The ground is frost-covered and icy, Mariah Carey has been playing on speakers at every retail location in town for past month, and inflatable Rudolphs are poking their heads out around every corner. That means Santa is definitely on his way from the North Pole (you can even track him right here) and it’s time for another list of wishes from the editors.
What’s on your mountain bike wish list this Christmas?
Sarah Moore
Kids Mountain Bike Seat
You bet we bought William his first bike before he was even born! However, it turns out that you need to be able to achieve certain milestones like holding your own head up, rolling over, crawling, walking, and taking simple direction before you can actually ride on two wheels. Since it doesn’t look like he’s going to be shredding Half Nelson on his own for a couple of years, as super advanced as I may think he is, I really want either a Kids Ride Shotgun or a Mac Ride so that we can go riding together.
I see tons of parents out with Kids Ride Shotgun and Mac Ride seats and I’ve been looking at them enviously. Both the kids and the parents always look like they’re having a great time. My partner and I used to ride together all the time, but there’s definitely a lot more “I ride, you ride” going on these days and I’m excited for us all to be able to get out together again. We did do some rides together with William riding in the bike trailer, but as fun as that was, it’s definitely not the same as being out on the trails.
I also think that I might need an eMTB since I’m not sure how enjoyable pedalling an extra 30 pounds uphill holding onto my handlebars will be otherwise. We probably need some of those cool little Kids Ride Shotgun bar mittens while we’re at it because you bet we’re going to go out in the rain and cold!
Dario DiGiulio
Dumb Janky Trails, Better Prescription Riding Glasses, More Silver Components
Dear Krampus, my preferred holiday deity:
Please send out your finest elves to concoct some weird and fun trails in the woods, preferably with tricky lines, awkward moves, and some hard climbs thrown in for good measure. I love smooth jump trails, good turns, and perfect loamers as much as the next guy, but sometimes you just want to struggle your way down something. I’ve found plenty of these gems in my neck of the woods, but I think the mountain bike world would be a better place with a few more thrown in for good measure.
The second wish from this humble beggar comes in the form of prescription riding glasses that aren’t totally awful to wear. My tried and true grandpa glasses do the trick, but the lenses are well past scratched, and they aren’t particularly well suited to fog prevention, protection, or style (taste depending). Consider this a plea for the other blind folks out there, it sure would be nice to see some well-integrated Rx trail specs.
Lastly, I beg of you for the gleam of shiny silver. I am a simple man, and find great satisfaction in the the radiant glow of a bike littered with tastefully curated metal objects. Like many good gifts, I’ve mostly already gotten this one for myself, though there’s an argument that silver coming straight from the manufacturer is better than my oven-cleaner-stripped method.
Jessie-May Morgan
A Hose That Never Freezes
Even when temperatures are sufficiently low enough to leave the garden hose frozen solid, it’s still possible to find trail slop of peanut butter-like consistency that will attach itself to one’s bicycle frame like a leech on the cusp of starvation. Having no option but to store my bikes inside my flat, winter brings with it a spare room that is simultaneously an office, a workshop, a bike store, and a loam dumping ground. While this impacts the quality of my living conditions, others will be familiar with the suboptimal efficiency of a crunchy drivetrain. The latter is simply unacceptable, especially when present on my precious idler-adorned enduro bike.
Thus, I’d like Santa to ship me a heated hose, preferably one that is entirely self-sufficient in terms of the energy it requires to keep itself heated. I want to say it could be solar-powered, but I doubt the viability of such a solution in the midst of a long, dark Scottish winter. Perhaps it could generate electricity from the flow of the water that runs through it? I don’t care. It’s not my problem, it’s Santa’s.
Failing that, at least deliver me a hose that, when it does freeze, it doesn’t rupture in several places, diminishing the flow rate to that of pathetic trickle.
Seb Stott
Tow ball and tow ball rack
I’m not going to buy a van for the odd occasion when I need to transport multiple bikes to the trails. I’m lucky enough to ride from my door most of the time, and if I need to take one bike with me, it’s easy enough to take the front wheel off, fold the back seats and sling it in the boot of the car. But now I’m a father of two and my kids selfishly take up the whole of back seat when we’re travelling together, so I need another solution for our bikes.
I’ve been testing a pair of SeaSucker Talon bike carriers, which attach to the car roof with suction cups. They’re easy to take on and off when not in use, but they offer no theft protection and the idea of sticking bikes to the roof of my car is unnerving. Then there are roof bars, which I do use more regularly, but they’re noisy, they significantly reduce fuel efficiency, and they advertise my bike obsession to thieves as I drive home or park outside my house, so I tend to take them off when I’m not using them (which is most of the time) and it’s a faff to install them again. It’s also pretty awkward to mount bikes on the roof of the car, especially if you’re carrying more than two.
The best solution is a tow hitch-mounted rack. They’re easy to take on and off (at least compared to roof bars and multiple bike carriers), and the bikes add much less extra drag and noise when driving at high speeds. It’s also easier to load multiple bikes onto a rear rack than onto the roof, and it leaves the roof free for carrying canoes, camping equipment or more bikes. The problem is, my car doesn’t have a tow hitch and getting one installed is pretty expensive, so given my tendency to leave the Tweed Valley just a few times a year I’ve been debating for some time as to whether it’s worth it. But since Santa has an unlimited budget for satisfying the whims of an already spoiled middle-class man-child like me, I wouldn’t say no to the ultimate bike-carrying setup.
