- Here we go, first official, uninterrupted descent.
(bike whirring)
(gentle music)
So I finally got to ride my new bike.
If you watch the last episode
this is a custom titanium frame that I had built
according to a very specific geometry
that's made only for me.
And we had one measly day
of decent weather where I was able to ride this thing.
And all I can think about
is going back out on the trail with it again.
(upbeat music)
(bike whirring)
My initial impression is that this bike fits me
better than any bike I've ever ridden.
It fits me better than my bike, if that makes sense.
Yet it feels different.
Most of the bikes that I've ridden
and owned feel like you're sitting on top.
This one feels like you're sitting inside of it,
like you can charge into anything
and the bike's gonna handle it.
It won't, it's a 130 millimeter hard tail.
(bike banging)
But it feels like that.
And it's a good feeling.
I hit the Whale Tail crooked.
Normally you can just squeeze your brakes and stop
but it's all wet today.
And so put myself in a stupid, preventable situation.
We'll have to try another time.
Climbing feels really good.
The shorter 165 millimeter cranks,
something I've never owned before,
and I guess I'm gonna have to get them
for my other bikes because they're awesome.
And the fact that the bike is overall real stiff
and light makes it a pleasure to climb with as well.
But also this steeper seat tube angle positions me
over my crank set, when I'm climbing, feels a lot better.
We'll talk about that more when we get to geometry.
Now, descending.
Holy crap, I've had experience with 29 inch wheels
but never on a bike that truly fit me,
that was truly adapted to a super small person.
And even though this bike has less travel
than my last bike, it carries more speed.
There's no question about it.
I mentioned in the last video
that it has two water bottle cages.
And so I was using the one on the seat tube for storage.
I was using a Fidlock storage container.
And then I found that this one that just fits
in a bottle cage actually holds more stuff
because it doesn't have the mechanism that locks it in.
And so I got two bottle cages.
I can carry a whole bunch of water, I can carry some stuff.
And then of course, I've also got this little mount
on the top tube that I can put my GoPro on.
And I can either shoot from this angle
or just use it to carry the GoPro with me in case I need it.
Now, as I said, this is a multi-use mount.
I can use it for whatever.
Just for fun, I made a mount for my knife
that matches the bike, painter made it.
And so if I'm going into a rough part of the woods,
I have a three inch knife to keep me safe.
I also made a little pump mount that can carry
this little pump or it can carry some CO2
or I could put that in my storage container.
So I've got tons of options and of course tools
and a tubeless repair kit in my steer tube.
So whatever I end up doing with this bike,
I'm gonna be able to squish things around and adapt it.
I like that.
(upbeat music)
So I wanna talk about the paint job on this bike.
In the last video I saw some comments saying,
those decals look really good.
It's paint.
It's not just paint, it's Cerakote.
It's an extremely durable paint.
You need to paint titanium.
And in fact, it's controversial to paint titanium at all
because if you have it, why not let it all show?
My initial plan was to just have a raw titanium bike
but I decided to switch it up and go with the paint
because I don't want it to look
like every other titanium bike.
I want it to be unique.
And so the painter hid Oscar and drama and little callbacks
to this YouTube channel and this bike.
Sage, the company that built this for me is in Oregon.
So there's a little Oregon hidden on the bike.
There's also a little Pennsylvania
because that's where the painter is.
The bike was painted in Pennsylvania
of course, it all got shipped back to North Carolina.
And so right here in between the seat stays,
we have a little North Carolina on the bike.
Now,another Easter egg you guys were staring right at
is inside the badge on the head tube.
You can see right here in the top
of the Sage badge is the Whale Tail.
Around the bike you'll see other little details
like the Berm Peak logo, brewed in Oregon, made in the USA.
Everybody who worked on this bike
knows about the YouTube channel.
It was a project that meant a lot to them
because their work would be showcased so publicly.
I wanted them to be really excited
and proud to be working on this project.
And I think that tells a much better story.
(bike whirring)
Now, riding this bike has also taught me something.
It made me realize something
that kind of ruins my life a little bit.
But before we get to that, I have to talk a little bit
about the geometry so you understand where I'm coming from.
