Bontrager
The name Bontrager was a real Enigma for me as a young teenager,
the first time I caught wind of this brand was stood in our local bike shop,
I was trying to sort out next seasons bike,
and the mavic rep was telling the shop owner of an American fella
that had cut and re-rolled a mavic road bike rim to mountain bike size,
making it stronger and lighter.
The shop owner was impressed and so was I.
The rep went onto tell the shop owner of the new product line following this new pattern with a rim called the ma40mb.
This was certainly for me,
a major step forward for the evolution of the mountain bike,
I enquired to the name of the guy that did the work, that man’s name was Keith Bontrager.
At this point my next bike was ordered
and the wheels were rebuilt using the ma40mb rims,
the improvement was clearly enough to change the mountain bike wheel forever. And to my mind this is forged in history.
Nearly half a season had passed and my only luck in finding out more,
was simply to buy MBA magazine
which usually showed the American product months before we could read about it in our own mags.
There never seemed to be massive adverts and big budget ads,
but man when I was fortunate to read a review or even see a picture….it never failed to impress me.
The Bontrager design and engineering went to new levels for me.
Working with kestrel, developing carbon and the first seen V brake on the 1988 totally futuristic full suspension carbon fibre "Nitro",
the development of the first production suspension fork with Turner for the then new company going by the Name of Rockshox…., Next for me were the Bontrager Forks, its use of the different materials, the bonding, and interchange-ability as well as weight,
strength and overall performance….all at the time for me totally revolutionary.
The name Bontrager was a real Enigma for me as a young teenager,
the first time I caught wind of this brand was stood in our local bike shop,
I was trying to sort out next seasons bike,
and the mavic rep was telling the shop owner of an American fella
that had cut and re-rolled a mavic road bike rim to mountain bike size,
making it stronger and lighter.
The shop owner was impressed and so was I.
The rep went onto tell the shop owner of the new product line following this new pattern with a rim called the ma40mb.
This was certainly for me,
a major step forward for the evolution of the mountain bike,
I enquired to the name of the guy that did the work, that man’s name was Keith Bontrager.
At this point my next bike was ordered
and the wheels were rebuilt using the ma40mb rims,
the improvement was clearly enough to change the mountain bike wheel forever. And to my mind this is forged in history.
Nearly half a season had passed and my only luck in finding out more,
was simply to buy MBA magazine
which usually showed the American product months before we could read about it in our own mags.
There never seemed to be massive adverts and big budget ads,
but man when I was fortunate to read a review or even see a picture….it never failed to impress me.
The Bontrager design and engineering went to new levels for me.
Working with kestrel, developing carbon and the first seen V brake on the 1988 totally futuristic full suspension carbon fibre "Nitro",
the development of the first production suspension fork with Turner for the then new company going by the Name of Rockshox…., Next for me were the Bontrager Forks, its use of the different materials, the bonding, and interchange-ability as well as weight,
strength and overall performance….all at the time for me totally revolutionary.