The Radavist

Yes, those astute readers of this website will recognize this bike. Kyle photographed it at Grinduro Scotland already, along with the bikes of other builders. It was the only mountain bike in the bunch and it coincidentally won the People’s Choice award at Grinduro Scotland, which is why it’s here in California right now. Adeline makes Mercredi Bikes in the UK. Her torch time is usually spent on road and ‘cross bikes, but this mountain bike was her first, in terms of building and the first MTB she’s owned. A serious cyclocross racer, it didn’t take much for Adeline to adjust to racing this mountain bike at Grinduro, where she won. I’ve always been of the opinion that riding mountain bikes will enhance your ‘cross skills and she’s quickly finding that to be true.

Things don’t always go as planned. That’s what I have to tell myself all the time. Last winter, Clayton from WTB and I planned on doing the Tahoe Rim Trail, the week of Interbike, not with any political agenda in mind, just that it worked for both of our schedules. It was the only week where neither of us had anything penned in our calendars.

While you can do the TRT on a rigid bike, you’ll probably have more fun on at least a hardtail. Clayton’s route includes a lot of singletrack on the eastern side of the lake and like everything up there, it can be rowdy at times. I planned on bringing my Stinner Frameworks, with a few component upgrades, which would make the long days and high elevation gain a bit easier. All I needed were some bags.

I’ve been using Porcelain Rocket bags for quite a while now and while my trusty frame bag fits my road or cross bikes, even my 44 UTE quite well, it wouldn’t cram into my hardtail. Around the time I was planning for this, Scott from Porcelain Rocket launched his sealed waterproof bags, with the first special color offering being “Prolly Gold,” or Coyote as the rest of the world calls it. I was honored and slightly amused at the playful nod to my obsession with various shades of tan, so I reached out to Scott, with the emphasis on the byline: nothing special, just want to buy a bag.

Hello, my name is John and I’m a hardtail addict. I’m not sure when or where it began, but when framebuilders send me bikes to review, specifically hardtail mountain bikes, I tend to want to buy the framesets from them. Most recently, this Stinner Frameworks Tunnel 27.5+ bike, which I reviewed a little while back when it was built with Box Components and Magura products.

Coming from my stout and solid Retrotec, the Stinner offered a much lighter, zippier feel. It wasn’t necessarily a better ride, just a different one. One that I liked a lot, save for one major – to me at least – flaw: it only had one water bottle mount on the inside triangle.

Our Saddle Drive photos continue with a custom-built Surly Karate Monkey, pulled together by the team at Teravail tires, specifically to model their Coronado 27.5+ tires. Painted Jade Green, I can’t help but think of it as a trail dragon, with the Teravail logo and tire tread being the scales. This thing scorches the trails and I love seeing in house brands at QBP work with the other family brands on something special like this.

When I first heard the news that Box Components had branched over from BMX racing products to mountain bike componentry, I was eager to get some hands-on experience with their shifter, derailleur, and big-range cassette. A few weeks later, the Box rep visited Golden Saddle Cyclery and I was able to see it. Albeit not on a bike, so when Stinner Frameworks offered to build a review bike for me, built with Box, for NAHBS, I was stoked. I love riding and reviewing hardtails and since Stinner is one of the local builders in the Los Angeles area, I like helping him out when I can, particularly when it comes to mountain bike design. Aaron Stinner had been working on their Tunnel hardtail design over the past year. Previous versions popped up here on the site and with some feedback, he had finally moved closer to nailing down the official Stinner Frameworks hardtail. The team had two bikes on display at NAHBS this year, Kyle’s Grateful Shred 27.5+ and this Fuck Yeah Desert Tan 27.5″. I was excited to try it out, but I was also looking forward to putting miles in on Box Component and Magura’s latest offerings.

Tom’s Super Shreddy Stinner One-Off 26+ Hardtail
Photos by Kyle Kelley, words by John Watson

Working at Stinner Frameworks for the past few months, and other builders over the past few years, Tom LaMarche has learned a lot about frame fabrication. Riding BMX and MTBs for a majority of his life taught him about frame design. Tom’s a ripper. An ex-Hollywood movie professional stuntman and overall ripper. When he picked up a job at Stinner, he really wanted to build a new MTB for himself to shred on trails, random jibs and also rip on at bike parks. Not being a fan of 27.5 or 29+ platforms, he decided on a 26+ frameset with slack angles and a lot of standover clearance.

This frame is a one-off, labeled a Stinner because it happened under Aaron’s roof, with Aaron’s tools, but this bike is Tom’s brainchild that he built on his own. Bikes like this look mean, like they have their own agenda and I can’t wait to see more of that…

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Follow Kyle on Instagram and Tom on Instagram.

