The Ghost

I did the 30km last time.... And it was pretty much 30km on my Garmin

Aggressive much? looks like an angry mans knife

Oh my sack

But I didnt claim it to be boutique That being said, I cant really fault the thing, I struggle to make up excuses to tell the wife why I should upgrade.

Or if I was to go to 100mm travel

So far, Im really liking this one... Not these colors though

No full susser 26ers

:lol: .......... Sorry, I didnt mean to laugh........... :lol:

Do true boutique MTB's still exist? If they do, which brands would fit into these category and which would you buy if money were no object? To give you some background of where Im coming from, I overheard somebody saying that Sant Cruz bikes are becoming to common and mass produced etc, and that the rear suspension setup (VPP) really isn't that great. Thats what got me thinking...

That begs another question, should I remain seated, or stand? Nah, my fork is just one you pomp, and either lock or unlock

Glad its not only me

Thanks all. The only thing I dont recall is how far forward on the saddle I was, but I will take note next time. My bike is what Ghost refer to as their AM bike, and I have shortened the stem because with the longer one the "cockpit" was just too long for me; so a longer one would make the hills easier, but everything else not so lekka.

Yesterday I was riding out at Thaba trails, and coming up from the Fire Station section there are a few short (up to about 10m) sharp inclines. I had to dismount to get up these, mostly because I just could not keep the front wheel down. I tried hard to get my weight forward and bent well forward, but still couldnt do it. I also tried not to pull on the bars at all. Any advice?

Spent yesterday morning here... And will try and ride there on Wednesdays for the next month. That sure tested my legs.

I went there many years back and the animals were so badly caged you couldn't get a pic without the mesh of the bars in the way; good to see it looks better now.

Looks cool, where did you go?

Thanks to this thread I have imprinted on an L40 model from Andre Thorburn ( http://www.thorinox.co.za ) at a cool R11 000 before personal options - when it arrives I will be lucky if my wife doesnt remove my testicles with it.

I hear you... Im now looking for a custom knife

There are 2 things I really want to get; a custom knife and a custom firearm... One day when Im big.

Im not sure of the correct answer; but in my case, I tried the distance first, and now Im struggling to lift the speed.

Anybody know of a decent knife that is hard and keeps a stupidly sharp edge, it can be brittle coz it's only for straight line cuts? Sharper than my Benchmade, and no more than say R3 500

Couple a Leatherman, couple a Gerber but this one I have with me all the time.

Definitely! The improvements will cost you well over R2 800 later

Price vs later upgrades is fairly simple to answer. In my experience what you get as a complete bike is always a lot cheaper than trying to upgrade later. For e.g if I took the price of my fork, components etc it comes to much more than what I paid for the complete bike.