Judge, Jury and Executioner: A Conversation with James Huang

Let’s get one thing out of the way right away: With very, very few exceptions (I can probably count them on one hand over fifteen years), test bikes that are sent to us for review are always sent back to the brand after we’re done with them. I think it’s absolutely critical from a reviewer’s standpoint that there be no expectation of a "free" anything — and likewise, I think there’s also danger in reviewing things that you’ve bought with your own money beforehand. After all, how many people will willingly rip into something that they’ve just spent a lot of their own money on?

Also note that I’ve intentionally put "free" in quotation marks. An industry friend of mine told me very early on that goes through my mind to this day: Nothing is ever totally free. And so whenever something comes my way that I truly don’t want to let go of, I’ll usually see what the company will be willing to sell it for, but only after I’ve finished the review. Whenever possible, I like to keep things clean. It’s just easier that way for everyone involved.

On the road, and assuming we’re keeping things local, I think my favorite descent might be St. Vrain Canyon coming down from the mountains into the small town of Lyons. It’s not particularly steep, but it’s fast enough that you can pretty easily outrun cars on the way down, there are lots of fun sweeping corners, and the pavement is really high-quality. Maybe best of all is how it seems to just go on forever. It’s definitely worth the climb up to get there. Otherwise, I’ve had the grand privilege of being able to ride on the island of Mallorca a bunch of times over the years, and while I can’t remember the name of the road, there’s one that descends out of the mountains and hugs the coastline as you sweep through what feels like a billion corners, all of them perfectly contoured with the Mediterranean sea off to your right. It’s just amazing.

Off-road, one of my favorite local downhill segments is the Longhorn trail at White Ranch in Golden. It’s chock-full of fun little drops and hits from top to bottom, a lot of the corners are pleasantly bermed, and there are even sections that are closed off to hikers and equestrians so you can really just let it rip. If you hit it in the early morning before it gets too hot, it’s absolute bliss. So, so much fun.

Further away from home, I’d probably have to put nearly anything in Pemberton, British Columbia on the list. I was fortunate enough to join in on the Pinkbike Field Test last autumn, and was blown away by the quality of terrain surrounding that tiny little town. I’d ridden a bunch in BC before, but this was on another level in terms of how the trail builders used the natural terrain and the sheer variety of options on tap. And oh my god, the dirt. It was so, so good.

Tolerances. A lot of the headaches people complain about these days (press-fit bottom brackets, disc-brake alignment, etc.) aren’t really things that should be problematic *in theory*. However, the sloppy tolerances that are often associated with mass manufacturing mean that a lot of these systems don’t work the way their designers and engineers intended.

That said, I do still hate press-fit bottom brackets (so many tools, so much hassle, so much waste…) and I absolutely loathe flat-mount disc brakes. Post mount may have been a little clumsier-looking and heavier, but it’s far more tolerant of slight variations in alignment, is annoyingly restrictive (I think there are plenty of riders who could benefit from 180mm-diameter front rotors, for example), and it's tons easier to set up. I hate it so much.

Press-fit bottom brackets. Sure, they save a few grams and the wider shells of some press-fit formats allow for more design flexibility for frame designers, but they’ve also ruined the rides for thousands of people thanks to incessant creaking and maintenance issues. It’s an era of the bicycle industry that I wish had never happened, all ostensibly in the name of saving a few grams. It’s just totally stupid.

My guess is that a lot of people won’t be happy that I’m about to say this, but I see cycling evolving along a path similar to what we’ve seen in skiing. In that world, lift-access is the norm, while cross-country and backcountry stuff are more of the outliers. Interestingly, both of those segments consider themselves to be a little more "core" than skiers who only stay inbounds and sit on a motorized chair to head back up the mountain. Sounds familiar, right?

I don’t think non-motorized bikes are going to go away, but as far as the mainstream goes, people ultimately are in it mostly for fun, and whether you like them or not, e-bikes are undeniably fun. There are plenty of ways this might not happen, of course: they’re super expensive, and there are also all sorts of regulations and whatnot governing how they can be used, especially in the United States.

That said, I still think that, in the long term, e-bikes are going to outnumber regular bikes. In fact, for some of the bigger brands, that’s already happened.