MTX Gold pads which seem to be the most commonly recommended pads for SRAM G2 brakes.

Thanks to O’Spire I got a Media pass thanks which allowed me to shoot everything for an hour before the doors opened to the public. The show is on over the weekend at Carriageworks. For event details, visit: www.spoken.bike

27.5″ Conti Trinotal and Dubnital tyres came in the mail. Was really hesitant to put them on initially as the fat 2.8 and 2.6 Specialized tyres look so rad, have so much traction and felt so cushy out on the trails in comparison to the thin 29″ Specialized Fast Track and Air Track tyres, but since I had them in my hands I thought I might as well at least give them a go.

Turns out what sealant was in the tyres had turned to water and man, just like the super wide Roval CLX II front wheel on my Tarmac SL8, the tyres were near impossible to get on and off these rims. I got the front tyre on AOK, but the rear was a prick and no matter how hard I tried I couldn’t get the bead to sit so I put the rear Dubnital (which was even harder to get off the rim than on) on a ZEN Carbon Bike rear wheel I had in my parts bin and voila! Went on easy as.

Turns out the ZEN rear wheel is way lighter than the Roval and it’s brought the total weight down to 11.1kg’s. The Conti tyres also don’t look as anemic as I thought they would look with the front Trinotal looking quite round and chunky.

I’m happier with the bike with the smaller wheels. Excited to feel the difference in weight and rolling speed with these vs. the Butcher and Purgatory setup. Still waiting on some much needed shorter cranks to claim back some of the -18mm BB drop.

I suffer from arm pump and being the sucker I am I bought some of these. They look stupid AF as expected, but they feel instantly weird, in a good way! Not ridden the bike with them out on the trails yet, but will do ASAP.

Procraft PRC Carbon 31.8 x 760 mm 9° handlebars are insanely light at 136g.

Procraft grips feel comfortable and super light too at 19g a pair.

PRC seatpost clamp. Was a little lazy to remove the dropper to install this as it’s only 4g lighter than the OEM Specialized one, but got it done after a couple of glasses of wine.

Updates specs list:

2025 Specialized Chisel Size S

Fork: Fork: Rockshox SID Ultimate RLC with 120mm 51mm offset (1612g)
Shock: RockShox Deluxe Select+ 190x40mm (340g)
Shifter: NX Eagle shifter (112g)
Derailleur: SRAM GX Eagle (300g)
Chain: GX chain (244g)
Crankset: SRAM XX1 Eagle Carbon 170mm (358g)
Chainring: Race Face 30T (63g)
BB: SRAM DUB (76g)
Pedals: HT Components ME03 Alloy (263g)
Brakes: SRAM G2 RS (260g/280g)
Brake Rotors: Trickstuff Ultralight 180/160 (119g/87g)
Rotor Adapters: Chaser 6-bolt to centrelock (8g/8g)
Rotor Lockrings: Craft Racing Works (9g/9g)
Seatpost: OneUp Dropper 120mm 30.9mm (374g)
Seatpost Clamp: Procraft PRC Carbon (11g)
Dropper Lever: OneUp (24g)
Saddle: WTB Volt Carbon (161g)
Handlebar: Procraft PRC Carbon 31.8 x 760 mm 9° (136g)
Grips: Procraft Superlite (19g)
Stem: Kalloy UNO 80mm (90g)
Spacer: God & Famous 10mm (4g)
Top Cap + Bolt (4g)
Front Wheel: DT Swiss XMC 1200 Spline, DT180 (650g)
Front Tyre: Specialized Fast Trak Flex Lite T5/T7 TLR 29×2.35 (633g)
Rear Wheel: DT Swiss XMC 1200 Spline, DT180 (835g)
Rear Tyre: Specialized Air Trak Flex Lite T5/T7 TLR 29×2.35, (617g)
Cassette: ZTTO SLR Gen3 Ultimate 10-50T XD (297g)
Valves: CushCore 44mm (20g)
Sealant: Silca Ultimate (90g)
Bottle Cage: S-Works Carbon Zee Cage II Left (24g)
Pump: OneUp EDC + OneUp inline mount (250g/27g)

WEIGHT: 11.17kg
Original Weight: 13.51kg

27.5″ Setup:

Wheelset: Roval Traverse SL Fattie, DT240 internals, 54T (1690g)
Brake Rotors: SRAM Centreline 180mm/160mm (141g/114g)
Front Tyre: 27.5 Plus 2.8 Butcher Grid Trail T7 (1100g)
Rear Tyre: 2.6 Purgatory Grid (970g)
Cassette: ZTTO SLR Gen3 Ultimate 10-50T HG (292g)

WEIGHT: 12.36kg

It never rains, but when it does it pours!

I’ve been invited to help CCACHE build a local Cycling Community and I just got the green light to soft launch the CCACHE Cycling Community Forum, so please join up and if you can, post a few things. It’ll really help me shape up the forums before they officially go live. Much thanks in advance!

