brothersbutler

Someone told me that bunny hopping on a road bike puts unnecessary stress on it, especially on carbon forks. Does anyone know how true or false this is? Don't want my carbon fork to fail on me

LesterOfPuppets

I bonnyhop my Pinarello all the time and it's almost 30 years old. Steel fork, steel stem and aluminium bars tho.

brundle_fly

I used to 180 on mine.The wheels bent up though

Bob Dopolina 

Bunny hopping is a fundamental skill.

I bunny hop my carbon bikes all the time. Learn to be light and smooth and it's less stress than slamming into the pot hole you just hopped over.

Learn it, love it.

ahsposo 

Like Bob sez, learn it and love it.

Not only will it save you from banging yer wheels up and getting pinch flats it can get you over curbs and such in bail out situations.

Might have saved my life once.

I was passing an intersection when a nasty little Buick Acheva making a right turn on a red light came right out at me. I saw it coming an instinctively bunny hopped and got scooped up on the hood instead of being plowed under. Now if the vehicle had been a Chevy Suburban, well, I don't know...

DropDeadFred

why the f3ck are you bunnyhopping on a road bike...go get a bmx kid

Fox Farm

Write to your frame manufacturer and see what they say

ilovecycling

I'm with Bob on this one. Fundamental skill. Ask the 'cross riders if bunnyhopping hurts their carbon fiber bikes.

MrMorrill

I hop just about every ride... Only once though. We come to a bridge that has a terrible entry (about 2 inches higher then the road) so I do a quick hop. Nothing too crazy just enough so I don't run into the mini curb.

ColinL

OP it isn't the fork at all. A bunnyhop leaves the ground and returns to earth on your rear wheel. Freeride whizkids can hop on either wheel, I realize. But normal people would call lifting the front tire a wheelie, and jumping the back tire a bunnyhop. This is the technique you would use to get both ends of the bike over a curb that you can't ride around.

How much stress is it? Technique is part of it, spoke count another, frame design and perhaps most critically the rider's weight. I weigh 175 pounds and ride lightweight wheels. I would consider a bunnyhop my last option, with the following selections ahead of it: 1) riding around the obstacle 2) braking and then riding around it 3) taking an entirely different path, such as turning a street early 4) stopping.

I bunnyhop my hybrid all the time, especially in the dirt since it basically is a 29er MTB now. It has 10-14 more spokes, 12mm wider tire, who knows how much more air volume, and a much beefier frame (excluding BB shell).

ahsposo 

This is a fair bit OT but this guy takes the bunny hop into the realm of cycling ballet.

svtmike

This.

Not these.

nhluhr

Sometimes I forget vBulletin doesn't have a downvote button like ******.

OldsCOOL

Sure beats slamming handicap curbs by the dozen. Tough on headsets.

tagaproject6

Learn the bunny hop. Learn to stress less about the undue stress on the bike. I have not seen nor researched any studies done regarding bunny hops and how it affects the carbon bits on your bike. Most people who comment are just giving their own SWAG.

merlinextraligh

Lots of scenarios where bunny hopping is a good option:

1) wet, railroad tracks that are not perpendicular to your line of travel.

2) crashes, such as you're nex't to the curb, pinned to your left. Bunny hopping on the curb may be the only thing to save your ass.

3) pothole no one calls out, and you've got people on each side of you. Bunny hopping is going to be a much better option than swerving and taking the pack down.

It's a skill that comes into play more in racing in packs, but having it in your range of options can come in handy on group rides, and occassionally even solo.

merlinextraligh

True, no controlled data. But I can guarantee you based upon experience that a well executed bunny hop puts much less strain on the bike than plowing a deep pot hole at speed.

Also carbon fiber bikes are much stronger and resilient than many people think. If the force isn't enough to pinch flat the tire, or f up a lightweight low spoke count wheel, it's highly unlikely enough force will be transmitted to the frame to do any damage.

globecanvas

I live to bunny hop. Potholes, frost heaves, uneven concrete on bridges, squirrels, whatever.

If you watched stage 20 of the Tour de France you saw Cadel Evans bunny hopping a bunch of speed bumps on his TT bike.

UberGeek

I would think it would put less stress on a frame than the hazard you are hopping over. Otherwise, why would you bunny hop the road bike?

chackern2

For anyone riding on the road, "bunny hopping" is a must. I remember years ago when I did my first long ride, it was a "fun" ride of 75 miles from Tecate to Ensenada, Mexico; going into Ensenada there was a nasty speed bump and me still being a novice, I couldn't quite clear it and it wrecked my front rim. Later in the year I did the Rosarito to Ensenada and by this time my fitness and skill level had taken a large leap, this time I "bunny hopped" that speed bump and since then, this skill has helped on numerous occasions.

DropDeadFred

bunnyhopping just to bunny hop on a road bike is just dumb though. I can bunny hop for days...i used to do freestyle flatland bmxing and the only time i "hop" is if i don't want to slam my tires into a sharp edge..

ColinL

So you hit the bump with your front tire.

I hate to nitpick, but pulling up the front wheel isn't a bunnyhop. If you had lifted the front tire and then ridden over the bump and trashed your rear wheel instead this would be a better argument in favor of a bunnyhop.

You should pull up your front tire to soften the blow of anything you ride over. This saves your front wheel, fork and headset a lot of fatigue. That's not in question and it isn't a bunnyhop.

gregf83 

You don't lift your front wheel in a bunnyhop?

haaseg

It's a great skill to have for when you're bombing down one of the local canyons and see a rattlesnake stretched out across the bike lane. Sounds funny, but it's happened to me at least 3 times this season.

ColinL

You do, but my opinion is that most anyone can lift their front wheel slightly to ride over something.

The HOP comes in when you jump the back tire into the air. This is a skill considerably fewer people possess.