FRIDAY FLASHBACK: 30 YEARS AGO—AND THE CHANGES WE’VE SEEN IN MOUNTAIN BIKING SINCE THE 1970S

30 YEARS AGO IN MOUNTAIN BIKE ACTION:

It was 30 years ago, in our October 1994 issue, where we took a look at a new, high-speed downhill bike with an aerodynamic fairing that Dan Hanebrink built. Hanebrink was one of the most innovative bike designers in the world back then. He built one of the very first downhill bikes, one that appeared in the first issue of Mountain Bike Action in July 1986, as well as what we would consider the first fat bike (one with 10-inch-wide tires), which appeared on the cover of another issue of MBA a few months earlier, with Toby Henderson riding it on the beach in Malibu, California.

As MBA’s John Ker recalls, Dan Hanebrink—who is shown sitting on the red-white-and-blue downhill bike with the fairing on the above cover—built that bike so he could race it in certain downhill events, such as the Palm Springs Tramway Race.

Hanebrink later wanted to use it in events such as the Mammoth Kamikaze, too. The Kamikaze was one of the first major downhill races in America. It was held on the fire road that started at the top of Mammoth Mountain and ended a couple of miles farther down, near the base of the ski lift and the lodging area. Since the Kamikaze downhill course stayed on the fire road, one of the biggest challenges for the racers was minimizing the drag from wind resistance to go as fast as possible down the mountain.

As we reported in that issue, the other racers at the NORBA downhill event complained that Hanebrink had to remove the fairing from the bike to race it in the event. To stop their complaints, Hanebrink removed the fairing and raced without it, as seen here:

Inventors who come up with new ideas for mountain bikes have to deal with a number of challenges.

First, the innovators have to come up with an idea that actually works better than what is currently on the market.

Second, they have to build their new bike so well that other people are interested in it and willing to try it.

Third, the inventors have to convince people that it’s worth the money to buy the new bike and take advantage of the new innovation.

Fourth, the inventors have to study the competition rule books to find out if their new invention will be allowed in the races.

And fifth, if the new innovation breaks the existing rules for race bikes, the people who want to sell the new product have to convince the governing body of the races to change the rules so that the new innovation can be used in competition.

When Gary Fisher first became an advocate of mountain bikes with 29-inch wheels, he had to work on getting the rules changed so that bikes with 29-inch wheels could compete against the standard 26-inch-wheeled bikes of the time. Because Fisher was one of the most well-known and well-respected people in the mountain bike world, he was able to make that happen (to read more about how that happened, go here: https://mbaction.com/gary-fisher-on-the-birth-of-mountain-biking/

Some of our MBA readers may recall reading an interview we did with Tom Ritchey a few years ago. Tom said that when he made his first mountain bikes (and they weren’t even called mountain bikes yet) in 1979 with 650b wheels (which we now refer to as 27.5-inches) he did that because he thought that the 650b wheels would work better on mountain bikes than the standard 26-inch wheels of the time. The 26-inch wheels were the ones used on the so-called “klunker” bikes—the old cruiser bikes that were used by the early pioneers of mountain biking who raced them in the Repack races at Mt. Tam, in Marin County, California, in the latter half of the 1970s.

Today, almost 50 years after those early Repack races on the 26-inch-wheeled klunkers, 29- and 27.5-inch wheels are the standard sizes for adult mountain bikers, while the 26-inch wheels are mainly used by kids 10 to 14 years old (with the possible exception of some dirt jumpers and some of the riders in the Red Bull Rampage, who were still using 26-inch wheels on some of their bikes when we checked out some of their wheel setups a couple of years ago).

There also was a rule up until a few years ago that downhill mountain bikes had to have wheels of the same size in the front and back to race in the World Cup events. It took a rule change by the UCI for downhill World Cup mountain bikers to start using mixed-wheel setups. Once the use of mixed-wheel bikes was allowed, the top teams that had those mixed-wheel bikes started winning a large percentage of the races. Today, the mixed-wheel setups for downhill bikes are pretty much the standard, except for the taller riders who often prefer to run two 29-inch wheels.

As a lot of innovators have learned, it’s one thing to come up with a new idea that works. It’s another thing to get the public interested  enough to start buying the new product. That’s one reason why the best racers tend to get the highest-paying sponsorship deals. If they’re winning races on a new product, then it will look like the new product must be helping them do it, and the manufacturer will be able to sell it to the public.

Then, it’s another major challenge to persuade the racing organizations to change their rules to allow the new innovations to be used in the races.