Visit: forum.ccache.cc

I very rarely, if ever, plan things, but somehow everything always seems to go to plan! For the past few years I’ve tried my best not to put any energy into anything that isn’t fun and hey, life’s been pretty awesome.

For many years people have been asking for me to bring the JDMST forums back. Just last week I was doing some housekeeping and I found a few new old stock JDMST T-Shirts. I started wearing them. I had a meeting with some friends who run an awesome bicycle shop (one of the owners happens to be an original JDMST Forum member and is still very much into cars), they got me in to ask if I could perhaps help them start their own forum, then this week I watched a fantastic video on the death of EOMM.

Timing is everything. Surreal, emotional, all the feels, but I look at all these events as a sign, a gentle nudge that suggests maybe it’s time.

So to those who were there back in the day, welcome back! And to those who are new, welcome welcome. No expectations, let’s see where this goes.

Visit: https://jdmst.cc

Got to take 2 of my bikes out today as I introduced my cousin Adam to mountain biking. I had plans to bring the Torrent hardtail out as he had been thinking about buying a hardtail, but I woke up this morning to a Facebook message from a guy who wanted the Torrent and was willing to come and pick it up at 12pm. I decided against taking it out for one more ride just in case, so brought the Starling Murmur out to play instead.

Adam is hooked. He’s got $1K to play with so the hunt is on for a duel suspension bike (probably a 2nd hand Polygon T6?). We both swapped bikes a lot today and man, nothing quite like having another bike to swap between to really identify the differences hey? The Murmur is just such a super plush and stable bike, it’s amazing. The Chisel really felt a lot smaller (it is a size smaller) and more rigid. It felt older/simpler/stiffer/snappy, more involved and most of all it felt fast.

All my thoughts about the 27.5″ wheelset feeling more playful, or the 29″ wheelset feeling more sluggish just kinda faded away today. Just enjoying both bikes for different reasons and happy they’re both so radically different to each other.

WEIGHT: 11.66kg
Original Weight: 13.51kg

Heyyyyy buddy!

I couldn’t live with the orange (seriously), so I took the 140 Fox 36 off and put the 120 SID’s back on. I also put the the 700mm bars back on and also stole the Jackson Goldstone OneUp grips off my Amflow. I love these grips, they remind me of my fave grip from back in the day, the ODI Ruffians, but there’s a big bulge in the centre for your palm and they’re made of a crazy soft tactile rubber.

I also got a 120 OneUp dropper post and dropper lever on there now. Had to take the BB out to route the cable, but it was nice to see how Spesh routes the cable up and out of the way of the BB. I can only torque the seatpost clamp to 3nm before the post starts to hang, weirds as it’s not an issue on my other bikes with seatposts torqued to 5nm. Kinda wish I could get a 150 dropper on there (maybe I could?), but happy with the huge weight savings of 241g over the TransX dropper on there previously (and also so good to have the saddle at the right height now).

I’ve been a bit cheeky and installed the grips 5mm out from the bars on each side (in essence now running 710mm bars). Feels pretty good to me. The whole setup felt better to me today than the high rise and wide bars with the 140mm fork. Yes I had pedal strikes, but they weren’t major and I think some shorter cranks would solve this. The 80mm stem might be a touch too long, might give 70mm a try.

Strava: I got 4 more PR’s today, all on climbs. For the entire Cliffs Trail segment I was 15 seconds faster on this 27.5′” setup with the 120mm fork vs the 140mm Fox fork, but 4 seconds slower than the 29″ setup. On the Kirrawee Burning Legs Climb segment I was 32 seconds faster on this setup vs. the 140mm Fox setup and 1 minute and 6 seconds faster than the 29″ setup. On the Proposed Hwy Climb segment I was 29 seconds faster and on The Way Back segment I was 45 seconds faster. Just numbers, but The Way Back segment is the boring fire road bit back to the car, and I just felt so much fresher on that today. Gearing is just perfect, bike feels like it takes no effort at all.

All in all, really happy with the bike! Weight is currently at 12.8kg’s. Definitely curious to see if a 28T front chainring would make a difference with the 29″ setup, but maybe later as I’ve got some light and fast rolling 27.5″ Conti Dubnitals on order which I’ll probably at least try out (the grip with the fat plus sized Butcher is so damn good though I’m hesitant to give them up). Clown bike, so I’ve also got shorter 155 cranks on order to replace the 170mm cranks on the bike atm, and a super light ZTTO cassette to replace the heavy 615g SRAM Eagle cassette.

OK just got back home from today’s ride. Same exact loop as my previous two rides, but this time with the 27.5″ wheels front and back but with the 140mm Fox 36 fork and wider 760mm bars. I felt like I bonked halfway through the ride, but I’m 100% sold on the wider bars and smaller wheels for this bike. Just accelerates faster out of the corners and in between techy bits. So much more fun, feels more efficient on the boring fire road bits too. I love it!