The geometry of a bike determines
basically everything about it,
how high the bottom bracket is off the ground,
the angle of the head tube and the fork,
the angle of your seat tube, the distance between the front
and rear wheel, how far you're reaching for the handlebar.
And so what Dave from Sage taught me to do
was look at geometry from a more holistic perspective.
You have to look at the entire bike
as a whole and indeed the size.
Now, one trend that we've been seeing a lot lately
is seat tube angles getting steeper.
Instead of laying back like that,
they're starting to get a little bit steeper
'cause it helps the rider center themselves
over the cranks when pedaling uphill.
Now when going downhill, we don't care
what the seat tube angle is at because we're standing up.
But when bike companies advertise
that they have a steeper seat tube angle,
on the extra large, it's gonna make a huge difference
because a half a degree is gonna move the rider up
really far on the front of the bike.
On the small or the extra small,
it's barely gonna make any freaking difference.
And so many bike companies have different seat tube angles
for different sizes of the same bike.
And so you can see how harping on one angle
of the bike is kind of useless without the whole picture.
And so in case you care,
the seat tube angle on this bike is 76.21 degrees.
Now another important number is the head tube angle.
Now if you have a really slack head tube angle
like my Revel Rail, the fork is really raked out
and it helps you hit obstacles head on,
keeps you more stable when you're traveling at high speeds.
Now Blue has a 66 and a half degree head tube angle
and a steeper head tube angle
makes the bike a little more nimble.
But that's not to say a bike
with a slack head tube can't be nimble.
And it's also not to say that a bike
with a steep head tube can't be stable at high speeds.
There are a lot of other factors.
This bike has a pretty short reach.
It's kind of a trend to go for a longer reach right now
but I'm actually not like a tall person scaled down.
I'm totally different.
And so I like a shorter reach.
This has a 406 millimeter reach
that's shorter than the reach on any of my bikes.
Now, other things that can influence
your bike's geometry are the width of the handlebars,
the length of the stem, your stack height,
the length of your crank arms.
But my main takeaway from the process
of building this bike is that one angle
or piece of information about a bike's geometry
is gonna tell you very little
about where you are actually being placed
on the bike without the whole picture.
And your friend who's telling you what head tube angle
or seat tube angle to get,
they don't really know what they're talking about.
And the best advice you could follow
if you're trying to make heads and tails of this
is to go demo bikes at a bike festival or a trade show.
And that brings me to the realization that I came to
after my first ride on this bike.
This is one of the very few dress shirts that I own.
I have to buy the shirt and then pay
like another 60 or 70 bucks to have it adjusted to fit me.
So all my pants have to get adjusted,
all my shirts have to get adjusted.
I have blocks on the gas and brake pedal of the Gator.
And so I don't know why I was thinking all this time
that the bikes I was riding fit me.
Know, this is actually the first hard tail
I've ever ridden that actually fits me.
And two days ago, I didn't know that.
It's like the first time a puppy tastes human food.
They're ruined forever.
Now a person in my position
can find a bike that fits them as close
as possible and then adjust the bar width
and the stem length and all these other items to adapt it.
But there's nothing better than a custom bike.
And if you're on the fence about it,
allow me to push you over the fence.
If you deal with the right person
who's gonna help you dial in the geometry,
somebody who really knows what they're talking about,
they're gonna get you on a bike that feels better
than anything you have ever ridden in your entire life.
And that's how I feel about this.
Now, I wanna be super clear,
if your body type falls within the normal range
of human anatomy, the perfect bike is out there for you.
They're designing these bikes to fit you perfectly.
But if you're abnormally short
or you got super long arms or whatever,
a custom bike is your only option
if you want the bike to truly fit.
And that's bad news.
I kind of liked it better before I knew that.
So it should be pretty needless to say
that I'm quite happy about this bike.
It's been a project I've spent a lot of time on
since July, and I've always wanted to build
the best hardtail that I could possibly imagine.
And so I'm very lucky to say that I was able to do that.
Thanks for sharing this moment with me
and thanks for watching all these years
and making it possible for me to do stuff like this.
I can't wait to ride this bike even more.
Really go out and explore and get lost on this thing.
But until then, enjoy the rest of the year.
Have a great holiday with your family
and thanks for riding with me today.
I'll see you next time.
- [Speaker] Rolling.
(upbeat music)
(person laughing)