why not just buy them a nice bike?

Peer pressure plays a huge role in this, and not just between children but from parents, too. Ultimately manufacturers respond to market pressure and if there is not the demand for childrens' hybrids because children don't want them (because their mates tell them they aren't cool) or their parents won't buy them because they are as blinded by the 'technology' as their children then its not surprising that they are very hard to find. Of course, manufacturers and retailers could aim to educate the public that you don't need twenty-plus gears, nobbly tyres and full suspension to ride to school (or even round the park or at the local trail centre if they get that far) but with most childrens' bikes being sold through non-specialist retailers like Halfords or supermarkets, then that is a difficult thing to do. There certainly seems to be a widespread belief that more gears, more suspension, more of just about anything is better by definiton. There are children at my children's primary school turning up on faux down-hill rigs with massive frames that must weigh close on a third of the child's weight. Anything other than a hardtail certainly marks you out as odd. We bit the bullet and shelled out for an Islabike Beinn for my daughter's tenth birthday having done quite a lot of research and struggled to find anything else like it. She loves it and it is a very well built bike, but she suffered teasing from children at school because it has 'only' eight gears (even though the range they cover is as wide as the 18 on quite a few of the others in the bike shed), doesn't have any suspention (one partiuclarly witless child telling her that she wouldn't be able to 'ride up kerbs of anything' without it); and has semi-slick tyres (showing total ignorance of the physics of bikes they all assume lots of nobbles equals more grip in any circumstances). She was being put off from riding to school by the teasing, and needed quite a lot of support from myself to carry on - including putting right one of the other children who was giving her grief about her 'inferior' bike. That's a lot for a ten year old to have to bear. There are a few people in the industry (like Islabikes) who do know what is right for a child and understand that buying what they need rather than what they think they want (or their parents want) is ultimately in their best interests, but I can't share your faith in the commonsense of thirteen year olds. Given the chance on a decent hybrid they might come to recognise that it is better suited to almost all the riding they do than aslow, heavy, over-complicated and unreliable cheap full-susser, but not many will get that chance and having the courage to go against the received wisdom of 90% or more of their peer group require a lot of self-confidence.

My 11 yr old daughter has been through the whole Islabike range too. It's amazing there aren't more bikes out there like that. Personally I think the industry underestimates the demand and overeggs the cool factor of suspension, and not just on kids bikes. I just asked her and she says no one has ever made fun of her Islabikes Beinn at school. A few parents who can bring themselves to pay proper prices for a bike have even followed her example. But I guess the cool factor might become more of an issue at secondary school. Talk to secondary school kids and a lot of them say they have MTBs at home but they prefer to walk or ride a BMX to school. The parts theft problem on MTBs comes into it too.

1. ridgeback do bikes without boing.

2. My sprog has a 20" wheeled marin one with suspension, and I have to admit that part the peer pressure comes from me: If my MTBs have front suspension, the kids dont think their bikes are real until they have them too. The problem with the kids suspension is not just the travel limited, you can't adjust it for lighter weight passengers, so it doesnt do much.

3. rear suspension is just silly.

Interesting point about peer pressure. On the plus side though, when you have races between kids on bikes(as they always do), the rigid, lighter bike should be able to beat the heavy, cheap sus bike. When this happens, maybe all the kids will want rigid and we might start seeing some decent budget bikes more often.

This all started back when I was a kid I seem to remember. So 20 years ago it was my generation that caused this problem, LOL!

I had a 50 quid Raleigh Scorpian back then, not quite a road bike but a mountain with skinny 26'ers and no suspension at all. I would leave the kids with suspension and big tyres for dead.

I keep trying to persuade my wife that i should buy an MTB for our 11 month old to grow in to, say when she's 18 or so... and, that i'm happy to 'look after it' until she's old enough to ride it...

seriously, it's a tough call to go against the 'wisdom of the masses.' A similar problem exists around these new toddler bikes that have no stabiliszers or brakes (the brand escapes me, but they use their feet to push along, balance and stop)...most people think i'm mad when i suggest getting one for the bairn...

here's a thought: set up local school races (like they're doing in California) and see the rigid hardtails trounce the full sus behemoths...maybe then, kids will start to understand...

interestingly, the same kids ride around on rigid bmx's...they'd probably show equal distain if someone made a full sus bmx!

I think it's more to do with current trends than peer presure. Looking at budget bikes I have to admit that a full sus bike looks good value, anyone that is new to cycling would probably have the same opinon? I on the other hand hate suspension, I've had a Specialized Ground Control for the last 11 years and hate the way it rides. Ok it's an old bike and things may have changed but I couldn't find a modern bike that has an older style ride, bikes may have rigid forks but the geometry is designed for sus forks. I picked up a NOS Raleigh M-Trax 200 the other week, 8spd STX, cro-mo frame and nothing that bounces! It's a joy to ride the RRP was £429, I picked it up for £175 so the are (rigid) bargains to be found, he's got one of the titanium tubed Raleigh MTB's that i'm thinking of getting too!

