so not to brag about what I have but my house has running water [Music] filling up water
bottles is easy I even have a toilet so when I'm done with my coffee I don't have to dig
a hole I can just go into the bathroom and sit there everything's cool I've even got
climate control I can just tell it what temperature I want the house to be and boom yet with all
these Creature Comforts I like camping
I still like staying in a tent for a couple of days digging a hole when I'm done with
my coffee being okay with whatever the temperature is there are a lot of other things like that
purposely doing something less comfortable
[Music] So today I'm going to ride a trail on this 90s era full rigid mountain bike
[Music] now some of you remember us building this on flip bike it was in really bad shape
I think I bought this for like 55 60 bucks and it runs perfectly fine like it would have
in the 90s I did Squeeze some fatter tires onto it just to make my life a little bit
easier [Music]
they barely fit I had to like sand down the side knobs a little bit so it would clear
I added a frame mounted pump and also something else You Don't See Much Anymore a saddle pouch
because I'm gonna need stuff to repair this now what I'm doing has a name it's called
under biking you take a bike that's less capable than the trail you're riding or the bike you
normally ride and yeah you under bike you just make sure that you don't have what you
need to get through the ride and it's fun you do it for the heck of it just like going
camping or listening to vinyl and today we're going to talk about all the reasons why under
biking is a really fun and affordable activity
[Music] so first of all one of the main benefits of under biking is you can do something a
little different have yourself an experience and not spend a whole bunch of money on it
you can dig your dad's old bike out of the garage or you can buy something on Facebook
Marketplace for next to nothing get it running and go out and have a good time and what's
funny is with this bike fixed up there are certain things it does just as well if not
better than a modern bike for example it's really not that bad for climbing now I could
see how really technical or gnarly climbs could be difficult on this just because of
the geometry but for normal climbing it's actually really comfortable because you're
sitting up it's easy to get your weight over the front of the bike and it's light this
doesn't have suspension linkage it doesn't have a suspension Fork bikes were just smaller
in general and so on the beginning of your ride when you're just pedaling up a road or
going up some single track it's actually quite enjoyable and kind of fun these older bikes
also have tons of range yeah it's got this little seven-speed cassette over here but
it's also got a three by so you can just drop a ring and have tons of power to go up whatever
Hill you want so at least on the climbing part of my ride I'm riding a light bike that's
got plenty of range really comfortable to sit on I'm having a nice day [Music]
Let me sho you a few things on this bike that were a little bit different starting with
the handlebars these are very narrow they're about the width of my shoulders now arms straight
out back then people just didn't go downhill as fast they didn't need the leverage there
were also some concerns about trees narrow handlebars can go in between trees now we
just cut the tree down and have a wider Trail and also coming from a road bike these handlebars
actually are kind of wide a bike like this has no suspension whatsoever your only suspension
of your tires and the tires weren't as fat like I said this morning I put bigger tires
on here they didn't even clear the frame I had to grind away knobs and these are 2.25
that was like a Fat Tire Bike back in 1992.
obviously the drivetrain is different clangs around a lot no clutch no hydraulic disc brakes
or disc brakes in general this was before v-brakes these are cantilever brakes they
designed them like this so that the cable will be far away from the tire and it could
clear mud easier so if you were riding around and stuff was flying into your wheel the brake
would have more clearance than a caliper brake but I'd say the biggest difference is the
geometry the bike is so short and it's tall and so when you get yourself into a difficult
technical situation it doesn't perform like the bikes of today it's a little harder to
get the bike underneath you and put it into position and it's just easier to go over the
handlebars or flip over because the bike is so tall and short I prefer shorter bikes and
even my bike is way longer than this but with that said it gives you a feeling that you
don't really get today it's more of a sitting up on top of a horse feeling rather than sitting
inside of a fighter jet cockpit it's different and novel and makes you nostalgic [Music]
another advantage of having an underbike on hand it can handicap you so you have some
friends or family coming into town they've seen your little Facebook clips of mountain
biking they've got a case of a GoPro effect they think it's going to be easy you know
the easiest Trail in town is going to take all day with them there take your under bike
you'll do a lot less holding on to a tree waiting for them they get your bike the really
capable one that's set up nice you take out your underbike it'll bring you guys just a
little bit closer to the same level and everybody can have fun and just like riding at night
or riding in the snow it can take a trail that you normally find kind of boring and
make it really interesting
so here's something you're not going to see very much anymore a saddle pouch these used
to be immensely popular can carry pretty much everything you need to fix your bike and the
only reason they went away is dropper seat posts and full suspension if you have your
seat too low and your suspension compresses it's just gonna hit right into the saddle
pouch and so we carry stuff a different way but the mountain bikers of yesteryear had
these and I kind of miss them they rattle around a lot
I'm not very nostalgic for that but they were really handy it's a convenient way to carry
stuff and this Fidlock pouch you can actually remove so you can get to all your stuff and
then just snap it back into place [Music]
[Music] so the
next thing we're going to do is descend [Music] [Clanging]
so all that stuff I said about Nostalgia and being able to handicap yourself and ride with
friends that's all well and good but when it comes to descending this is just straight
up scary especially if it's on wet steep technical terrain and uh I kind of dig it to be honest
now there are a lot of reasons why this is so sketchy to descend on and it mostly comes
down to tires these bikes don't have tubeless tires the rims are not tubeless ready the
tires are not as fat they have to run way higher tire pressure these are I think 40
PSI and so you hit a wet rock or root and it just goes everywhere it just can't get
purchased on terrain as well and it makes things really spicy now another thing I mentioned
before was the geometry it's really hard to get up in behind this bike it's just so short
and so you really have to be confident about your line choice now the fact that it's full
rigid the fact that there's no suspension that only really matters when you're going
fast if you're going slow you can pick your way through just about anything on this but
I must say there are times when it's hard to go slow because we have rim brakes we have
these little skinny tires I mean everything about this I find myself having to get more
momentum on this bike than I really care to given the conditions right now
but when I was a kid I rode a bike like this and I think a lot of the skills that I have
today are there because I had to throw around a bike like that I had to make it work and
if you take out your underbike every once in a while you could tap into that knowledge
base from the early 90s those mountain bikers in a lot of ways were way more masochistic
I mean just think about it they fell in love with mountain biking they got addicted to
it they rode these bikes on Trails like this and that led to mountain biking as we know
it today and man we've got a really nice and cushy today with all the technology we have
on our bikes
and finally the last benefit of under biking is you can get into mountain biking for not
that much money people are practically giving these things away on the used market and if
you have a little bit of know-how and you're mechanically inclined you could fix one up
you could go out on the trail and have some type-2 fun and decide whether Mountain biking's
for you I'll tell you what the newer bikes make it a lot easier to go over stuff like
this but you'll be able to tell whether you like the physical output whether you like
being in the locations that people mountain bike in and you can actually learn a whole
ton on a bike like this like I said this is what I learned on and so whenever you see
those articles that say 10 Entry-Level Bikes Under $4000" ignore that you don't need anything
more than this if you want to just get out on the trail and call yourself a mountain
biker I hope you guys enjoyed under biking with me today it's not something I do all
the time but it is a novelty activity that's quite fun I hope you'll try it yourself where
you will enlighten us with your tales of under biking below I hope you learned something
today and if you didn't I hope you at least found this entertaining thanks for riding
with me today and I'll see you next time