I've said it once and I'll say it again, there are plenty of modern day designs that hark back then take forward the traditional triangular design. Some are - dare I say - even prettier. I'm a big fan of the Cielo range.

legrandefromage":es0nyvoi said:As before, geometry is not 'modern'. Dropouts and lugs had to be custom made if you wanted to change geometry from what was available from the suppliers' lugwork and dropouts.
The Overbury's Pioneer was available back in February 1986 with totally different geometry to the rather plain looking mainstream offerings (sound familiar?). Many bikes had been released with terrible angles making them almost unrideable offroad but many were successful. Other materials released builders/ designers and allowed them to run riot hence the idiosyncrasies of the late 80's/ early 90's.
Gearing has not really changed since the introduction of the ramped cassette. 'Oh my modern stuff works soooo much better than that old shite' - well it will do, the chain has sooooo much less distance to travel in a 9/10/11/12 speed system over 6 or 7 or even 8. Its physics Jim!
What has driven frame design for the last 20 years has been suspension and forks bringing the front end up higher and higher. Marketing has told people this is what they need rather than what actually works for each individual rider.
Marketing has told us everything. Marketing now tells you to dump that front mech and it happens. Marketing tells you that 2017's bike is soooooo much better than 2016 or 2015, 2014 or anything 30 years previous. How can you trust someone that tells you something so obviously untrue year after year?
Designs that work dont create income streams. It cant pay for share dividends if design A works so brilliantly that no-one ever needs to buy anything ever again. And thats what is wrong with cycling. It really is trying to re-invent the wheel every five minutes to generate enough hysteria to generate the incomes needed to sustain itself.
ultrazenith":1cl8lvg6 said:For me the retro aesthetic died around the same time v-brakes (1997) and the threadless headset became standard OEM specs (1994/1995), and suspension became more cost effective.
Prior to this, you had a rigid steel MTB which was practically the same as the next brand, and the main way brands differentiated themselves was with a cool paint job or colour-coordinated components. The bikes already worked about as well as technology of the time allowed, and the best way to upgrade or individualise your bike would be to buy some blingy anodized parts. Maybe some awesome looking cantilevers, a coloured seat post or bar, QRs, etc. The upgrades we did were almost always cosmetic and barely improved the function of our bikes.
I think over a period of a few years beginning in 1994 most manufacturers abandoned the concept of snazzy paint jobs, and there were two new 'must have' upgrades that were so cost effective that just about every mountain biker I knew went out and bought one or both: V brakes and Rockshox Q21R. I bought both, using up most of my pocket money in the process, but this stopped me from making aesthetic upgrades that I would otherwise have gone for.
Shimano's v-brake revolution had an especially strong impact. Their basic LX-level model worked well but was ugly, or boring at the very best. While XT and XTR looked better thanks to the parallel push mechanism and the slightly better finish, they still looked quite utilitarian and dull.
Sadly a number of component manufacturers simply didn't keep up. Dia Compe, Onza, and other aftermarket cantilever makers just seemed to give up, denying us the chance to have colourful or cool looking brakes. Avid, for reasons unknown, followed Shimano and produced quite ordinary and functional looking brakes.
In conclusion, as far as I am concerned 1993 was the last year when MTBs looked amazing, by 1994 the rot of utilitarian styling had started to take hold. Consider, for instance, the 1993 (1992?) Raleigh Special Products Dynatech Diablo, compared to a 1995 M Trax:
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evolved to:
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Your analysis has far too many overlapping variables to be of any use to anyone. It hasn't actually told you anything, other than possibly giving you "evidence" for confirmation bias.ultrazenith":26vfeaxa said:At the end when I looked at my time (I was something like 500 out of 1000), I discovered the winner of the men's elite category was 'only' 50% faster than me over the complete distance. Yes, that's a lot, but at the same time it lets me set a limit on how much faster a modern, super expensive XC bike can make somebody.
Being conservative, I'd guess the fastest riders have:
+10% speed advantage due to being 15 years younger and genetic advantages as natural athletes
+5% or more speed advantage from having near perfect nutrition and hydration
+5% or more speed advantage from having an optimal body weight unlike someone with a bit of a belly like me (regardless of cardiovascular fitness)
+??% for cardiovascular fitness - this is hard to guess about, but surely we're talking at least 15%, probably more.
Total: >35%, which leaves less than 15% for differences between the actual bike itself.
Erm, the pros have decided. 29er is the fastest size for XC, unless you have biomechanical restrictions, as theres a limit on how small a frame you can make and still use 29er "sensibly", see the compromises Schurter and some of the women have made to get a position set up on a 29er, neg rise stems, zero offset posts with the saddle slammed forward and so on. Pretty sure every world cup podium in 2016 was populated by 29ers. Edit, just checked, Schurter was on 27.5" prior to July. Every other podium rider was on 29er. Every podium since then has been 29er. Including the World Champs.ultrazenith":26vfeaxa said:Another point is that the pro's and fastest riders can't even decide between themselves which wheel size is faster. If larger wheels were the winning technology they're hyped to be, we'd see Trek and others coming out with 30ers or 31ers, to get more of the advantage of large wheels. Likewise, if 650b was the sweet spot it's marketed as, then we'd see the top flight riders abandon 29 or 26 and all take up 650b instead. And we'd see riders of only one wheel size on the podiums, because even a 1% increase in average speed is more than enough to win a long race. The same argument can be made about full suspension.
mattr":1ms8oajh said:For social/fun riding. It doesn't really matter what wheel size you use.