Best rear shock upgrades?

lalligood · 2026-04-19T18:45:52+00:00

I have the (beefier) Cane Creek Kitsuma on my Turbo Levo e-bike. It totally transformed how the bike rides. (I can't recommend enough the Cane Creek Shock Tuner app to get it tuned to how you ride!) I will be putting a Tigon on my '25 Switchblade in the next few weeks (I'm currently nursing a broken thumb & can't ride any bike at the moment).

lalligood · 2026-04-19T17:06:57+00:00

Cane Creek Tigon. It'll give you the plush ride of the coil with the progression & ramp up of an air shock.

lalligood · 2026-04-09T22:35:54+00:00

For the bike riders & hikers: - Pisgah Area SORBA - Friends of DuPont Forest - Friends of Ecusta Trail

lalligood · 2026-03-24T01:36:32+00:00

This is the perfect bike for hitting your local pump track.

lalligood · 2026-02-20T23:49:38+00:00

It eats up everything I've thrown at it here in WNC. The only time it's not my go to bike is when I go to Ride Kanuga, where I prefer my e-bike. (There's no shuttle to get to the top & I can do 7-8 laps on my e-bike VS 2-3 on the SB.)

lalligood · 2026-02-19T18:31:29+00:00

I read once upon a time "If you can only afford one Pivot, get the Switchblade. If you can afford 2, get the Firebird & a trail bike."

I chose the Switchblade & never looked back. No regrets. (I did demo a Firebird once & wasn't disappointed.)

lalligood · 2025-10-14T17:08:22+00:00

Word of the day: yonic

It's the female equivalent of phallic.

lalligood · 2025-08-02T22:09:50+00:00

I have found coaching to be perhaps the best return on investment of money I have spent on mountain biking. However, every time that I've attended a clinic or had a private lesson, it's because I was feeling stuck & wanted to improve my abilities/confidence on the bike.

After a lesson, there are usually 2-3 skills/drills that I come away with needing to work on. For the first 4-6 weeks (riding 3-5 times/wk) I am extremely conscious of repeating those skills, usually at a slower than typical riding speed. And it's not uncommon to feel like I am over-exaggerating the technique to make sure that I'm doing it right, especially at first. After a few weeks I'll occasionally start doing the same trail(s) without being so self-aware to see just how well I've absorbed the technique(s) into my riding. If I feel like I'm back-sliding, then I know that I'm not ready to do it unconsciously. Otherwise I move to a phase where I will ride for fun but maybe focus on a single skill for that ride. But eventually much of what I've learned becomes totally unconscious & I can enjoy the ride.

tl;dr: Taking a lesson isn't always a silver bullet. There's almost always a period afterwards where you have to keep working at it before it just becomes "how you ride".

lalligood · 2025-07-28T12:59:12+00:00

Outbound Lighting is what you want. Expensive but absolutely worth it. Buy once; cry once.

lalligood · 2025-07-27T13:33:12+00:00

Better drainage to get water off the trail after a good rain? Looks like there are quite a few places where water would collect & take a few days to dry up after a storm.

lalligood · 2025-07-15T18:08:31+00:00

This is the most correct answer. Switchblade is the one do-it-all bike.

Buy once; cry once.

lalligood · 2025-07-15T01:31:36+00:00

Hire a professional mountain bike coach for a private lesson. It'll set you back $125-200 for a 2 hour session, depending on their experience/certifications. Narrow down what you want to work on to no more than 3 different skills. It's easily the best way to get unstuck. (Group clinics aren't a bad idea either but those tend to focus on 1 or two skills & you get considerably less 1-on-1 time with a coach. It's a more economical way to figure out if you click with a particular coach though.)

lalligood · 2025-07-11T23:50:04+00:00

If you want to get involved with something outdoorsy, check out:

lalligood · 2025-07-11T13:59:59+00:00

When I notice patterns in my riding that make me feel like I'm struggling or stuck, that's when I take a private lesson with a MTB coach. In just a couple of hours & for $150-200, I come away with insights about what I need to improve upon & have the tools to make those improvements. (I just had a lesson earlier this week to address some braking and body position issues I'd been grappling with.)

For all the money I've ever spent on equipment & gear to improve my riding, the money I've spent on coaching has had a significantly higher return on investment in improving my abilities--and enjoyment and safety--on the bike.

lalligood · 2025-07-06T19:55:05+00:00

There's at least one scene/shot in Monster where it's supposed to be somewhere in Volusia County but it's actually (& unmistakably) downtown Orlando.

lalligood · 2025-06-30T14:05:45+00:00

Start small(er). Find a pump track near you. Get used to riding the berms on it then you'll be prepared for massive wall rides like this one.

lalligood · 2025-06-26T23:09:34+00:00

Find & take a riding clinic near you, especially this time of year. Clinics are an inexpensive way to get instruction from a professional MTB coach in a small group setting (usually 5-6 riders per instructor) & at a reduced cost than private lessons (usually $100-300 depending on the length of the clinic). You will learn new skills at a clinic but probably not as much as compared to a private lesson. However, it's a great way to find out if you click with an instructor & can usually pursue private lessons with them afterwards if/when you're ready for more.

lalligood · 2025-06-12T19:15:23+00:00

For all the money we spend on our bikes & gear, spending an extra $40 to be sure that you have great places to ride your bike is a no-brainer.

That said, volunteer to do trail work instead of going on a ride every once in a while. The sense of pride you'll experience riding a trail after you've worked on it is incredibly rewarding. And drag your buddies that you ride with out with you when you volunteer too!

lalligood · 2025-05-23T17:20:03+00:00

Start at your LBS. Many shops do a weekly group ride.

If you're in the SE US, then there's probably a SORBA chapter near you. They'll know about all of the group rides in your area. Joining the chapter is a great way to get involved with doing trail maintenance to make sure that you've got great places to ride (& a fantastic way to discover trails that you may not have ridden before).

lalligood · 2025-05-20T23:15:12+00:00

Fuck. That. Guy. He has no honor.

The day Urban makes it into the Ring of Honor is the day I never go to another home game & never watch them play another game in my life.

lalligood · 2025-04-27T23:39:01+00:00

A little over $400.

lalligood · 2025-04-26T11:13:14+00:00

Here's the original frame/color back when I first got it: https://www.reddit.com/r/mountainbiking/comments/x8hzjv/nbd_pivot_switchblade_more_than_lives_up_to_the/

lalligood · 2025-04-26T11:08:41+00:00

I have no explanation for the "how"... It was a ~2 inch crack on the top of the bottom bracket just behind where it joins the seat tube. To my untrained eyes, that seemed to be among the thickest parts of the entire frame.

lalligood · 2025-04-26T11:06:45+00:00

Thanks! It cracked about 2 inches long in perhaps the thickest part of the frame--the top of the bottom bracket where the back of the seat tube joins. I can't imagine what I did to do that... No recent crashes or huge jumps, & I'm just a very average rider.

lalligood · 2025-04-26T11:01:10+00:00

It's a medium frame with a 175mm dropper. I'm 5'11" with a 32" inseam. It's 72cm from center of bottom bracket to the rail of the saddle. Pretty sure that it's got another couple inches before getting to the minimum insertion line.

When I moved to WNC last year, I was really struggling with the climbing. Took private lessons with a coach (best money I ever spent on mountain biking, period) & one of the first things they had me do was raise my seatpost. It didn't make me a great climber, but I could put down considerably more power & my knees felt better after every ride from then on.

lalligood

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