If I told you that Claire had only one question about the bike she’s pointing to what would you guess it is? No really, take a second before you scroll down. 

If you guessed “why is there multiple front rings” then you were right. It never really occurred to me that as many bikes as she’s worked on at home or when she comes to help me at the shop, Claire has never actually actively seen a front derailleur. 

It almost bothered me for a second, but when her mom pointed out that bikes are way better now I couldn’t disagree. So points to Nina. Do front derailleurs still have their place? Absolutely. On a road-road bike or a fully-loaded touring bike, or even the beautiful hybrid of those two machines and an early ’90s mountain bike we call a ‘gravel bike’ they make plenty of sense. We just don’t own any bikes that have one. 

But it is sort of funny that my kid has laced a wheel but never shifted – never even noticed – a front chainring‽ 

I was quite pleased with myself that my leg has recovered enough to ride my single-speed for Cumberlandworx. I’ve never shifted gears in over a decade of riding Cumby and it’s one of those little personal streaks that’s been nice to maintain. 

It was more than a little foreboding to run into my single-speed and rigid fork-riding friend, the infamous Larry Talker, AKA Model-T, a man who thinks nothing of cleaning Boogie Man on his rigid #1FG rig, riding a multi-speed drivetrain and 6.5″ suspension fork in Cumberland.

“Foreboding,” you ask? As great as Claire has been climbing and descending I’m still a little bit faster in both directions than my eight-year-old. But the reason Model-T has left the simple mountain bicycle at home is that his teenager, Sean, is proper ripping on any trail Cumberland has to offer. 

When Sean started describing the fantastic “Sports Surface” I almost fell over laughing. The Clairebarian points out that I say this “all the time” but that’s sort of the point. Larry (whose real name, for the record, is actually Terry) says it so flippin’ often and with such enthusiasm that it battered itself into my lexicon years ago and I’ve never been able to wash it out. 

He also bears complete responsibility anytime you hear me say, or see me write “there’s not enough O’s in Smoooooooth.” So in a way, I’m stoked that his kid is taking him into all the corners but it’s also a reminder that if I want to have a sporting chance it’s a good thing my V2 is able to run a suspension fork and multi-speed drivetrain. 

It does maybe sound a bit weird to head to Cumberlandworx and take photos of bikes I could easily bump into in North Vancouver. But when I ride with Model-T we always rock rigid one-speeds and this is the first time I’ve ever seen Sean in action. I truly enjoy the fact that he’s lusting after a fresh carbon Forbidden while at the same time financially intelligent to such a level as to rock a rig within his current maintenance budget. 

He’s also one of those wise-beyond-his-years kids who has figured out the truth about hardtails that all of us old farts know. Most of the time they’re only slower than a full-suspension bike if your friends know that you’re racing.

Aside from replacing wear items like tires, brake pads, and bottom brackets, Sean’s next planned purchase is to ditch the awful Shimano dropper post remote. Keeping in mind that Shimano designed and manufactured the Fox DOSS remote on Larry Talker’s bike a decade ago they can’t claim they don’t know how to make a good dropper lever. I guess they just chose not to?

To be clear, I have also met folks who have no issue with these Shimano dropper post remotes but they’re always attached to a super-light action post that would work well enough with just a bare cable sticking out of some housing zip-tied to your handlebar. 

If I could be king of product management at Kona for a day I’d swap the TransX post for the same thing from PNW – it’s all about the after-sale support and fantastic long-term customer service – and I’d lace those Race Face AR rims to a pair of Formula 6-Bolt hubs instead of the Shimano SLX units. I’d also love to see a rear CushCore insert stock out of the box – Sean installed one before he suffered an expensive egg-shaped rim replacement job. 

Hardcore hardtails ridden hard need tire inserts. 

Alright, so there’s a couple of North Van Honzo (Honzo is the plural of Honzo right?) and some old tree art with three chainrings for your viewing pleasure. I think three at a time is about the right number for some proper bikes-we-saw coverage so I’ll see what I can do about putting together another installment or two before we roll on.

I’ve seen a few interesting bikes on the back of cars but having witnessed some epic misunderstandings so with only my phone or my camera with a pancake lens I don’t want to get too close. I guess for Cumberlandworx next year I’ll have to bring some full-on Paparazzi gear? 

Ha.