bontrager, again

Bontrager

I finally rode the Bontrager this past weekend, with a fair amount of vigor, and I’m still not sure what to think.

I got up early on Saturday, and took it out to Yellow River. The trails are sufficiently dried out from the last batch of floods to re-open, and were surprisingly free from damage. The only pedals I could find were an old pair of not-quite SPD clones, made by Wilderness Trail Bikes. Their bodies resemble the old Ritchey pedals, very flat, but with bright yellow plastic washers instead of springs to control the release tension. I must have bought these at a yard sale, probably as a box lot, because I can’t imagine a price low enough to have been fair. The plastic (“elastomer”) washers went the way of all pplastic washers—that is, they embrittled, either from cold or just age, and split. The previous owner tightened down the adjustment to make up for the lack of springiness, discovered that they wouldn’t release, and, with a florid curse, sold the damned things. To me, apparently.

Anyway, they were the only stray pedals I had, so I threaded them in, adjusted the brakes, twisted the fork adjusters to see if they’d turn, then mounted up and rode. The Bon is long in the top tube, and is equipped with a 135mm stem and straight handlebars. These combine to rotate the rider far forward and head down. I felt like a missile ready to be launched. The real effect of the rider’s position is to weight the front wheel quite heavily.

The drop-in at Yellow River is a downhill, off-camber sweeper, steep enough to pull you into it too fast, especially when you’re still finding your position on the bike and trying to warm up. I picked my way through it, just trying not to look like a tyro, tripod-ing along with one foot out. The first climb, on the other side of the creek is one of those that falls between the middle ring and the granny, washed down to the bare clay, with wrist-sized roots standing 3 or 4 inches above the surface. I usually do these in the middle ring, using steady, heavy power to keep the front wheel light. If I’m really strong, I’ll wheelie over the roots, just touching down between every third or fourth one, and letting the rear wheel walk over them. But in the push-up position the Bontrager demands, I feel myself pushing the front wheel into the terrain. I keep the power on, and let the fork bully its wway through. The rubber fork boots are always squished, and the fork feels like it’s already used half its travel. I haven’t taken a measuringing tape to it, but it may actually have.

The tires have to go. I don’t recognize the model, but they’re something from Specialized with tiny, shallow trianglualr knobs. They look like they’d be okay on pavement, but on dirt, there’s no bite, much less the increasing grip you’d want as you bank the bike over. I can’t say how much ofthis is from their age—I mean, what can compete with that new-sneaker feeling?—and how much is the design, but I’ll swap them for a pair of Velociraptors before the next ride.

So, I was riding Blankets Creek the next day, on the advanced loop, where the trail is just a narrow shelf sculpted out of the cliff side. There’s a wall on the right, and a drop on the left, going down maybe 25 feet to the lakeshore. It’s not quite a sheer drop, but much steeper than 45 degrees. The trail is about handlebar width, gradually ascending, and there’s a stairstep rock in the way, maybe the height of a curbstone. I unweight the handlebar, give a good hard pedal strok, and expect to wheelie over. The front wheel stays stubbornly on the ground, deadheads into the rock, and stops me short. I unclip on the left, stab my foot at the ground…and there’s no ground there.

That’s one of the noble traditions of mountain biking, is falling end over end, wondering when it’s going to stop, and how much it’s going to hurt. And at the bottom, there’s the other noble tradition, that of the bike landing on top of you. No injuries, just a mounth full of leaf mulch, and the chore of climbing back up, with a bike that, although made of the wonder lightweight metal, is still to heavy to carry effortlessly.

I’m still of two minds about the Bontrager. I like the non-conformist design, the pioneering name, the Ti frame with its crooked decals, the XTR/XT group. I don’t care for the greasy wooden tires, the flat-footed fork, or the flying-over-the-bars position. Oh, and brakes are Rube Goldberg at his worst, although they work better on the trail than you’d think from adjusting them in the workstand. I’ve already bought an old pair of Dia-Comps, cyclocross brakes from about 1986, and found a pair of Velociraptors in a giveaway box at the curb. I’ll switch the pedals for real SPDs, and start looking for an 11 degree bar and a shorter stem. I’m reluctant to delve into the black art of fork repair, especially with an orphan like Judy, an acknowldeged dog when it was new. I’ve got a couple of possible trades in the junk box, that can’t be worse and might be better. Or I”ll see if there’s an Arlo Englund Total Air kit to be had. I don’t trust myself to measure the offset correctly, and don’t want to wreck the handling of a bike that I find marginal already. I really want to like it, but the Moots has set the bar awfully high.