Grannygear and I are back from the first day of the Outdoor Demo and are wind blown, dusty, and sunburned, but we had some fun checking out all of the following, which we now present………

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Salsa Cycles revealed their long awaited drop bar suited for off road pursuits. It’s called the Woodchipper and it will be out sometime in December. Two bar clamp sizes, two widths, and bar end shifter compatible. This one is mounted to Great Divide Race finishers Joe Meiser’s Fargo. It is the wide version. Look for more on this bar soon!

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Devin Lenz was on hand building more of his most recent “DH” bikes which as he promised, now actually has a name. “PBJ” or “Park Bike Jam”. Devin says it was a take off on the old Lunchbox name. What we have here is one seriously long travel 29″er! We didn’t see one built in our size in the morning, but we hope to score one ride before we leave.

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Yes there were 29 inch Dissent 29 tires floating about. (Along with 29″er Dorado forks!) Honestly, this tire is really knobby, but doesn’t look all that huge. We’ll try to get something more definite on size, but for now the “eye ball” measurements aren’t overwhelming. Definitely impressive though. This tire has seriously mean looking knobs!

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We stopped by and took a look at the Banshee Paradox. It is a hard tail that is optimized for a 140mm travel fork. The rear of the bike is interesting in that it has incredibly short chain stays, and the seat tays and chain stays are internally ribbed making them very stout for aggressive riding styles that this bike is intended for. What my pictures may not show here is the great orange metal flake paint that caught my eye and the highly polished aluminum. This bike is sharp looking. Oh yeah, and it is Hammerschmidtable. (I know that isn’t really a word, but you know what I mean!)

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We tested a couple Jamis 650B full suspension rigs. The impressions on these bikes from Grannygear and I will come later. Stay tuned! Short and sweet? Fun bikes but with a few technical short comings in comparison to others.

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Foes B-29 was on hand, and only in a size medium for testing. (Drat!) So we asked about the rig and found out that a few minor tweaks are yet in store for improvements. Hopefully we will be getting a chance to swing a leg over a proper sized B-29 in the near future.

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Looks like GT Bikes replaced the old Marathon 29 with this Sensor model. Hopefully we’ll track one down and get a ride tomorrow.

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Jamis has a cool carbon rig named the D-29 which we really liked alot. Fast, light, and racy. We’ll have more to say about this rig soon too.

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This bike was the hit of our day. The Santa Cruz Tall Boy is dialed. Climbing, descending, and in almost every aspect, this bike is highly refined. (As well it should be considering the pedigree and price!) At any rate, we’re very impressed with the way Santa Cruz’s first twenty niner rides. Oh yeah, they even had tall boys in the booth to celebrate after the ride! (More on the Tall Boy impressions later)

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Tomac Bikes had their new 29″er out on display. Called the Flint 29, it features aluminum construction and a eccentric bottom bracket for geared or single speed applications.

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Norco had a hard tail 29″er in their booth with some wild graphics that were hard to read, so we couldn’t figure out what the name of it was!

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Cielo, which is Chris King’s custom brand, was showing a 23lb steel hard tail in the Chris King booth. The 29″er is gaining strength with Cielo and we can expect to see more of these custom rigs in the future.

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The Raliegh XXIX Pro, again a limited edition bike with a 853 Reynolds steel frame, was another of today’s outstanding rides. look for a breakdown on this one soon.

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Grannygear was pretty impressed with this Specialized S-Works carbon Stumpjumper. He’ll be giving his impressions on it soon.

Stay tuned for Day Two of the Outdoor Demo coming soon!