Your best bike for Sydney

I started riding a Giant XTC but got right into the techy stuff of NB's and was going to break it.

I then sold it and got a Spec Enduro which let me get some skills and saved my arse many times at Red Hill and Oxy.

I got over lugging it around and missed purity and now ride a Santa Cruz Chameleon hard tail with a 160mm 36 TALAS, dropper style post and ride the same drops and on all the loops at Red Hill etc as my Enduro. Itchy and Scratchy is still my favorite track. AM hard tails are where it's at, legs have more travel than all bikes.

I now also have a sub 17kg 2012 Specialized Demo 8. The two bikes can take me anywhere in the NB. The new Demo even pedals better than my '06 Enduro and is only 0.6kg heavier should for some reason I want a dually on a trail ride. It even climbs with the 1 by 10 drive train.

By some genius fluke my two bikes have very similar feel, until you drop the TALAS and then the lizard changes colour for XC.

If I only had one bike it would be a dually, something in 6-7". Head angle 67 degrees with a TALAS to steepen it or make it slacker. Short chain stays, 421mm is about right. Longish top tube. Low bottom bracket and either a 2 by 10 or 1 by 10 set up. 40mm stem. Bars 750mm. 26", why make things more rollable I like it techy. I'd then go slowly mad and be back with my current two bike combo.

Any five to six inch dual suspension bike should see you fine and give you the most opinions.

Mine is a 170mm/160mm F/R dually

My riding consists of about 75-80% AM style riding on the beaches, my weapon of choice is an Orbea Rallon with a set of 36's on the front. (160F/150R) I take it everywhere, it shreds up at OMV and it's a blast at Ourimbah, Awaba, Stromlo etc. I do a bit of XC racing on a different bike and the Rallon is for me by far the perfect bike for burly and techy AM and light freeride style riding, yet it really does pedal very well up hill, although it's not as fast as my XC race bike, it's not far behind. The frame has a lifetime warranty and the build quality definately reflects this. Plus it looks hot!

If you do more trail orientated riding, and want something that can handle a good session at Redhill that would handle most of what the beaches has to offer, I'd get a 26" Orbea Occam 30X model (yes, I'm an Orbea whore, but with good reasoning. They are a bloody good bike that has the 140mm fork option and 120mm in the rear. Of if you plan on doing some XC enduros or team 24hrs, look at the Occam 29r. 100mm front and rear, or again the 30X model has a longer fork at 120mm.