Strava says my average speed was only 0.1km/hr slower than the 29″ setup, but the 29″ setup is faster on the entire Cliff Trail segment by 39 seconds. That said I got 5 more PR’s today, of note a PR on the Kirrawee Burning Legs Climb and Kirrawee Track Climb Out segments.

As someone who failed at math so bad in school that I opted out of math as an elective altogether in year 12 I sometimes surprise myself.

The 27.5″ wheelset has obviously completely altered the Chisel’s geometry (not that I really care as the bike feels great to ride!), but curiosity and the savage -18mm bottom bracket height (more pedal strikes) on the smaller wheels got the better of me so I sought to correct it.

This geometry calculator made it easy for me to figure things out (it even lets me enter in the 51 fork offset of the current forks vs. 44 offset of my other forks).

With my 140mm Fox 36 SL fork from my Torrent hardtail replacing the 120mm SID the geometry is looking much more like a standard non EVO Chisel. The BB height is still lower, but I gain 5mm more height from putting the flip chip in the high position and also a few mm from the super fat tyres.

I’ve got the Fox 36 SL on now (easy swap thanks to split crown race on both forks). The orange is OTT (too much IMHO), the steerer tube is WAY too long too (will not cut until I’m sure) but the 36 is only 143g heavier than the SID which is surprising.

Keen to get out and test this setup some time this week!

Rolling Resistance – I thought slower grippier and more aggressive tyres made a huge difference to rolling resistance, but I put some Forekasters on the Starling (which are known for being faster rolling than an Assegai) and the Starling just felt sluggish to me on my first outing. One my second outing with the Starling I was with a mate who was on an old 26″ bike. We swapped bikes a few times. His old bike felt like a race car. The Starling felt like a powerful luxury car. No doubt about it, the Starling rolled faster but it didn’t feel faster.

27.5″ vs 29″ – For the record I’ve never gotten along with 29″ wheels. I’ve always felt like they make a bike feel like a tank. I gave up on them years ago and stuck with 26″ up until late last year when I bought my 1st new MTB since my 2008 Giant Reign. Since then I’ve had an Amflow (settled on mullet and I love it), 2 x Norco Torrent Hardtails (tried both in mullet and 29″ front and back) and the Starling Murmur (29″ front and back).

Today I felt that sluggish feeling again on the Chisel with a 29″ wheelset. It wasn’t the tyres, it’s the wheel size. I failed to get up a pinchy tech climb that I easily got up yesterday on the 27.5″ setup because I lost momentum and I didn’t have enough power to crank it up. I think there’s something in this. IE: I don’t make enough power to get the most out of a 29″ setup. I feel that as soon as I slow down the bike asks me for more power to get the wheels moving and each pedal stroke just feels more laboured than when I am on the 27.5″ setup. Fire trails are where I like to recover. On the 27.5″ setup I can just spin (I’m a spinner more than a grinder), but on the 29″ setup I feel like I need to get it up to a certain speed in order to spin.

Frame Size – One thing for sure is that I’m really happy to have sized down to a small frame from a medium. The 27.5″ felt really playful yesterday but way less playful on the 29″ setup today. The bike felt more like any other bike to me today with the bigger wheels. Yes I could bomb down the rocky descents more comfortably with the 29″ wheels, but the bigger wheels just make the whole bike feel bigger.

Strava – looking at the data from yesterday’s ride and today’s ride my average speed was 1.6km/hr faster on the 29″ vs the 27.5″ setup but I was still faster on the tech climbs with the 27.5″ setup, but overall I got a PR for Cliff Trail so I was faster on the Chisel with 29″ wheels than the Starling or the Torrent hardtails. So no doubt about it the 29″ setup is faster but I also feel way more wrecked after today’s ride than yesterday’s ride.

OK that’s my brain dump. My brain is fried and I’m quite confused. I don’t race. I make little power and I just want this bike to be super fun so I’m going to stick with the 27.5″ setup. The smaller wheels lower the BB by a huge 18mm. I can put the flip chip in the high position to get 5mm back. I’m already running HT pedals which have a super low stack height. The massive 2.8/2.6 Specialized tyres measure 5mm taller than the 2.35 Hans Dampfs but I’d low this 5mm if I went for some fast rolling XC tyres (not that I need them as the bike just feels so fast on these fat tyres but I am curious). If I was to get some 160mm cranks I’d actually have more clearance than the stock 29″ setup but the only 160mm crankset as light as my 170 SRAM XX1 Eagle Carbon cranks are the Race Face Era SL’s which are damn expensive. That said, as a weight weenie it hurts me to say this, but maybe I’m starting to believe that weight doesn’t really matter as the bike just felt so much more fun on the smaller wheels (heavier setup by 200g).