Ever let a buddy hop on your mtb just to check it out? It's a rare treat to find someone dimensionally similar and who has the same cleat system, and we're all a little peevish about letting others touch our equipment. But you owe it to yourself to swap rides once in a while.
I had the pleasure of riding with a bunch of high school shredders this spring as Alastair was competing in his last-ever season of varsity high school racing. These kids met every Tuesday and Thursday, and the range of equipment varied from Walmart+ to S-Works Epics. This sport is WILD. But once in a while the kids would want to check out each others' bikes, to hilarious effect. "Dude--what's wrong with your suspension? It's like you're on a jackhammer!" "Bro why is your seat so LOW?" "OMG how do you even ride this?"
I laughed. Everyone did. Occasionally a coach would take a quick look, but usually the bikes were left to the riders' preferences, and it was just assumed that they knew what they were doing.
I also assumed that I knew what I was doing. When I got my Canyon Lux WC CF 6 in early 2023, I had come from years of struggling to make the old 27.5 Anthem fast. It wasn't fast. It was never gonna be fast. But the Lux was. Right out of the box, zero config: fast. No pedal strikes, less fatigue, whip-sharp handling.
Mountain biking was fun! For the first time since I dropped dollars on a suspension bike in 2016, I was actually enjoying myself! I put as many miles on the Lux in 1 year of riding as I did on the Anthem in 6.
And over the years Alastair had become quite the adept mountain bike rider, such that he was competing for top-10 positions in the crowded JV fields at NICA & VAHS races. So we got him a really fast top-flight Trek ProCaliber 9.7, and suddenly his improvement just stalled. He could ride faster and push harder, but wasn't progressing in races and struggled mightily with confidence at speed.
He tried riding my Lux in a race and came out feeling even worse, with no improvement in position and back pain that lingered for days.
Fast forward to June 2 of this year. One day after graduation. One month after his final chance to race for high school glory. We took our bikes to Leakes Mill Park, which has a great trail system that takes about an hour to ride. Our goal was 2 laps, but riding behind him on the first lap I could not believe how twitchy his bike looked. His handling was this wild combination of pitching his body weight and catching himself by yanking the bike up under him. It looked very uncomfortable, and he was avoiding every root like it was a venomous snake.
After the lap I asked if we could swap bikes.
Within 1 minute we were doing the familiar "dude what is wrong with this thing??" Both of us! His suspension felt locked when it was open, and he insisted my saddle was too low. We rode the lap on each other's bikes with no changes, identitcal heart rates, and amazingly the lap was only a few seconds different from the first. 58 minutes of discomfort, but *different* discomfort.
I had a shock pump in the car and took 20psi out of his fork, then jumped back into the trail. It was like a brand new bike, but we didn't have time to play any more.
Then this past weekend we went out again, this time with him on a fork that works, and me still too low on the saddle. I fought to hold his wheel at the upper end of Z2 for almost 90 minutes before pulling out a tape measure and a hex wrench. 0.75" higher and suddenly the same watts were ~15bpm lower. I felt instantly fresher. Maneuvering was weird for a bit because the saddle felt like it was in outer space.
So with *both* of us on bikes that worked, we went to Pocahontas State Park and did a vibes-only ride, and we PR'd almost every single trail we touched...in Zones 2 & 3. Uphill, downhill, flat, and technical: everything was improved. Alastair was no longer ducking and weaving to avoid roots, and my power:hr was considerably higher than...ever on a mountain bike.
Now I can't wait to see what we can both do at a race-pace!
So if you know someone who's about your same size and can stomach the idea of letting someone else ride your bike, swap. Not for a day, but mid-ride. Because I'd ridden Alastair's bike before and hadn't noticed the problems. What I needed was the immediate context of having been on mine. And be honest with your feedback. Platitudes won't make you faster.
