I now notice the suspension bikes outnumber the rigid bikes. I feel I have to vote a rigid one. This leaves me with the TrailRunner, the Pinnacle, the Evans and the Palisades Trail.
TrailRunner
With the Yo my favourite bike in my stable. Well made, clever and I have a history with it.
Pinnacle
I am not the no.1 Klein guy, but this Pinnacle may very well be the nicest I have ever seen! The Bullseye cranks and the forks make the bike losing the to me typical Klein 'sleakness'. I do really appreciate the aesthetics! Great bike.
Evans
Actually I first had to do some reasearch to learn what Evans is. This is what I visited:
http://www.evanscycles.com/
http://www.bikebrothers.co.uk/evans.htm
Okay, very nice to learn. The Evans is a 1983 bike what makes I have a lot respect for it. In some kind of way it makes it superior as classic to the other bikes. On the other hand it is inherited in the design that some issues will make it a not so effective bike on the trail.
Palisades Trail
This Palisades Trail seems to be a pretty nice example, but last thing I mentioned on the Evans also applies to the Marin I guess.
What I am missing in this months BOTM are steel rigids like the Eddys and the Assault from last month. For me it always had to be such steel ....or a bike from the make that always build me a great performer in about any material.
I will go that way too now.
On the suspension issue: I am not a suspension hater. I can life with the aesthetics of some early in particular machined or colour matching examples (though they often suck in functioning). Nevertheless, it may very well be that many not agree with me, but from some sort of purist kind of view, I feel suspension is inferior to rigid. Consider I do love my Yo, but I would have loved it even more with Yo fork. With suspension now outnumbering rigid I felt it had to be RIGID for this BOTM.
- Melvin