go faster..
2007.. Marin Mount vision.. 100mm full suss.. loved it, but wanted to go faster..
2009.. yeti 575 Carbon.. after one ride, love it, makes me go faster!

_Ferret_

it depends on 3 things:
how you ride
where you ride
what you ride

Personally I don't think full sus leads to poor skills, for me it has allowed me to develop my skills further, but then others might get a full sus and get lazy on it...