Mountain Biking - New tires.

Haven't posted in quite a while. Too busy riding. Well I've been trying to ride as much as I can whenever I can. Doing mostly technical trails. Lots of roots and bumps. Now I wish I got a fs bike. Fell lots also. My worst crash was attemtping a 3 ft drop. Hesitated right before and just endo'd right onto my face. (Don't worry the bike didn't get hurt!) Most of my other falls are from not being able to unclip. Pretty embarrasing.

Anyways my question is that most of the trails I'm riding have lots of roots and bumps and some fast switchbacks. I want to get bigger tires. I'm thinking 2.3's. But my friend says thats overkill on my C'Dale F800. I want lots of grip and a softer ride. And I don't want to worry about pinch flats as much when I try jumping things. Also do any companies make a blue tire in 2.3 size?

Also One last thing. I seem to have trouble pedal kicking when I'm on a downhill slope. Any advice?

One thing to check is your frame clearance. I've put some 2.1's on a guy's F1000 and the knobbies rubbed the chain stays. He had to go with a less aggressive thread pattern. I ran WTB Velociraptor's on my F2000 without a problem. It depends on the "true" width of the tire. I think the fork clearance is adequate, just the chainstay.

As far as colored tires, Nokian has a cool blue that I like. I believe it's available in all their tires. Panaracer has their colored sidewalls. I have heard good thing about their tires, not their XC version, the other one, the Trail Blaster I think. ?????

With that said, a bigger tire will accomplish the traits you've listed and desire.

Finally, when you say "pedal kicking" do you mean a "kick out" where you kinda do a reverse wheelie, but off to one side?

Is this for maneurvering (sp?) around switchbacks? If so, it's a matter of feathering the front brake a bit more and leaning a wee bit more forward.

L8R

Sorry by pedal kick I meant you mash the pedal before a drop to bring your front end up. Like initiating a wheelie.