Surely it doesnt take a genius to make an asthetically pleasing rigid bike. The comments here have all quite rightly pointed out peer pressure and image as major causes for this crummy suspension revolution...

Look at the 'cool' rigid bikes out there being ridden by some of the best riders on the planet: Dirt bikes, Trials bikes, heck even some 4x bikes.

Now take a genuinely practical and capable mountain bike thats rigid (if less cool): A rigid singlespeed - do seem to recall certain riders even in the freeride leaning MBUK who are pictured on these machines.

Now am I just being insane in thinking could they not make a bike with a nice trail friendly sitting position that would make the bike pedal happy (like the xc rigids) but stick a nice low top tube on them (which gives plenty of clearance) and some short chain stays to make them look 'jump/dirt/4x esque and put decent kit on them..

Oh wait its called the santa cruz chameleon!!! Well if someone could just make a cheap one with rigid forks we'd be sorted!!!

Plus I wish they did mtbing in school when i was there - I sucked at every sport except the one i loved - mtbing... I could have been popular ;-)!!!!!

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"why not just buy them a nice bike?"

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Define nice? Laden in pointless heavy full sus?

This was someone helping out a neighbour on a limited budget.

The point of the article is that manufacturers put on these ridiculous and heavy suspension set-ups to make the bike look like it is up to the job, where a lighter, well made rigid bike was more suited to the 15 mile round trip on a sustrans cycleway.

The schoolkids understood this, but the author suggest that manufacturers are seemingly not aware of it.....

+1 for the blog,

The prodigal has a beastly wrought iron thing with forks and the whole thing weighs a ton and because of this, the slightest incline becomes an Alp! As soon as he grows out of it, he will be getting something along the lines of what I think will be right for him and not the supermarket or local non descript multisports mega mart. I'm thinking fully rigid aluminium, 24" wheels and no more than 8 gears. At his age (7) and at his rate of growth he doesnt need excess weight to carry like that.

Coolest bike I ever owned was a Charge Duster Rigid. E bay for £200. It rode better than any Tesco special with or without suspension.

Ocrider I think you've described this bike: http://www.islabikes.co.uk/bike_pages/beinn24.html

Good article Steve, I totally agree. I don't see any suspension on Danny MacAskill's bike but he seems to do OK going up and down kerbs.

£100 is not enough to cover the costs of a decent bike with full suspension. Witness the challenge in Cycling Plus a few months back - their staff had to buy a bike for £100 to ride from Bath to Bristol. The guy who bought a new bike from Tesco barely made it - it was falling to bits.

Cheap bikes often end up broken in the shed then eventually chucked in the bin. It's a false economy and it's bad for the environment. It's easier to service bikes without suspension too.

As for peer pressure, the parents are usually the ones who pay, so they can help here, although there always the risk of becoming the Modern Parents from the Viz!

The industry knows perfectly well that suspension on a £100 bike is pointless, its the buying public that don't know and therefore demand it, the industry merely feeds that demand. Maybe magazines should look at starter bikes a bit more often and try to educate people rather than constantly masturbating (metaphorically) over the latest £3,500 bike.

Make The Government pay for it! I know not another kick in the sack about them spending money but they are currently quite happy to shell out millions on giving people laptops ( and the internet )

they are also constantly rambling on about fuel efficient cars and getting children to ride to school. so how hard would it be to fund families some money to have a look at some tidier/lighter bikes.

or at the very least leaflets on whats best like they did recently at the "Bike Fest" in Shrewsbury a few weeks back.

- oh and just to clear things up, i think cheap bikes are an abombination at the moment and they should stick to rigids -

Your average member of the public is not aware of these issues until they start to do a lot of riding. My friend bought a bike for his 6 year old which weighed nearly 50% of the childs body weight. Some of the bikes made for children should be taken off the market because they are instruments of torture! Some of these bikes weigh nearly as much as £300 mtb from one of the better mtb manufacturer's. I totally agree with the blog.

Often the 'town' orientated bikes are better for this reason, like the carrera subway and Revolution range from Edinburgh bikes.

sasman52, you may be onto something there. maybe a legislation should be made so a bike of a certain price should weigh no more than a certain amount. It would mean that the manufacturers simply CANT put together cheap, dangerous full suspension bikes., it would also free up the budget for better gears/safer brakes. Of course this would never happen, but I do think bike standards should be MUCH stricter. I also think bikes should be only available built by a cytech qualified mechanic and it would be his/her responsibilty to ensure the bike reaches the customer in a safe condition. It simply shocks me that you can walk into a shop like Asda and take away a very poorly (semi)assembled bike in a box that will only be safe once you've had a proper mechanic spend hours on it and replace the brakes, stem, pedals, wheels etc.