There are testbikes available in Füssen, near the Austrian border... but at the end of august we'll probably drive to the Maxiavalanche race in Are, Sweden. With testbikes, so with a bit of luck we can rendez-vous when driving northwards if you're really interested.
Speaking of races: this weird bike that most think is a slow tractor
finished 6th in the Salzkammergut (the long distance) a few weeks ago and is currently 2nd in the Ironbike - already winning two stages. With 29er wheels (which with the adapted hubs are perfectly compatible with the geometry - did I mention we tested for 4 years before marketing this bike ?).
Earlier this year on his Sandman, Milton shared a victory in the Pedals de Foc, an ultramarathon similar to the Salzkammergut in the Pyrenees.
At the other side of the use spectrum, with the fat wheels, we went to the Megavalanche last week and had some pretty astonishing results in the qualifiers. To get to the finals, you have to run qualifier heats of 200 bikers each. The best 35 go on to the "real" Mega.
Martin Toplak and Mark Walter, both of them from Füssen, qualified 5th (!) and 15th in their respective heats. Martin (from the video) qualified 15th as well in his run.
That is, on hardtails
. Martin has some great video footage which shows what you can do with a Sandman on fat wheels and how easy it is to pass fullies on them
- he started at the back of his group. I'll post the link when he has edited it.
In the Mega final itself they had no luck: flat tire for Simon, he spent 10 minutes trying to inflate his tire with a faulty pump. He still managed a run under the hour and is convinced that a sub 50 minute run is possible on a Sandman. That's his goal for next year.
Mark and Martin got involved in crashes on the glacier or further on (Martin while running in the top 20). Mark finished around the hour and Martin limping in almost last (we had to take him to the hospital afterwards...).
We got A LOT of interest at the Mega, after seeing what Simon, Mark and Martin were doing with the bikes. Lots of people waiting to take the testbikes out for a run and no bad comments afterwards. At first, people just can't believe that a fat tire and the right geometry can work as well or better in most normal conditions compared to ultra-chic computer generated linkage and shock systems. By getting these results with relatively unknown bikers (really nice guys, who know to handle a bike), we're providing facts to back our claim.
The only trail parts where we needed to give the big fullies some space were the ultra rough DH portions and a succession of whoops/jumps.
