I’m normally a fan of flex everywhere but in this instance, the super stiff BEAST parts kept the bike feeling positive and surprisingly efficient on climbs. And surprisingly, he often finds a diamond in the rough — or at least a salvageable build hyper mountain bike he can later modify. (In fairness, he finds total lemons too.) So I caught up with him to find out why he loves box-store bikes, whether it’s ever a good buy, and what you can do to make a 200-plus-dollar Walmart bike a respectable ride.
My children love it and they are very happyand amazed. I recommend King Toys and I myself will reach out to King Toys for future purchases. The stiffer lever feels a lot snappier and makes the brakes feel much more direct and powerful, whereas the original lever has greater modulation and feels a little more progressive. The Oak lever adds a twizzly knob for adjustment normally reserved for the MT7, so if that’s important to you then the Oak lever upgrade might offer an alternative to a fancier brake set. The stem looked incredible in the unique raw forged finish. It weighs just 86 g and is tested to exceed standards for an enduro bike.
At just over 400 euros it’s not inexpensive, but it’s built to last and offers an insane range for the weight. Tires are, for me, one of the most important choices for any build. Most people, including Schwalbe themselves, seem to think that the “G” in Schwalbe’s G series of tires refers to gravel, however, it actually refers to wildman and all round good egg Grant. Grant works for Schwalbe in the UK but in his spare time is also a tire nerd, who indulged me and my fantasies about the kind of riding I might do for far longer than reasonable. It was built under the ambiguous and slightly tongue-in-cheek Sour SRD umbrella (more on that below). It’s neither an enduro bike nor their new race-proven ultra-distance/XC prototype we saw at last year’s Bespoked.
This might mean that I have never owned a mountain bike because a mountain bike, in modern times, is so separate from the uncomplicated machines of the ’90s that I grew up riding. The mountain bikes that I have owned have mostly functioned as off-road tourers. Most notably, a 1998 Specialized Rockhopper (on balance, perhaps the best bike ever made), a Rock Lobster Team Tig 853, a first-generation Surly Krampus, and a slew of other bits and bobs I made myself. I have a great local bike shop, and I shop there regularly. It’s always a good idea to seek out a good bike shop, even if you own a big-box bike.
The Hyper eRide mountain bike has been hailed as the perfect companion for younger cyclists looking to get out and explore. At an affordable price, it’s equipped with a powerful electric pedal-assist motor and a 26-inch mountain bike frame. This cutting-edge equipment provides a great hyper bike way for riders to travel faster, farther, and more comfortably than ever before. The real stars of the show were the grips, which were super comfortable, amazingly durable, had integrated bar ends, and were designed to be rotated with wear, which is unusual for lock-on grips.
I was overbiking for sure, but simultaneously, I was pushing myself to ride new things rather than pushing my fitness as I’d expected. The lack of anything fun to ride locally and my deep desire to ride the bike all the time instilled a sense of being lost and bored, which seemed to always result in play. I’d cruise around looking for things to ride up, down, off, or onto. I could go out for a ride with no aim and no idea where I was going and have a great time just repeatedly trying to hop over a log or riding down a set of steps fast enough to be able to ride up again on the other side; just playing around by myself, having a nice time.
This Hyper Havoc Mountain Bike is the key to outdoor fun. It has a lightweight aluminum frame that lets users ride harder for longer, providing a reliable experience. Becoming accustomed to riding more dynamically, going full pelt into my own personal unknown, and coming out the other side surprisingly unscathed became—through practice—a matter of course that has brought more play to all of my riding. Gravel became road cycling for mountain bikers and, at the same time, the gateway drug to mountain biking for road cyclists. There is also a simplicity to just making tires and clearances bigger for comfort and traction.
The RD-1 rear mech is by far the best-looking out there, but more critically, it’s unfussy about what other parts it works with, meshing equally well with 11—or 12-speed SRAM, Shimano, or even Campagnolo shifters. In practice, that translated to the bars feeling significantly stiff. Regrettably ill-equipped for the scientific process, I’d estimate deflection over their ample span to be within the acceptable deflection tolerance over the same span for a rolled steel joist designated for constructing a skyscraper. The 35-mm clamp diameter carbon risers that the bike came with have an anti-crush zone where they be clamped, as well as a soft, high-friction coefficient lamination on the outside in clamping areas because over-tightening of stem bolts is often a reason for handlebar failure. In this way, the bars don’t move, even with less-than-the-ideal torque, and won’t get crushed with more, so the risk of crush-based failure is mitigated. My SRD’s life began as a pile of mitered tubes destined to be an iteration of the forthcoming enduro-focused Sour Double Choc during the middle stage of Sour’s onshoring process when tubes were still mitered in Taiwan and welded in Germany.
The frame was welded just outside of Dresden, Germany. While we discussed a basic bitch build kit as an intro to mountain biking, when I collected the bike it was built with some of the most esoteric, decently high-end made-in-Europe parts out there. The biggest problem I’ve seen is improper assembly and setup. Even a big-name bike can give a miserable experience if it isn’t set up properly. And sadly, this is an area in which most big-box stores are lacking. There are instances where that may be somewhat accurate because there are certainly some questionable bikes I’ve seen on the shelves at big-box stores.
SRD (Sour Racing Development) also stands for Stadtreinigung Dresden, Sour’s local refuse collection and recycling company. The twist feels doubly fun as my SRD is made from tubes that were actually repurposed. Given my non-mountain biking background, there may have been some mixup before I took the bike about what a trail bike is for.