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Mountain Bike

When you think of a mountain bike, what do you see? Two and a half inch wide tires, shocks with six inches of front travel, a frame that looks like it was grown rather than forged? All of these things are common in modern mountain bikes, but they didn’t start out that way. In fact the history of off road biking dates back more than a century, and like many modern inventions, the first uses of the technology were for military applications.

Just like skis, microwaves, plastic, and vaccines, mountain bikes were pioneered by military research. The term research is used loosely here, as not much is known about the actual research done on the original mountain bikes. What we do know is that buffalo soldiers used off road bikes in their trek from Missoula, Montana to Yellowstone. The bikes they used were little different than a standard cruising bike of the time, they just added wider tires to the original frames.

It was not until the late 1970’s that mountain bikes started to develop as a product in their own right, rather than as modified road bikes. Frames were bulked up, and the wheels were reinforced. These two modifications were made to help the bikes hold up under the wear and tear of off road use. It was not until later that suspensions were added, and a full suspension bike was not a common sight until nearly the turn of the millennium. Now mountain bikes have diversified to the point that truly die hard riders have multiple bikes for different applications, a downhill bike, an all-mountain bike, a cross country bike, and racing bikes.

 

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