What is a Mountain Bike?

[xxnick1975]

I visited the museum yesterday and saw loads of cool bikes, loads of cool mountain bikes. It was brilliant.

The people there were wonderful, and extremely welcoming to me and my young family.

Really don't get why the old Geoff apps/650b tyre story needs bringing up over and over.

 

[firedfromthecircus]

Really don't get why the old Geoff apps/650b tyre story needs bringing up over and over.

Well it is part of the history of off-road riding in Britain. There were links between the Marin Pioneers and Geoff Apps. The Aventura was a specially built off-road bicycle running 650b tyres long before the current trend. These are facts of history. Any attempt to write them out of history should be challenged. This is why.

 

[GrahamJohnWallace]

Re:

I think that the compelling line of thought that I am developing from this thread is that the "Mountain Bike" was a bicycle design that came out of California and went 'viral' worldwide.

Once the "Mountain Bike" design spread worldwide it ceased to be the property of its original contributors and evolved and diversified to produce many different designs. As a result modern mountain bikes owe only a small proportion of their 'genes' to the original Californian "Mountain Bike. Hence the difficulty in defining exactly what a modern mountain bike is.

The original "Mountain Bike" was not an invention as none of its features were new or novel in themselves.

Nor did it have an inventor but a number of people, influences and ideas that all contributed to the design over many years. Not all of which originated in America.

Some of these contributors were more important to the original "Mountain Bike's" success than others and some where pivotal, in that if they had not been involved the design may have, not developed as it did, or proved so successful.

As for mentioning Geoff Apps, according to Joe Breeze, Apps and his sending large diameter Hakkapeliitta tyres to Marin was pivotal in the seeding of the idea that eventually led to the development of the larger wheel mountain bikes.

 

[The History Man]

I think your ideas on this were already fully developed, you just had them confirmed. Again.

Why don't you ask for a sticky for a UK GJW MB history thread as all of the similar threads I've read on here over the last few years contain similar and useful and interesting information and archive material. Would be good for you to pull it together in one place for reference.

 

[GrahamJohnWallace]

Re:

You're right, there is an element of repetition here. Even though I am trying to avoid that, I also want to make the thread comprehensible to people who haven't read the other stuff.

The idea of a sticky sounds like a good one though I am also thinking of starting a blog where people's recollections could be collected and one day turned into a book of British mountain biking history.

I would dispute that my ideas 'were fully developed' before this thread. Even if they were the thread is still a forum where people can challenge them or add information that I was not aware of.

 

[Woz]

Could I ask why you are not targeting the National British Cycling Musuem?

 

[GrahamJohnWallace]

Re:

I'm not actually targeting anyone as as far as I am concerned I am still at the research stage. However occasionally people like the Crested Butte Moutain Bike Hall of Fame or the Mountain Bike "The British Untold Story" production team ask me to compile potted histories.http://cbklunkers.com/page.cfm?pageid=13665

For Instance:

*A year ago I had not yet made the connection between Cycle Speedway and 'Tracker' bikes.

*Six months ago I did not understand the motivational importance of TV motorbike scrambling on 'Tracker' riders.

*Two weeks ago I did not know for sure that John Finley-Scott was a member of Roughstuff Fellowship from 1961 and that he commissioned UK frame-buliders to make roughstuff bikes of his own design. Nor how he used these bikes and that he deemed his celebrated 26" fat tyre bike to be a failure due to its mechanical unreliability and excess weight when compared to roughstuff machines.

And only in the last few days on this thread did I find out that film footage of a 'tracker' bike being ridden in a 1961 cycling race existed.

I do however realise that at some point I will need to stop researching and settle one version of events to then publish via whatever means is practicable. But I would prefer, if possible, to use as many 'original voices' and documents as possible to tell the story in their own words & pictures.

It would also be good to collaborate with others in order to tell the full story of 20th Century British mountain biking. In this regard its a big shame that Steve Worland is no longer with us.

 

[xxnick1975]

Really don't get why the old Geoff apps/650b tyre story needs bringing up over and over.

Well it is part of the history of off-road riding in Britain. There were links between the Marin Pioneers and Geoff Apps. The Aventura was a specially built off-road bicycle running 650b tyres long before the current trend. These are facts of history. Any attempt to write them out of history should be challenged. This is why.

Not sure I buy that. No problem with the history, just why its brought up over and over.

Everyone (who's interested) knows this now surely

 

[GrahamJohnWallace]

Everyone (who's interested) knows this now surely

Apparently not. The quote below from earlier in this thread is the reason why I reiterated the details of 650b/700c tyre history.

....like Gary Fisher allegedly inventing the 29er (or was it the 650b/27.5er? I've lost track :? ) maybe some more myth and marketing than history.

And if Dan, who owns a 1985 650b bike, hasn't got a clear idea of their history then there may also be others who are also confused.

 

[danson67]

It was which size Fisher had commandeered/assarted that I was unsure of....whichever size it was, I'm sure that he didn't.

I suppose that this stuff gets dig up and wrongly applied in the interest of international marketing. Fisher and Ritchey have huge vested financial and brand interests in maintaining and padding out their reputation/legacy in the industry, whereas others who were there at the time, such as Charlie Kelly have moved on without a big axe to grind.

All the best,