Photos: Operator - Andy Vathis, Stab - Kane NaaraatConnor Fearon had big plans this year, and was hoping to double up on EWS and World Cup duties to prove his 3rd place at EWS Derby was no fluke. Unfortunately, as with so many other things this year, COVID-19 got in the way and travel restrictions meant he was forced to stay at home for the race season in Europe. He's been able to keep himself busy in another way though - building up and racing a 2007 Kona Stab Deluxe.
He found the frame and wheels on eBay and built it up by delving deep into his parts bin and sourcing some bits from friends too. The hardest part to pull together was apparently the Boxxer, but Connor's friend Lindsay Klein managed to find a pair in his shed that had been sitting there for the last decade.
Connor unveiled the bike at the Inside Line Mountain Bike Club race at Eagle Mountain Bike Park and finished second to Troy Brosnan by only 6 seconds. Apparently the biggest difference between the two bikes comes down to size, with the medium Stab coming up way too small for him. He also noticed fatigue was an issue. He says, "I got way more tired riding the old bike, I think that comes down to fit and suspension. In comparison, you just stand in the middle of a modern-day DH bike and let it do most of the work!"
It's safe to say there have been a fair few changes in downhill bike tech in the past 13 years so to see just how far things had come we got both bikes side by side to compare more than a decade of progress.
About the rider
Connor Fearon
FrameWhat a difference 13 years makes. While the link-driven single pivot still remains king for Kona's downhill bikes, the frame surrounding it is completely different. Kona now uses a carbon front triangle and the whole package looks a lot cleaner than the classic design. There has also been a decrease in travel from 8" (203mm) on the Stab to 195mm on the Operator. The final big change comes from the wheelsize where Connor currently runs 29" front and rear on his Operator, but 26" front and rear on his Stab, which is from an era when the bigger wheels were nothing more than punchlines.
Connor runs a medium frame on the Stab although he's actively looking for a larger one as it is a bit too small. If you know where he can find one, get in touch!
Fork The Boxxer is a name that has been around in mountain biking since 1998 so it's no surprise to see it on the front of both bikes here. It's a 200mm model on the Stab but only 190mm on the Operator.
A Charger damper and Debonair spring replace the Motion Control and Solo Air Spring of the earlier fork. With the new tech comes more tuning options as well and high and low speed compression can now be set on the Boxxer and bottomless tokens can be added.
Shock With the advent of metric sizing in 2016, Rockshox swapped over from Vivid shocks to Super Deluxe for downhill. The shock on the Stab is shorter eye to eye than stock, so it has slackened the head angle to a bit less than 64° and makes the cockpit feel even more cramped. Connor is looking to find a regular sized one if he can.
Wheels 26" plays 29" when it comes to the wheels for Connor's bikes. The Stab is still set up using inner tubes so Connor has to run them at higher pressures to avoid pinch flats, although it apparently hasn't been fully successful so far. Tubeless and Cushcore allow him to go down to 24psi front and 27psi rear with punctures much less common nowadays.
The wheels on the Stab are clad with a classic High Roller front and Minion DHF with the super sticky Slow Reezaay 40 compound from an era when tire hot patches were a bit less boring. Connor runs a Minion DHR II front and rear on the modern race bike.
Contact Points Connor has allowed himself modern parts when it comes to his contact points. That means a Deity cockpit and saddle, HT flat pedals and ODI grips on both bikes.
Groupset It's SRAM DH gearing on both bikes but the product line has definitely moved on a bit in the gap between these two bikes. The SRAM X0 Connor is running is a bit newer than the Stab frame but it's a 10 speed cassette with 12-26t on the cassette. The modern Operator has a similar range on its 10-24 cassette but it does it with just seven speeds thanks to the XG-795 mini block cassette on the X01 DH groupset.
Brakes are also SRAM and it's Code RSC brakes on the Operator but Avid X0 Trail brakes (from 2012) on the Stab.
Fast forward many years and I am riding my bike at my local trails where there is this little drop that is about maybe two feet max on this fairly steep section. You could probably roll the thing and be ok. Nothing too gnarly that your small travel "down country" bike couldn't handle.
As I ride through the area, a little voice comes out of the bushes and tells me to halt. His buddy, no older than 14, is about to do this drop and you can bet your favorite donut, they are going to get some sweet footage of it and they don't want me in the shot.
Then up on the trail comes this majestic boy emerges, dressed in what I imagine is his fathers old riding gear and a beat up Kona Stab. A look of pure concentration on his face as he is about to do the gnarliest drop he has ever done and make his bike and father proud.
He did the drop easy with very little drama, but they were both incredibly stoked with themselves and feeling super accomplished. Watching it unfold, I was thinking to myself, "Damn, this is exactly how I imagined myself riding when I was their age and riding that bike."
Point is, old Kona full suspension bikes are my nostalgia bikes.
10 years after buying an STP I've bought a Kona process 134, though it was a bit sad not to see the flower logo on the bike. It's a bike I've enjoyed the most and to be honest, remembering Paul Bass ripping on the Kona did make me to consider the brand a tiny bit more ????
Michelin’s excellent-traction DH tires have been notoriously slow in terms of soft-compound rolling resistance over the years, going back to the late 90’s and even today with their DH22 and similar new tires. Michelin’s slow-rolling reputation (just ask Vouilloz today, or refer to his old interviews) is especially true for heavier riders, partially due to their old (and new) natural rubber compounds that many pros ride/rode that have excellent traction characteristics, but deform a lot and thus convert some of the rider’s forward kinetic energy into friction / heat within the rubber, creating a “slow” rolling tire...and the sidewalls on those Michelin tires usually use a similar softer natural or semi-natural rubber which likewise has relatively high internal polymer-chain friction.
