Timo - GT Outpost: Finding Joy In Overlooked Bikes

Leaves, strewn across the ground, blanketing the loamy earth beneath the two tires I’m rolling on. Flashes of crimson and gold, tangerine and bronze catch the eye as a cool fall breeze makes the eyes water. Dry rotted tires churn the leaves to mulch, and weathered cantilever brakes squeal as they attempt to slow the 4130 Chro-moly steel frame underneath me. Single-lever Shimano shifters snap the derailleurs to attention quicker than a British Royal Guard. A week ago this bike was sitting in a garage, drivetrain covered in rust and gunk, nearly a dismal husk of what was once cutting edge technology. Yet its fate was not sealed by the corner it was shoved into. It is riding once again. 

Keeping the theme of bike simplicity rolling through the end of this week, I thought it might be fun to share some fun that I’ve been having recently taking it back to the 90’s. While on the daily Facebook Marketplace perusing, I came across a his-and-hers set of mid-90’s GT Outpost Trail mountain bikes. I had been on the lookout for just such a pair of bikes that would suit both my girlfriend’s want of having a non-road bike to go to and from town on, and my desire to have an old steel frame mountain bike to mess around on. This was the occasion I had been waiting for. $60 and a few hours of replacing rusted cables and cleaning caked-on crud later, and we both had a sufficient answer to our problems.

I was ecstatic to take my bike for its inaugural (to me) ride at Fowler’s Crossing, a small system of loamy and flowy trails in Saranac Lake, NY. I had always admired my dad’s affinity for his mid-80’s Jamis rigid mountain bike, and enamored at his refusal to ride anything with suspension. I had of course adopted the full suspension mindset years ago when I realized the progression of obstacles I could go over became exponentially greater, and hadn’t ridden a rigid bike since I was a kid. Needless to say, it took some adjusting to get used to. Gone were the plush 180 millimeters of cloud-like travel graciously offered by my Salsa Cassidy enduro bike, with legs acting as stanchions instead. 

It had been years since I had shifted a front derailleur while on a mountain bike trail. I truly had forgotten the true choice of gear one makes while riding a 2x, or in this case 3x drivetrain. At first the difference was overwhelming as I had to constantly be manipulating both levers to avoid ending up in sticky situations or pinging gears, but much like driving a manual transmission car (or in this case riding a bike), the skill quickly returned to me. And soon I was cruising around, doing an unnecessarily amount of hootin’ and hollerin’ and having one of the most truly enjoyable times I’ve ever had on a solo mountain bike ride, on this bike which was neither fast nor fancy.

But this bike isn’t just for being a hipster re-living the heyday of 90’s mountain biking. It also makes a fantastic apparatus for a cruise around town, night or day. From the grocery getter to a cruiser to a sunset picnic in the park, this thing is a dream to pedal around. 

So the next time you feel the need to blow a cool $10,000 on some new gravel bike that is just a minimal travel mountain bike with dropbars, just think about whether 30 millimeters of travel and multiple added layers of complexity are really necessary to have fun on a bike, or whether what you crave is just change in general. Take things back to the past, get a group of friends together and ride some old bikes that don’t have frills and batteries, just a glorified hunk of steel with some cables and rubber on the rims. That or just use the bike you already have and look for something different in your ride. It is so easy to get caught up in wanting the latest thing, or insisting you need the newest thing for a minute change in your riding, and sometimes it’s important to remember how much fun people had for decades without any of those innovations. Get out and try it, you never know; it might just be the next thing for you.