People often ask what I love most about my job. After the obvious – riding bikes – comes watching projects like this unfold. Paul Price lives in Chico and is the man behind Paul Component Engineering. He’s been in this game for a while and has been to NAHBS countless times over the years. In that time, he’s watched a lot of new names pop up in the framebuilding circuit, most notably Sean from Oddity Cycles. Sean’s creations are whacky, fun and offer very unique riding characteristics. For one, they’re titanium, which at smaller diameters, can be flexy. Not in a bad way, just in a unique way. Next up, Sean bends the shit out of the tubes, making them swoopy and thus increasing the wow factor.

Before we jump into the coverage from my visit to Somerset, England’s the Bicycle Academy, I thought I’d share a very special bike. You might recognize this hardtail from the video I shared a few months back. It made its debut in the Tom Ritchey Old Skool New School video. It was built by Tom, while he was at the Bicycle Academy and has been ridden by various guests of the school. This fillet brazed hardtail features some unique cable routing, clean fillet brazing, a clear coat over the raw frame, 27.5+ wheels and tires by Ritchey, Shimano XT components, RockShox Reverb, Pike and Ritchey Bullmoose bars.

If you’re thinking the frame looks a bit small, Tom purposely made it a size medium, hoping to allow a number of people the ability to ride it. The Old Skool New School program is a great idea and this particular project made for a great first round. Look forward to more coverage from the Bicycle Academy this week and even more Old Skool New School news in the coming months.

… and if you haven’t watched the Ritchey video, you really should!

Turquoise can be a beautiful color, in the right context and while this bike was born and has spent most of its life in Bozeman, Montana, it really came alive in Moab, Utah with all of its red rock cliffs and invasive dust. Katie and Steve (that shredder dude from all of our riding reportage) are good friends with Adam Sklar. Steve’s shop, Altar Cycles, is adjacent to Sklar‘s workspace and Katie runs a local sports massage company. Together, they’re an inspiring couple who can hold their own on mountain bikes. I won’t even get into the meal they cooked up for us on our last night in Moab…

Katie’s Sklar is a 27.5 hardtail, built with Race Face, RockShox, Pro2 EVO hubs and some good n grippy Maxxis rubber. After riding for a few days on such amazing trails, I can tell Katie knows how to jive with this bike. Hopefully I can make it to Bozeman this summer to shred their local trails.

Party on!

Sacramento-based Meriwether Cycles gets its name from owner and builder Whit Johnson’s nickname, after Meriwether Lewis of Lewis and Clark. This became the inspiration for these excursion-seeking rigs. A hardtail can be an ideal trail companion for touring, with the right bags. That’s why for NAHBS, Meriwether teamed up with Bedrock Bags out of Denver and Durango. They make a number of capable bags for whatever kind of trip you desire, including their dropper-compatible Black Dragon saddle pack.

These two brands created one solid option for those looking for a trail-ready, and still shreddy bikepacking rig.

Alex from Portus Cycles was the late Ezra Caldwell’s biggest fan in Germany. After fighting cancer and documenting the process for six years before passing away in 2014, Ezra inspired many people, even today. For Alex, it became his inspiration and helped him through his own father’s battle with brain cancer. Ultimately, Alex’s father passed away, inspiring him to live life to the fullest and keep on keepin’ on with Portus Cycles. This bike is an homage to both Ezra and Aelx’s father.

Powered by the unique, made in Germany, Pinion gearbox, this hardtail was used in one of Germany’s 24-hour mountain bike race, Sleepless in the Saddle. If you’d like to know more, head over to Portus Cycles.

Each year when NAHBS rolls around, many builders use the opportunity to build themselves a new bike. This year was Curtis Inglis‘ time for a new hardtail. Over the years, Curtis has experimented with the Funduro model, altering the bottom bracket drop and angles ever-so-slightly to dial in what he feels like is the ultimate hardtail geometry. As a pretty tall dude, he decided to give the 29+ platform a spin, resulting in a bike with a large stance and aggressive geometry.

Over the past few days, Curtis has been riding this show bike and not exactly babying it. He’s got one of those new White Industries headsets on the bike, along with White hubs, cranks and a Paul stem, PIKE fork, XTR rear mech, with a Thomson dropper.

I’m in Moab, Utah with a handful of framebuilders and will be previewing their NAHBS offerings leading up to the event…

Fans of the Rebel Alliance would know that paint scheme without even reading the title. Ted Lincoln is an artist, one that paints scenes from the Star Wars Universe using mother of pearl in what he calls “Mother of Pearl Art.” Ted has been officially endorsed by George Lucas and has gained quite the traction amongst the Star Wars fans. Traction like a 27.5+ tire on sandstone! It just so happened that before Ted was big, Jeremy Sycip knew him in San Francisco, so for this year’s NAHBS, he asked Ted to paint his own personal hardtail for the show. What you’re seeing here is Ted’s first ever mother of pearl bicycle art.

Even as a photographer who loves challenges, this bike was particularly hard to document without my studio light setup allowing me to make the details pop out, but then again shooting bikes in Moab > shooting bikes in a convention center…