Bike Forums - Intense First Ride Report!

Alright, I got my new (used) bike on Friday, took the afternoon off, went to the shop and assembled/tuned my bike.

For those of you who don't know, I got an Intense Uzzi SL. Fork is a Rock Shox Psylo SL with the Tullio thru axle. Shifters/Derailleurs/Cassette/Chain are all XTR. Cranks are Profile Racing Chromoly Cranks with Race Face rings. Hubs are also Profile Racing laced to Mavic D321 rims. Chris King headset, Thomson stem and seatpost, and I put on a new Easton Monkey Lite riser bar on it. Grips are ODI lock-ons, and seat is a WTB something or other. Pedals are Shimano's 545's that have got to go!

O.k., picked up my bud in the morning and we had to stop by the shop to get his bike. What was supposed to be a 2 minute stop turned into 20 minutes, had to swap out tires and readjust the brakes.

Get to the trail head, suit up and get ready to ride and our other friend finally pulls up. I'm very anxious at this point to actually go "RIDING", well, buddy #3 is talking waaaaayyyy tooooo much and getting ready waaaaaayyyy tooooo slowly. We finally get going!

Trail is a tight technical single track that runs alongside a creek (i.e. pretty flat terrain, just short climbs and drops along the bank of the creek) That's riding in FL for you! Ducking trees, climbing over roots, sliding between trees.....etc. A whole lot of fun.

The steering is much more slack than my previous bike due in part to the 5" travel fork, and a more "laid-back" set-up for the geometry. It took some getting used too initially. The big fat squishy tires rolled over everything. Hit a small drop (@2') and just launched the bike. Smooth landing and handled great in the air.

This bike just seemed to float over everything and the climbs (albeit small) were made without complaint.

Had two crashes. First one was an endo. Riding through some rooty sections just after a short climb, and lost concentration for an instant and didn't see the root that instantly stopped my front tire. My buddy almost got tire marks on his face as he was close behind. He said, "One moment you're hammering, next I see your feet about my eye level" another missed Kodak moment! BTW, the bike was fine!

Second crash was a large mound about 7'0" high that's rooty just after a decending bridge. It's usually ridden the other direction as a drop. It's nearly verticle. I was feeling good and powered up the thing and hopped to the top. Planted my feet and thought whew, I made it. NOPE! My momentum switched and I was now stradling my bike, but going backwards off the drop! I pushed away and knew I was going down. I heard the bike crash and thought, "o.k., I'll hit now! Nope, I was still about 2'0" up and then "BAM"! Good thing it was right on my bum, and no one was around to witness it. And yes, the bike was fine!

All in all, it was a good ride. Buddy #3 likes to stop and talk too much. We were calling him "girlfriend" by the end. Next time we'll just "turn it up" a notch to prevent him from any unecessary discussions.

I'm going to play around with the settings on this bike. There are multiple and see what I like best.

Don't feel I need to change anything on the bike at this point. I'm still unsure about the fork, but I'll ride it like this for now! I'll switch to a Marzocchi when I blow this one, or get some extra $$$ to spend!

L8R

I'll post some new pics when I get the chance to take some with my digi camera.