What racer do you guys ride?

For my riding style and the races I hit a hardtail is the most fun. It's not the most efficent or the fastest on all of the courses I race. But there are certainly times when I'm glad to have one, and I know without a doubt it's faster. With my hardtail I have the option of taking 20 minutes to set it up SS if the course is appropriate.








My bike is a test mule for the production bikes. My medium frame right now weighs in at 3.2 pounds. Changes to the semi yoke, seatube and dropouts will have the mediums sub-3 by Production. This bike rules!

the Yeti ASR -SL

Is one of the most popular at the races here in Colorado , I race a Orbea Oiz it is a 3" bike that is great for my weight 190 # the Luna Chix team is racing orbea's this year and i have heard that the lighter riders have trouble getting the rear end set up kite enought due to the design that the carbon has a small amount of preload built into the the bike.

Edit: weight 22 lbs with 500 gram tires ! this bike is way faster than I am, super climber get on the desents braking with the horst link ! Just an incredable bike go test ride it you will by one. I had it down to 21.38 lbs then i change out the stem bars and tires it's 21.93 as it sits right now!!

Overall Fit...

I'm not one to talk, since I did the same thing. Most people go out and ask "what bike to buy...racer-x, epic, fuel, blur xc, etc.?" I know when I was shopping last year I was stuck between a turner flux (horst version) and a racer x. I was on an Epic and did enjoy the ride. Definitely efficient and generally a hardtail like ride. One complaint I had about the ride was how the shock would activate when climbing, and then cause a bit of pedal bob until it closed back up. That's probably the only disadvantage to that shock. I used to have a Kona Kikapu Deluxe but it just wasn't my thing. But I was never pleased with the Epic's standover, and I was stuck between sizes (S and M, and I'm 5' 6"). I ended up w/ a M to get the right top tube length, and now have minimal standover. It never proved to be a problem, but I just wanted a little more "breathing room" if you catch my drift.

I had pretty much narrowed my sights on the flux and the racer-x. When I asked the Turner forum, it was the flux, and when I asked the Titus forum, it was the racer-x, obviously. I had a chance to try both. Both were setup similarly, but something about the racer-x felt a bit better. The shop w/ the racer-x was also more friendly and willing to swap some parts around so I could try them out (for example, stem lengths). That really gave me a good idea as to what would fit right. From the beginning, I thought the racer-x would be better due to the geometry charts on their website. It gave me a good length for the top tube, and a good amount of standover.

In the end, as many people here have said, all those bikes are great bikes. People will often want to suggest the bike they're riding. If the bike fits you, it'll probably ride well. That's probably the most important thing. Find it and TEST RIDE IT! Good luck. Just to answer your question on what I'm riding, it's an 05 Racer X 100 Small, weighing in at 24.73 lbs w/o anything superlight. All rideable, and lovin' it.

First, the engine matters far more than the bike (obviously). But that being said, a fast bike goes a long ways to helping the engine feel fast.

I have a Turner Nitrous that I absolutely love. It was very easy to build to 23 pounds without upsetting my wife too much. It's very stiff and just feels fast. I rode a Trek Fuel before, and the Nitrous is definitely a step or two up. The Fuel was a good bike, but the Nitrous is lighter, stiffer, feels faster and I'm riding faster. Maybe it's just the sweet gold anodized finish.

On a tangent, I've had two Manitou forks that I've been very happy with (including an R7 Platinum this year, which I love). I have a friend who had to send two Fox forks back for maintenance (one of them went back twice in rapid succession), and another friend that couldn't make a Sid work to save his life. That's not to say that Fox or Rock Shox can't build decent forks, but you'll hear horror stories about every single model of fork out there. I think the bottom line is that all of them are pretty good and will usually serve you pretty well. Every company makes mistakes with individual forks, but that doesn't mean every fork from that brand is bad.