Downhill thinking...

Ah youll enjoy it.

As Ameybrook said - it surely did spell the end of xc racing didnt it?

well the XC is the day before - may even be able to see that too!

A funny thing happened

This thread reminds me of the time when the MBUK wrecking crew were doing a photo shoot in Sherwood with big travel Sus'bikes (looed all of 40 pounds plus each) in one of the big bomb holes, getting lots of "air". After an hour of entertainment and being goaded into "having a go" on our XC bikes, we sped off back thro' the trees to the Caf' for lunch. The amusing bit came when they tried to follow us and keep up! I swear one of them puked blood trying to keep up. But guess we earned their respect after all.

Descender

Moving away from the world cup scene, its worth mentioning the Descenders from the 80s as downhill specific machines. OK they were built in very limited numbers but you could hardly call them a XC bike with a lowered saddle.

As Elev12k has pointed out the Verlicchi is really the first good example of a production DH specific bike, and as the tracks became more technical and moved away from simple dirt tracks the bikes and geometry changed to suit, and you start getting bikes like the Turner Burner DH from around 95 onwards with no provision for a front derailleur.

For me the start of the DH specific thing came with people fitting larger big chain rings and chain devices and sacrificing there performance in the XC and uphill race in order to concentrate on the DH - over here the uphill always preceeded the DH, how else did you get to the start... and there used to be an overall winner as well as the different categories (XC, UH, DH)

Didn't Julie Furtado win a DH and XC worlds in the same year, with a GT RTS as at least her DH bike if not XC? I may hve this wrong - all i can find online is that in 1992 she did win the DH worlds and was close in the XC - certainly up there with Tomes as an alround legend...

Ian

Yes, she did won both events the same year. She raced in XC with a Xizang and wanted to race in the DH World Cup, so GT gave her a stock RTS-1 a week earlier. She wnet out with the bike only once before the race, but she won the World Cup that year.

Great times...

Julie Furtado was a legend alright, but she didn't win both titles;

Furtado crashed out (problem with the front cantis on her GT Xizang) on the first lap of the '92 Bromont worlds XC (which I think Ruthie Matthes won?) so she rode the Downhill on a 14 inch RTS. And she won it!

Does that make the RTS the first DH bike?

I seem to remember the first UK full suspensions that were DH specific emerged during the 93 & 94 DH National Series. But seeing as some courses had loads of pedalling hard tail's still held their own for a while.

Proper downhilling died the day they started building massive jumps on to the courses and suspension went to 6" travel F&R. Where's the skill in that? Remember the dude who's forks went on a hugh double at the French worlds? (1994?) Ouch.

...Oh, such sweet memories of the DH course in Shrewsbury...

Proper downhilling! have you ridden/raced any of the current dragon downhill tracks?? they are awsome, & nailing any of those on an 8" travel bike takes TONS of skill. (& fitness)

No I haven't, and unfortunately I don't know what they are like so can't really comment on the skills required to ride them.

The point I was trying to make was that there were a few years at the beginning of the UK downhill scene when tracks were natural (i.e. no man-made obstacles) and a course used the terrain that was already there; rocky bits, roots, ruts, etc... NOT big jumps, berms etc...

TO ME that will always be PROPER DOWNHILLING. That's what we did every weekend on our local trails - riding what was there in front of us as fast as we could!