Originally Posted by
Ironfish653
The Zaskar was a good bike. In 1996. When 26x1.95 was the typical tire size and 80mm was a long-travel fork. Long-and-low was what worked on the NORBA style courses of the day, biased towards climbing and speed on the flats. When you look at rider position, it’s not that far off of a ‘sporting’ road bike of the same era.
Modern MTBs have bigger wheels, longer travel suspension (with much better dampers) and the geometry and rider position to take advantage of that. I’ve demoed a couple of new mid-range trail bikes in the last year, and their off-road capability just blows away my old F-1000.
Now, on a fast fire road, or on slicks in the city, the old XC bike probably has the speed advantage, but that’s what it was designed to do.
My understanding, is that the Zaskar was more of a singletrack bike in its day. As the competition began to catch up, it sort of became demoted to singletrack duty.
At any rate, mine is the XL size. I measured the seat tube at about 23". Its not a low riding bike, at least not with the seat raised up to my ideal riding position. It climbs hills like a beast though. Im not a crazy mountain biker, but the thing handles technical trails with effortless balance and inspires a lot of confidence to go very fast. Despite its age, I still think its a fantastic bike even today. Are there new bikes out there which perform better? I'm sure. But do they weigh 21lb fully equipped? This is the last of the American built GT frames and they've sort of developed a cult following versus the newer taiwanese made versions.
Mine has fairly modern compinents all around, such as a deore/alivio drivetrain and a Manitou Black Elite 100mm front fork. Can it hang with the newer mid range bikes? I'm sure, because its dependent on rider skill, and what the rider feels comfortable riding, not what someone else thinks is good, bad, modern or outdated.
For me, i prefer 26" rims because the bigger ones tend to bend easier. Would bigger wheels and more suspension travel help? Maybe 1% of the time, for 1% of us who are skilled enough..
Originally Posted by
badger1
This ... all of it, and a good explanation why some of us, self included, still love old-school NORBA-geometry hardtails for non-technical off-road/in-city riding: they can be very light, quick, and agile.
very true, but ive felt very confident on that bike navigating technical stuff too. In terms of a bike that can reasonably tackle the vast majority of what a intermediate rider can throw at it, hard to beat with such an overall light weight.
Considering that I started looking for a bike when lockdown came into effect, I had to make due with costco issue northrock until I this zaskar popped up on the used market. Next season I'll probably look into something more modern such as a scott scale to see what all the fuss is about.