Mike Kazimer
Fiat Panda
I don’t actually need or want anything this year – I’ve got a roof over my head, plenty of food, a bike that works, and great trails to ride on, so all of my needs are more than met. Still, if some imaginary being is granting wishes, well, I wouldn’t complain if a Fiat Panda appeared in my driveway. I know I said that I don’t like driving, and I still don’t, but there’s just something about this cute little 4×4 rig that’s captured my attention. I’ve always enjoyed taking small cars where they don’t belong. Years ago I bought a 1988 Toyota Corolla for $500 that I took on all sorts of ill-advised off-road adventures, a car that I followed up with an ’88 Subaru GL-10 that also went places it probably wasn’t really meant to.
The Panda is small and practical, likely the reason they’re nearly impossible to find in the US, even though they seem to be all over the place in Italy. In any case, it’s earned a spot on my list of things that would be cool have but I don’t really need.
Henry Quinney
A Single Day Skiing Green Runs with My Snow-Idol
Just because I’m irritating and I take the fun out of everything, while also insisting everyone see things from my shallow perspective, Mike doesn’t want to spend the whole day skiing greens and light blues with me. Ever since, three weeks ago, when I found out Mike is the only nearly-pro (at least at some point) I’m ever likely to meet, I’ve gravitated towards him like a wasp to a jam tart but to no avail. I’m star-struck – and I don’t know what to do. Kaz has said he’ll give me half a day of on-piste-pointers, collect me on the way through, and buy me coffee and bagels, but I know my worth and am holding out for the full day. Hopefully, Father Christmas can take it from here.
Brian Park
Machines, movies, mobility, and massive social upheaval
I have everything I need. My little family lives in an amazing place, I get to think about bikes all day, and life is pretty great. But I’d be lying if I didn’t want a bunch of things. So in the spirit of the assignment, here’s the stuff that would give me temporary happiness while I chase the next capitalism-induced dopamine hit.
Tons of M5 brass heat set inserts. I’m always running out. And Voile Nano Straps. You can never have enough, I use the 6” ones for pump holders and bags, and the 9” one for spare tubes.
A full length mountain bike movie. No story, no narrative, just let me live vicariously through cool people doing cool shit in cool places with good music. Is that too much to ask? Fingers crossed for Deathgrip II.
If anyone out there wants to do me a teeny tiny favour.
A Penta Machine Solo. I bought a Pocket NC 5-axis desktop CNC machine a few years ago and don’t have time to use it nearly as much as I’d like. But that doesn’t stop me from wanting its fancy new big brother. With an automatic toolchanger, built in probing (not that kind Levy), and a 6” cubed work volume it looks like it’d be amazing for making stems, lugs, and all kinds of bike stuff. It’s also a casual $75K USD and there’s no more room in my garage, so I should probably ask for Vancouver house prices to implode instead.
A Cannondale Compact Neo because they’re just so silly. Seriously thought—compact, accessible e-bikes are exactly what we need more of, and this one looks fun.
Is this too much to ask?
A functional right shoulder and the resurgence of domestic bike manufacturing; and, if those are too hard I’ll settle for world peace. Oh, and the most impossible thing of all: time to actually use all this stuff.
Alicia Leggett
An ultralight paraglider, my ability to mountain bike back, a travel mug that lasts forever
The most definite thing I want, something I’ve been researching and scheming about lately, is an ultralight single-surface paraglider, one made to prioritize light weight over just about everything else. It’ll use less material than a standard wing, weigh almost nothing, and pack down tiny. Sure, the flight performance on those wings isn’t great, but that’s not the point – they let you take off, fly, and land somewhere else. I’ve been daydreaming lately about possible future adventures, many involving hiking or scrambling or climbing up something then flying back down to where I started or to somewhere else entirely. A single-surface wing designed for exactly that would be sweet.
Moving into something heavier for a minute, I’d love to get my ability to mountain bike back. (We’re writing a letter to Santa – this is already magical, so I can include the big ask, right?) I’m recovering from a bad head injury from 2022, and while I’m sort of back on the bike nowadays, it’s not the same. I’ll carry on with my “easy” rides and I still really love so much about the sport, but man, it would be pretty great to one day get a glimpse again of how mountain biking used to feel. I’m working always to move back toward that, believe me.
Finally, I’d really like it if my thermos could last forever. Not as in keeping things hot forever, but as in never breaking. I got an insulated coffee travel mug a while back that I absolutely loved. It didn’t leak at all, no matter what, so I could fill it with coffee or tea and throw it in my backpack to retrieve later on all kinds of days. Then, finally, I dropped it on its head enough times that it started leaking slightly. It was still mostly reliable, still something I used all the time, but I couldn’t count on it the same way I’d used to. I bought a new one very recently. The new one is great. It doesn’t leak. My ask for Santa (we’re still doing magic here, yeah?) is to make this last forever. Please and thank you. The peace of mind is so nice.
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