Since I didn’t have my regular bike that I have been riding, a carbon Rush from Cannondale, I took one of our demo bikes.  I choose a Trek Top Fuel 69er in a 17.5. I’ve ridden the 69ers before but it has been a little while. The 69er is a unique bike in the sense that it has a 29 inch from wheel with a 26 inch rear wheel, all on a full suspension platform.

The theory of the 69er is that on the front wheel you get the larger wheel that gives the rider greater ease in riding over things along with the larger contact area that the bigger wheel offers. The 26 inch rear wheel still allows the bike to accelerate a little faster.

Complaints that the 29ers (dual 29 inch wheels)often receive is that it takes more effort to get the 29 inch wheels moving, the up side is that once they get going they roll super fast. I think this characteristic makes the 29 inch wheels better suited for cross country rides and many of the 100 mile mountain bike rides. Many people find that the bigger wheels are harder to manage and control then the 26 inch wheels; making a 29ers better suited for taller riders.

Other benefits of the 29er wheels are they roll over larger objects with greater ease because the axle is higher from the ground then the 26 inch wheels. A neat feature about the 29er platform is that you can easily swap out wheels to a 700c configuration for road riding.

I enjoyed riding the 69er, I love both the front and rear suspension on the bike. Both of these are Fox Shocks a 29er RL100 for the front and an RP2 w/Pro Pedal for the rear. For the drive train the bike is spec’d with SRAM and I love the SRAM components they also happen to be on my Rush. Mechanically I think the bike worked great, it is well spec’d the components work well together and there is a lot of value in the bike.

The handling of the bike is another story. I guess I am a little more old school having been riding mountain bikes for year, I still remember when I worked in a shop and the first Rock Shox came in. I am slowly adjusting to the more upright position the new longer travel bikes offer and the slightly slower handling they have. What I do continue to realize the more time I spend on the mountain bikes that the fit of the mountain bike is just as critical as the fit on your road bike. As I tweaked my position on the bike yesterday I felt more power going to the pedal and greater overall comfort on the bike. I had fun seeing how moving my position on the bike improved comfort and performance.

For me as the day went on I felt like I was slightly “behind” the bike in the handling and steering of it. Another characteristic that I noticed was that on certain size bumps the front wheel would roll over the bumps and the rear of the bike would come up off the ground. As one road the bike more I think you could learn on which bumps you would need to compensate for this. The other issue I had with the bike was that if I wanted to approach a curve at speed I couldn’t hold my line through the turns. This isn’t a characteristic uncommon in many mountain bikes; in fact Fisher came out with a G2 geometry to reduce the trail to improve handling. The G2 is designed to address these handling characteristics at the lower speeds.

For now I will reserve a final judgment on the 69er but have to say I am leaning to believe that the 69er is not the right bike for me. I’d like to ride it a little more before I ruled out the bike once and for all. One thing about the 69er is that I am only 5’ 10” so someone who is taller than myself may have a different opinion of the bike. I have ridden 29er full suspension bikes, the Super Caliber from Fisher, and have been very impressed with the 29er platform.

It was a gorgeous day and it reminded me how much I miss riding in the woods. It took me back to when I was a kid spending endless hours in the woods behind our house riding our BMX bikes on the dirt trails we built.

Rosaryville is a near perfect venue. Not to hard but not boring in any way either. It is a great place to take a beginner mountain biker but still fun for the more seasoned rider. M.O.R.E. and IMBA have been putting a lot of work maintaining and upgrading the trails lately to preserve them for years of fun to come.
I got to ride three different models of Cannondale’s. I can tell a lot about a bike while riding it around the parking lot. Certainly you can tell a heck of a lot more while riding the bike where it was designed to be ridden, on the trail. It was time well spent not only for learning more about the bikes but also for simply getting back out in the woods. So I rode a Carbon Rush, spec’d just like what the pro team rides. Then I rode a Prophet and finished up my riding on the 29er. It is amazing what a difference the 29er wheels make over the standard 26in wheels. It takes a lot less effort to ride the 29er then a standard 26in wheel. Then you have the additional benefits of the 29er. More contact on the ground with the bigger wheel. This offers the rider greater control of the bike. With the higher axle placement it is easier to ride over stuff that gets in your way on the trail.    Cannondale equips the 29er with the Lefty fork. All of the bikes I rode had a Lefty on them. I fall more and more in love with the Lefty each time that I ride them. The front end is rock solid and does exactly what you want and expect it to do.  For 08 Cannondale is planning to add a few more 29er models to their line up, however not a full suspension version. (For a full suspension 29er check out a Gary Fisher Sugar.) Hopefully they will be making a lighter version of it. It is a tad on the heavy side but there is a few quick and easy places to lighten her up. Each of the tires that come with the bikes are around the 900 plus gram range. Secondly adding a two-piece crankset to the bike would further reduce the weight. If you are an endurance racer/rider adventure racer I highly recommend checking out a 29er. It is likely to be a perfect bike for you. I also think that for many cross country races the 29er would be a good fit depending on the terrain.  Full suspension mountain bikes are getting so light these days. The carbon Rush was no exception either. For me the Rush is a bike that I could ride all day. It was super fun, handled great and has a perfect amount of travel for this area. With bikes getting so niche oriented these days it is sometimes hard to pick a bike that serves multiple purposes. The Rush could be that perfect bike. If you like to ride cross country and single track and aren’t big into jumping off lots of stuff check out the Rush. If you are more into jumping off of stuff, but not to extreme then the Prophet might be a good choice for you. One of the neat things the Prophet offers is the ability to easily adjust the head tube angle from a cross country to a freeride angle. Ideal for someone who may ride in many different areas and wants to have that flexibility.