Got my new Oiz M Team on Monday. Just rode today. I am happy with this choice. LBS was 8 months for Supercaliber or Epic. Also I like the non-proprietary suspension and standard components over those brands.
Size large 22lbs, it is super light for FS and not crazy money!
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This website looks great! I’m looking at it on mobile, and doesn’t appear to be an easy way to search by model. Sounds like there is on the normal laptop version.
I may spend a lot of hours on this site this weekend!
I had that issue, I googled and came up with the 2017 Spark RC which I figured was as good as I was going to get 
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Very interesting though.
Dropping this here, since while obviously the Tallboy isn’t an XC bike, the context of this build is interesting as folks are planning out their rigs. This guy didn’t just Everest, he Olympus Mons’d!
Basically the equivalent of a very long stage race in 3 days.
194cm rider on a size XL
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Ben has some seriously long legs! Cool break down, I’m glad PB is chasing more of the endurance side of the sport recently (few years).
I really like the looks of their most recent suspension design. Keeps rear suspension components low, centered and tidy. Would love to see them find a way to implement this on an XC bike.
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I’m looking forward to listening to the pod, and you may have already talked to Keegan about this, but I think some of the XC bikes trend too slack to be truly competitive in a World Cup or technical XC course.
I was thinking about this last night wondering if bikes may swing back in the direction of steep HTA a tiny bit. Depending on the evolution of the XCO courses.
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May not provide much insight, but we should see a real life case study w/ PfP and Emily Batty. Batty is an incredibly skilled technical descender but has seemed to lose pace on climbs (Fitness or bike, who knows). PfP is a rocket on climbs, and is obviously among the best in the world pointing down but seemed to perhaps struggle a bit head to head among a Yolanda, per say, on descents.
PfP is slacking it out on the BMC from the old school Canyon
Batty is going more old school on the Canyon from a slightly more slacked Supercal
Maybe we see some changes in results or style… Idk, probably not, they’re both beyond good enough to adapt.
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I agree, that will be interesting. I suspect you’re right that both are probably strong enough in both aspects to marginalise the difference. Some of the other women are much more lacking in technical ability (compared to their peers/their pedaling strength) and they would make a very interesting case study.
I think Jolanda would embarrass many men and women on any bike 
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MVdP has been making a few comments recently about how highly he is prioritizing the Olympic XCO race. Given how technical the Tokyo course looks it’ll be interesting to see what Canyon does. You’d think that might motivate an update.
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100%. She could do that before training and joy riding with Luca Shaw 
. I’d like to see her enter a DH WC just for sh*ts and giggles.
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I think if we’re looking at it from that perspective than it means WCO courses should continue to trend towards keeping the course as technical as possible. I love seeing A lines, and B lines and courses need to continue to reward skill and fitness.
I get that this boils down to preference to a degree but I’ve never ridden a bike that was a bit slacker and felt impeded by it, rather the opposite, although I suppose if I was riding a million corner type of course I might change my mind but the reality is that’s not how WCO courses are evolving.
I’m going to also continue to bring up fork rake which has much of a noticeable affect on cornering as HTA.
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I’d hate it because I’d have to order a Tallboy. My Hightower has the lower new suspension and I really like it. And who doesn’t need another bike?!
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I don’t disagree, I really enjoy watching the WC courses that have true technical a and b lines. There should absolutely be a reward for MTB skill. I don’t personally want to see it become fire road up and super gnar down though.
I hope they don’t take away the tight and technical climbing in order to facilitate long and slack style down country bikes.
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I don’t think you have to worry about the courses changing to meet the bike design. It’s actually been the reverse from what I’ve observed. Tends to follow the following pattern
- Course designer adds features or changes to make it more exciting to watch or more fun to ride
- More spectators watch and more revenue generated, or riders enjoy riding it
- Other course designers observe and do the same
- Eventually bikes become sub-optimal for new courses and bike designers adapt
- Bikes become more optimized so course designers start over at step 1
Riders have started to push back against features that are too dangerous or too frustrating to ride, which lead to the chicken wire being added on some of the descents so I think we are starting to max out against the consequence level of features.
I think where you will see course design being lead by bike design is in e-bike racing. The cart is leading the horse for those.
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Just want to throw this out there. Just talked to the owner at the local Santa Cruz dealer. Not only had she not heard any news about a potential new blur, she said that SC told them they have no stock of any 2021 bikes to sell this year. Obviously a new model might be a little different, but it’s certainly going to be hard to get when it comes out. I was thinking I might wait to see the specs, but if I can find an Epic I’ll probably pull the trigger.
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Something to add to this is that yes the bike kinematics matter a lot but so does the shock tune. A bike with relatively low A/S values but with a heavily damped or digressive compression tune will not have the “active” behavior you might expect at sag.
In other words, looking at the kinematic plots won’t tell you everything about how the bike feels and behaves and it’s always good to throw a leg over and test it out.
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On the bikes and geometry it is horses for courses.
Take the Supercaliber - I would certainly agree that it is not as progressive as the Epic. But to be honest, that was one of the reasons I bought it. I liked the slightly more snappy feel - and I felt many of the bikes with a HTA of say 67ish felt sluggish. Note I talk about feeling here rather than perhaps reality.
Equally as a powerful (and heavier) rider I appreciate the stiff platform of the Supercaliber and was actually considering a HT - so in some ways the 60ish mm travel is a bonus and certainly enough to take the sting out of the riding i do.
I will mainly use it for longer XC / mararthon stuff and even some stage racing - none of it technical as current XCO style racing. And for that I think it is pretty much perfect.
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This is very true, good point!
One trick with fox rear shocks on new bikes that I like to do is find a photo with the 4 digit code imprinted on it and go to Fox’s service section: Bike Help Center | FOX
You can look up the shock id and get the tuning specs before you even test ride and that can help determine whether you’ll be able to use spacers in the shock or not.
Example from PinkBike for the Scalpel
They mention a custom compression tune in the article and when I plug in the code I see that the bike is stock running a low compression, medium rebound, climb firm tune. Given the low AS rates of the Scalpel, it’s not surprising they would do a slightly firmer compression tune for the WC and potentially soften the climb state a little bit for how wet Nove Mesto was going to be
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