How did you get in to MTB

[Trebz]

In 1988 my pal Mike offered me a test ride on his girlfriends MTB, can't remember the make. Mike had a 1987 Specialized Stumpjumper at the time. We went on a 15 minute ride down a little piece of woodland in a place called Swanland where Mike lived. The woods are called 'Snake Wood'.

It was single track, through woods with a few tight switch backs from left to right. We came out of the bottom end of the woods and I was hooked. Three weeks or so later I'd bought my 1988 Specialized Rockhopper from Star Bikes in Willerby. I was 18 years old at the time.

I have Mike to thank for all of this. Gotta love the guy.

 

[02gf74]

In 1988 my pal Mike offered me a test ride on his girlfriends MTB, can't remember the make. Mike had a 1987 Specialized Stumpjumper at the time. We went on a 15 minute ride down a little piece of woodland in a place called Swanland where Mike lived. The woods are called 'Snake Wood'.e.

I have Mike to thank for all of this. Gotta love the guy.

^^^^^^
I love my friend mike
Who lent me his mtb bike
Riding through the trees
Is a wonderful wheeze
Whats not to like?

 

[Gerard]

I love my friend mike
Who lent me his mtb bike
Riding through the trees
Is a wonderful wheeze
Whats not to like?

About Mike and my Bike.

 

[Silvergoat]

Re:

The summer of '89 whilst at art college in Cardiff. Started exploring the hills alone on my Raleigh Arena, going over Caerphilly Mountain and along the S.Wales coast. When everyone came back after the summer break, they returned with them new-fangled mountain bikes, to a soundtrack of Carter USM, PWEI, EMF, grunge, indie-dance and early rave. The old Arena didn't quite cut it out on the trails alongside A-Stars or Yetis or GTs, so the next year I managed to get the funds together for a zolatoned Marin Palisades Trail with Rockshox. That got stolen in '92 and then later that year I bought an 89/90 Clockwork frame with some new shiny nickel F7 forks and built up my own bike. Still riding the same Clockwork today!

 

[PanoIgano]

This I find an interesting thread and feeling a bit sad that it hasn't flourised I thought to try to resuscitate it.

Anyhow, for me it all started at the age 8 when like many others I realised that with bikes you can actually get way off your neighborhood limits and explore a lot more than you can do walking or on a skateboard. In fact, with my 3 - 4 close friends at the time we organised day rides (especially in the summer when days were very long and warm enough) that would takes us to the next village adjacent to our city. It was an 30 to 40 km round trip and with our parents hardly knowing our whereabouts (other that we were hanging out with our bikes in the "neighborhood") it definitely added an extra thrill on the whole endeavor. It kinda gave us a badge of honor to come back from these rides (it would often take us 5 or 6 hours to complete them) and recount all the adventures (dead snakes and other road kill on the road, visits of abandoned wharehouses and houses, deserted forest paths, etc) we came along the way.

At about the same time I also took to organizing small races withing the neighborhood that included not just small streets but main circulation roads with a lot of traffic. Given that we were some times 10 or more kids that took part on these races, looking back now I consider ourselves lucky that none of us was run over a bus or hit by a car...I can recall quite a few miss outs and panicked drivers when suddenly a dozen of kids on bikes will jump in front of their wheel racing each other.

Seeing my interest in biking, my mother registered me to what appeared to be an MTB team a few years later. It was in fact an all cycling team meaning that we were doing track, road and MTB altogether depending on the season of the year. This lasted 4 and a half years (94 to 9 and had a few successes but mainly hated the racing and competitiveness edge of it. I was mainly there for the company and for making new friends.

This all finished in the summer of '98 when I spent it road racing in Paris (I had found a team that was willing to have me there for three months) where I won a race. Since then my interests slowly changed (see heavy partying) and only had the occasional bike trip (one for example was in the summer of 2004 in Creta). I remained uninterested on bike trends and mechanics from then till 2012 when I bought a new bike and discovered bikepacking.

That's pretty much all there is too it! If anything writing this piece brought back some nice memories. Hope you enjoyed it too!

 

[boswell]

In 1988 I was 22 and had just gone from being a car mechanic to working in a Vauxhall dealers service reception, as a consequence I was starting to grow a little beer belly and had started running in a morning before work and I hated it.
One saturday night we were out for a drink with some friends who were about 20 years older two of whom had just bought bikes...Mountain Bikes they called them...I'd ridden road bikes until I left school so I was intrigued...to be honest I was hooked just hearing the words Mountain Bike. Within days I'd bought a brand new 89 Saracen Tufftrax and was ready to hit the trails on Sunday mornings or so I thought, my mates hammered on my door at 08:00 Sunday morning, I took some waking from my Snakebite induced coma but I was amped at the idea of riding out into the Peak District, I really wasn't ready for the numerous massive off-road climbs they had in store me though to be fair neither were my hands and forearms ready for the 30 mph downhills on a rigid MTB with cantis.
The rest they say is history and what awesome history it is, countless early morning, late evening, winter, spring, summer and autumnal rides across some of the UKs most stunning scenery.
For one of those mates who persuaded me to buy an MTB and join their Sunday morning cult, history and memories are now all thats left as Frank sadly died yesterday after a mercifully short illness. I'm so glad I rang him up and said lets go ride tomorrow several times this summer as we rode his local bridleways like it was the nineties again only we were now riding his two Specialized Full Sus eBikes which he'd bought a couple of years back after confessing he'd always hated the hills and now he was in his seventies felt he no longer had anything to prove.

This is a photo of Frank doing what he did almost everyday since retiring, riding his local bridleways and the occasional naughty footpath because you're never too old to be in bother!

Thanks to Frank for getting me back onto a bike and keeping me there.

This is why.

 

[PanoIgano]

Beautiful and very touching story! The ride of a lifetime…