But ask Greg Minnaar — he’s waxed intellectual about stresses on various bike parts of being tall...and believe it or not, it can affect things including tires and traction =P
The Michelin guys like Elliot Heap on Chain Reaction / Nuke Proof bikes with the new DH22 (or maybe DH24?) tires were cornering at noticeably greater angle than nearly all others in two specific corners (then again, he was also runner up in the 4X world champs, so that might be part of it!). Mick Hannah was fast all over, but drooled over my 2001 D521/Hope wheels (it was a throwback Turner 4X rig for fun of it, which also caught the attention of Eric Carter of Hyper who previously rode a bike nearly identical to my Turner...talking to his rider, Bas Van Steenbergen about how I was practically on his old race bike). Mick liked my wheels for nastalgia’s sake, despite how slow that tire/wheel setup ended up being on the new track. Riders pretty much agreed that Maxx Terra / EXO, 30psi+ or so, light light wheels, and more suspension travel than less (5” to 6”, not 4”) was best for this new track we had all never seen nor known details about prior to arriving. Had the dual slalom course been steeper with less critical pedaling sections (like Whistler DS tracks were many years ago when I dusted Andrew Shandro on a similar setup), my wheel/tire choice would’ve been more competitive. But next time I’ll be running something closer to Slavik’s lightweight wheels (probably 26” We Are One) with Maxx Terra EXO tires and probably 29-30f / 32-33r, and 5-6” rear travel (if I stay with 26”...otherwise I need to ping Kevin Walsh of Evil, my old racing teammate, to see if he can hook me up with a rig like Austin Warren’s. My gosh Austin was on fire on that bike!).
That said, you could not be more wrong about "peak fun". There's literally thousands of bikes with different geometry to choose from. If you cannot find something "fun" currently, you're not looking very hard.
The comment was in reference to an opinion that a few years ago the majority of single crown bikes having ideal geometry for average riders in even the most challenging terrain, and then moving to even longer and slacker geo. I guess I could be more specific, but telling people on the internet they're completely wrong seems to be a hobby for many so I think I'll probably just move on.
My reply was to the fact you don't need to buy a bike with long reach or overly slack head angles; other bikes exist. We've yet to reach peak fun. You're basically saying "the geo I prefer is more fun, and people buying other bikes don't understand how much more fun other bikes are" and while there's some truth to that, there's also a lot of ego and ignorance.
Interesting about your last line, grabbing the ball and going home essentially. You started the talking down here, sorry that you don't appreciate it when it comes back to you. Have a good ride dude.
Gotta say, bikes have come a long way over the last few years and the industry is still working it all out but Geo is much improved on those 71 HTA degree hardtails of less than 10 years ago.
I'm sitting in the middle with 65 but I can pop the thing off roots and rocks on a flat trail and still have fun. Now, that older 12 speed GX drive train - just when I learn to dial it in nice - it craps itself. grrrrr.
No matter how much I fiddle with it, I’m just not able to get the middle gears get dialed in.
Upper 4 and lower 3 are fine but everything in between is just pure luck if you get it to shift right.
A massive pain in the ass, since the rest of the bike brings me so much joy..
I think it’s maybe time to invest some money and get the all new 2021 GX Eagle.
Maybe even opt for the Carbon Crank Option which is now available for the first time in the GX tier.
Everything above GX is just way to expensive for me, even if I’m super tempted to combine the new GX with a AXS derailleur and controller.
However, since this will almost double the investment, it will most likely stay a dream.
On the other hand Carbon cranks maybe not worth it on an otherwise all aluminum bike like my 2016 Mega 290.
But if I upgrade to the totally redesigned Mega (which of course is Carbon now) in 2022 or so,I’ll bite my own butt, if I did not went for carbon cranks.
Heck, way to much decisions to make, way to less money in my bank account..
The good: Dialed shifting.
The Bad: The rear derailleur has a habit of collecting forest fauna in the bottom jockey wheel.
Think 10 - 50 with a 32tooth Oval is to wide a spread.
Would prefer 10 - 46 with a smaller cage for the derailleur
Sometimes, go to fish out stuff that gets trapped between the cassette gears, you can tell as that is the only time the X01 doesn't shift happily. The gear with crud sitting inbetween it will not feel it's engaging right. Maybe this is a downside of 12 speed cassettes.
Got the Cassette which is quite light and you notice it, shifter (pre lunar so it does more than single shifts), derailleur and chain. Not cheep but I image it will be more durable than the GX version but time will tell.
Wish I could get as good quality 9 or 10 speed 10 - 46 range.
I don’t think so Connor. We can see that it’s not a Ibis.
I still browse for xl/xxl classics!
I'd donate a nut to science for an XL/XXL final gen DHR
It’s a Faux-Bar or single pivot suspension “design”
So it seems they were looking for more mechanical interference so the bike stays further into its travel and the bike pitches less under braking. This is the exact opposite of what most brands are marketing with FSR and ABP, making you wonder if single pivot is the way to go after all.
Thank you Pinkbike for listening
Maxxis bring back the old hot patches please!
That sounds like high-speed compression to me?
Not "worst bikes"