The Biggest Bike Show on Earth?

Sea Otter is huge--this shot doesn't even capture a tenth of what this show has to offer.

We magazine drones have the good fortune of attending a veritable cornucopia of bike festivals and events. While every weekend spent drinking beer and riding bikes is inherently superior to a weekend spent cleaning house or listening to in-laws, some bike events are, nevertheless, better than others. The annual Sea Otter Classic ranks right up there with the best of them. What makes Sea Otter worth attending is that this single event is really like five or six separate events rolled into one.

TECHNO-WEENIE PARADISE Sea Otter is the annual coming-out party for the bike industry. Each year, bike companies give attendees a glimpse of the products that’ll be available the following Fall. This year, Santa Cruz, Haro, Kona, GT, Trek and Cannondale all showed off new models that (in most cases) won’t be available until early 2006. Component manufacturers such as Manitou, RockShox and Avid also debuted new models at this year’s event.

In addition to getting a sneak peek at next year’s goods, you can also cruise the Sea Otter Village getting good deals on shorts, chamois cream, spare tubes and just about anything else you’d want to wear or bolt onto your bike. Bike shops and bike companies alike sell a wide range of products from their booths at (frequently) discounted prices. Pick up a spare tire, grab a basket of golden, deep-fried calamari or a plate of barbecue and geek-out to your heart’s content.

Freeride Air While the cross-country, full-suspension market has steadily moved in the direction of air-sprung rear shocks, most serious long-travel bikes are still equipped with coil-sprung units. Historically, coil-sprung shocks have been more rugged than their air-filled cousins and generally offer a smoother ride (particularly over smaller hits). A number of suspension manufacturers, however, are trying to change that.

Fox's new DHX Air: the latest salvo in the war to make freeride suspension lighter and more adjustable.

At Sea Otter, Fox Racing Shox showed off a new long-travel, air-sprung rear shock—the DHX Air 5.0. The DHX Air 5.0 features Fox’s position-sensitive BoostValve technology, externally adjustable bottom-out resistance (which is adjusted separately from the ProPedal), 15-click adjustable ProPedal compression damping and externally adjustable, speed-sensitive shimmed rebound control. In short, the basic pitch here is light weight, ultimate adjustability and a smoother, coil-like compression feel.

While we didn’t get a chance to ride a DHX Air-equipped bike out on the course, we did steal one of the Fox guy’s bikes (thanks, Jared) for a few minutes. Initial impressions after fiddling with the knobs and pedaling around the venue were positive. The platform could be dialed from non-existent (super plush) to fairly firm. The ease of adjustability, however, was what I noticed most as the system doesn’t require you to bust out a shock pump to firm up the platform.

Manitou’s New Fork Line Earlier this year Manitou showed off a new line of cross-country forks. At Sea Otter the company debuted a new line of freeride-downhill oriented forks which they call “Travis”. Travis is a new line of single and double crown forks that will replace both the Dorado and Sherman fork lines in 2006. In a nutshell, the forks are extra burly, take-no-prisoners freeride fare: 34-millimeter stanchions, coil springs, and up to 203-millimeters of travel. The dual crown forks feature a 1.125-inch steerer and the single crowns feature (not surprisingly) Manitou’s 1.5-steerers. There’s also a new damping technology going on inside the forks dubbed “Intrinsic”.

In a nutshell, Intrinsic has been designed to give a plusher initial compression stroke for ultimate small-bump sensitivity (they did this by moving the SPV valve from the shaft up to the top of the fork leg. With the valve now working off of fluid displacement instead of shaft travel, the platform damping doesn’t kick in right off the bat and the fork feels plusher during the first stages of travel. As the fork progresses through its travel, the fluid movement inside the fork causes the pressure to build up and close the valve so that the fork doesn’t just blow through its travel. At least, that’s how I understand the Manitou guy’s reasoning (we just saw Travis, we didn’t ride it….that’ll be a future story). The real story here is that Manitou is trying to tweak SPV so that it feels appropriate for each type of riding: XC riders will want a firmer initial feel from their fork than freeriders and Manitou is addressing that (Fox is taking similar steps in 2006…more on that in a future report).

Expect the single-crown, 203-millimeter travel Travis to weigh about 6.5 pounds and the dual crown version to weigh about 7 pounds. The forks will also feature externally adjustable bottom out resistance and rebound circuitry.

Don’t expect to see Travis for awhile (probably around August). Pricing has yet to be determined.

Santa Cruz's new VPP bike sports is light, yet sports 6.5 inches of rear travel.

Yet Another New Santa Cruz? Santa Cruy Bicycles debuted yet another new bike—this one’s called the Nomad. Santa Cruz was looking to fill the gap between their new 5.3-inch travel Blur-LT and their 8.5-inch travel VP-Free. The Nomad sports 6.5 inches of rear wheel travel as well as a beefy set of linkages and stout but reasonably light hydro-formed tubes. Fairly light, plenty strong, lots of travel. The Nomad uses a standard 135mm, rear spacing, which means you can go ahead and use normal quick release hubs. The Nomad is still in the proto-type stages, but Santa Cruz expects to have finished Nomads available to the public shortly before Interbike this Fall. Spec and pricing have yet to be determined.

