this post was submitted on 20 Jul 2026
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people buy bikes like they buy cars.
and like cars, they buy a new one rather than maintain their current one.
I mean mine is a used 2016 la Pierre that I got a good deal on 3 years ago and have been doing the maintenance on mostly myself.
There are plenty out there that change their gear like they change their underwear. But as Shawn says in the hit movie Fast and The Furious Tokyo Drift, “It’s not the ride, it’s the rider”.
Sorry wat? Guess I didn't get that memo, I'll go trash my 2008 giant stp and buy a new bike. Thanks
a 2008 bike is like a model T ford at this point.
you should very much get a new bike, and be amazed. 2008 bikes were still mostly using road geometry and road components.
Won't lie that's a far stretch to say that a bike with hydraulic disk front and rear, Marzocchi Bomber DJ 3, and a geometry that most hard tail mtb mimic these days, I find it hard to agree. The only thing that I am missing out on is having access to a 12x1 group set. But an 8x1 is more than enough for the stuff I do.
Back in 2008, there were only two brands that made bikes with geometry that was anywhere at all close to modern, and those brands were Kona and Ragley.
By modern, I'm talking about a rearward bottom bracket that shows up on geometry charts as a steep seat tube angle paired with a slack head angle and long top tube.
You can go onto the website called "bike insights" and plug in your numbers and it'll show up as a graphic which you can compare against something modern. Your bike won't be modern at all.
I'll go further and point out that if your bike didnt come with a dropper post, you're basically riding an antique. The whole world needed dropper posts to deal with the bottom bracket / seat angle / standing up hitting the seat relationship that only started to be a thing within the modern geometry paradigm.
You should test ride something current.
Here, I did the compaison for you at this link. You will be shocked. Note that the Chromag is described as "average" for today.
I mean, you're wrong. But ride what you want man. Nobody is forcing you to buy a new bike, you can keep riding your model T and thinking it's the best thing ever, rest of us prefer suspension that actually works and isn't a glorified pogo stick.
Plenty of alt-cycling hipsters are riding bikes with 1980s tech and spending thousands to do so, to 'own' people with modern bikes. Marketing is a hell of a drug.
Wow, not often you meet a prick in the mtb community. Are you also one of those who think the bike makes the rider? And now, are salty because you found out the truth? Or are you too scared to actually ride your bike because one dent and your high tech carbon fiber frame is scrap?
You're wrong.
But please blame and mock other people for your ignorance and stubbornness.
https://www.bikeradar.com/reviews/components/forks/suspension-forks/marzocchi-dj3-review
Is the reviewer here, also a prick because they only gave your fork a 3.5 star rating, because even in 2008 it was a middling product?
Interesting. After 18 years, my fork still slams just the same. Nice. Looks like a win to me.
Nah, you're just being a gate keeping prick.
Like I always say, Shut up and ride.
I agree with this sentiment.
I was a former racer and a suspension tech. When I get a new bike it takes me a few rides to get the suspension dialled.
However, once dialled, that begins a year of deeper tweaking that could include changing damper shim stacks, various internal reconfigurations with volume spacers and suspension mods.
It basically takes me a year of ownership to really feel like the bike is doing what I want.
I think I can basically take almost any suspension package and eventually modify it to what I imagine. So I don't super care if it's a Fox or Rock Shox or air or coil, these are not essential constraints on ride quality.
I also usually take about 2 years to figure out the wheels and components to a point where things have the right set of characteristics all together. For example, I won't enjoy riding a stiff handlebar with noodly rims, for me it's all a stack of springs that have to respond evenly in various loadings.
Having given this anecdote, what I see other riders doing is total part and total bike swaps. They have a valid issue with some shortcoming on their current ride but they don't have the right strategy of tuning, so what they do is trade one set of problems for a whole new bike, repeat, repeat.
I actually hate riding a new bike, it makes me ride much slower and much worse.
As someone who can do a lot of basic level auto diagnosis and repair, I don't treat a car much different.
When you start to pay other people as mechanics, it is often a rational monetary decision to sell a slightly used item and get a new one... If you flip items fast enough that you never pay for depreciation or maintenance you can get away with it...