New To The Sport, Looking For Advice On A Bike

[StuartD]

Hello, Im wanting to get into this sport, Ive found a bike that I want but Im wondering if it would be any good at the stunts you guys can do. I would like a "hybrid" to be able to ride the bike and then drop the seat to do some freestyle, if thats even possible or does the bike have to be suited to freestyle only? I have around £400 to spend.

Its a Saracen Instinct 2

http://www.saracencycles.com/index.php?opt...&Itemid=284

Cheers for any help/ advice!

[Krisboats]

Well first things first, this sport is called bike trials or just trials for short... not freestyle. Welcome to the forum, i hope you enjoy chatting to us all on here and look forward to seeing anything you may wish to contribute.

As for the bike. From personal experience starting out on a similar bike you will find that its geometry is much more of a hinderance to your progression. The suspension forks will add a lot of weight to the front of the bike as well which will make it harder for you to learn. You'd probably be better looking at something like a base TA26 frame and then fitting the parts to it yourself. The frame can be picked up cheaply second hand or can be picked up brand new for something like £120. Which leaves you with a fair amount to pick up a decent rea wheel and crankset and fit the other smaller components like brakes bars and forks.

I'd probably assign £120 for the frame, £80-100 for the rear wheel, £50 for the cranks, £30 for the forks and the remaining £100 or so for things like the brakes, bars, tyres, headset etc.

I'd also advise at looking at second hand parts. Trials gives the bikes such a beating that the parts get damaged very quickly so buying second hand stuff is definately a more financially viable option.

Hope that helps a little bit dude, if you have any more questions just holla.

[mod-92]

well, my first bike that i started to ride trials was the onza t-bird and found it easy and monoverable because of its

size

hope this helped

[Ticker]

Personally i would stay away from the saracen if you seriously want to get into trials then get a proper perpose built bike. The dirt jump type bike you are looking at will be heavy and not really suited to trials. also trials bikes are really a one purpose bike you can't really get one that you can just drop the seat and ride. I would look at buying a second hand bike like a onza t-pro which i think is a great bike to get into the sport. Hope this has helped.

[Luke Rainbird]

Keep an eye in the "For Sale/Wanted" section of this forum too, as there are a great deal of bargains to be had, and for that kind of money you could pick up something more than adequate.

Buying/selling in New Members' Chat is not allowed, however you are free to look through the FS/WTD section and talk to members via MSN/email etc

As Kris has said above, you'd probably be better off having a separate trials bike and getaround rig, purely as trials bikes are generally pretty specialised now, although if you were to go for something a little more old school (something with gears and a seatpost ) it would be easy enough to have one or two getabout gears, and a long enough seatpost to ride from spot to spot. Again, the FS/WTD area is a good place to look

Another advantage of buying a second hand bike is that chances are the person putting it together will have a vague idea of what parts should be put on the rig, or it will be a near-standard build that a bit of thought has gone into by the manufacturer. Either way, this will result in a reasonable spec, for around £400, and you will be able to fine tune things to your needs/style etc at a later date.

Something along the lines of a Base, Planet X or Pashley would probably fit the bill quite nicely, both pricewise and stylewise, so keep an eye out for something like that

I won't go on any more, but any other questions just ask

Hopefully that should help a touch, but if anything's a little unclear just shout!