Born Again Zaskar GT was showing off a new version of their legendary Zaskar hardtail. The new model features a set of hydroformed tubes and sports some revised drop-outs as well. While the bike is still in the proto-type stages, it appears that the geometry will remain geared towards the hardcore XC race crowd.

Juicys Get Juicier Avid Product Manager Paul “They call me Bremsen Paul in Germany” Kantor was on hand to show off the latest flagship Avid hydraulic disc brake: the Juicy Carbon. As the name suggests, this model sports a new carbon fiber lever blade. Why carbon? Avid’s sister company, SRAM, recently debuted updated carbon X.O Trigger shifters and rear derailleurs (see the SRAM press camp coverage in the NEWS section of this website). Accordingly, it was high time for Avid to create a brake lever that matched X.Os new pimp styling.

While a few of us journalist-hacks stared skeptically at the carbon levers (pondering their long-term durability), Kantor assured us that the company has subjected the carbon levers to the normal testing procedures (picture stress analysis and standardized testing machines) as well as a slew of informal ones (beating on the levers, monkey-style, with hammers). Apparently the levers passed both testing protocols with flying colors.

The Carbon Juicys also have a few more tricks up their sleeve, so to speak. The brakes feature a blingin’ high polish finish and an aluminum Speed Dial (the brake’s pad contact-point adjuster knob). The Juicy Carbons will be available in 160, 185 and 203-mm rotor sizes and will retail for somewhere around $280 per wheel (give or take a few bucks…it’s still too early in the production process to nail down a rock-solid price point). Like it’s less stylish Juicy siblings, the Juicy Carbon will also feature too-free pad replacement, tri-align caliper positioning (no shims needed to eliminate rotor-rub) and drip-free bleeding. Finally, the Carbons are fully ambidextrous (a nice feature if you have to swap bikes with somebody who runs their brakes moto-style).

This year the promotor's radically increased the size of the Dirt Jump zone. The place was crawling with jumpers from Thursday through Sunday.

NUMBER PLATE NIRVANA At its core, Sea Otter is a race. What makes Sea Otter different from other races, however, is that almost every segment of cycling (other than BMX and velodrome racing) is present at one venue. Indeed, the promoters tout the Sea Otter Classic as the only event in the world to host both professional road and mountain bike racing at a single venue. On just one day you can watch a pack of professional road racers pour through Laguna Seca Raceway’s famous corkscrew section at terrifying speeds; you can watch the next generation of mountain bikers pull aerial maneuvers at the dirt jumping zone; or you can hang out and watch downhill, dual slalom, mountain cross and/or a cross-country mountain bike race—all within spitting distance of one another. If you want to step out from behind the yellow course tape and actually compete yourself, there are plenty of options to do just that. In fact, amateur riders (from beginner on up through expert-class racers) ride the very same courses as the pros.

GREAT RIDING Let’s say you love riding, but just aren’t feeling the need to strap on a number plate and prove yourself. Well, you can also spend four days flat-out riding the course at your own pace (without battling the other 200 people in your Sport Class division). Another thing that makes Sea Otter unusual is that the cross-country race course is actually fun to ride. Seriously. The course consists of miles of singletrack (and yeah, a few decent stretches of fireroad) that winds its way through the emerald green hills just outside of Monterey, California.

While the course isn’t very technical, there are still a few great, fast sections of singletrack that leave you grinning like an idiot. Riders have a choice of riding both a 10 or 20-mile route. If a 20-mile ride just sounds plain wimpy to you, the course designers also laid out a monster 50-mile Epic Ride this year that features over 8,000 feet of climbing.

Sea Otter opens on a Thursday and closes on a Sunday. If you hit the course during the first two days, you pretty much have it all to yourself. Just miles of wide-open, high speed singletrack carving. Hoo-damn. If you (like most people) try to ride the course on the weekend, well, you’ve got to squeeze in a loop when the course is free of racers (a little challenging) and you also have to contend with a ton of other riders on the course who also failed to call in sick to work on Thursday or Friday. This isn’t necessarily bad, but if you can stay healthy most of the year and then make a point of playing hookie from work on Thursday and Friday, I highly recommend the experience.

AND YOUR SPOUSE WON’T HATE YOU Anyone who has walked through a parking lot at a mountain bike race has undoubtedly seen the classic unhappy spouse. Typically, a guy drags his wife or girlfriend out to a race (telling her how fun and exciting it will be) and then abandons her to the wonders of the empty race pits while he goes out and tests his testosterone level out on the course. The spouse shuffles around in the heat and dust for a few hours before finally resigning themselves to camping out and stewing in the passenger seat of the empty car they drove up in. It’s not exactly a fool-proof way to get a non-mountain biker interested in the sport.

Sea Otter, on the other hand, actually offers a range of activities for non-racers and non-riders. There’s a Kid’s Bike Rodeo, a Sea Otter Egg Hunt for kids under 8 years of age and a kid’s carnival. If you are not bringing a rug-rat to the show, your spouse can also sample the coffee shops, bistros, art galleries, theaters, museums, and just about everything else under the sun, a short (15 to 20-minute) drive away in the very happening towns of Monterey and Carmel.