Would you shift your suspension as often as your gears?

The gents at Bike Radar are convinced that the Scott Ransom is the state of the art in mountain bike design. The 30-pound "all-mountain" bike has trigger-shifters for its suspension, including a "traction" setting that actually reduces the travel. This raises the spectre of an old argument many times repeated, namely that suspension is not designed to keep your butt comfortable, it's designed to keep your wheels in contact with the earth.




But of course that's not entirely true with these big-hit bikes that are intended for shipping docks and Canadian bluff-hucking.

So I can accept that, although I would resort to the old El Camino law that suggests that hybrids are never going to please the pure-at-heart. Great looking ride, but the El Camino is neither a good car nor a useful truck. Seriously.


And lest you think I'm all wet, here's an interesting quote from Paul Denk, the man who designed the Ransom: "We could have built it much lighter, but then it wouldn’t have had that aggressive look — and style is fundamental in this category. "