My trusty Santa Cruz Heckler is almost 5 years old. Its seen a few changes in that time, primarily a change from a DUC32 to a Pike, but on the whole its been a great bike I enjoy riding. About a year ago I flirted with a Chameleon frame instead, but for various reasons, primarily trying to make it do to many things, I just didn’t get on with it, so it went and the Heckler stuck around. Since then I’ve been pondering a new Heckler, looking out for something else with a bouncy back end and generally thinking that actually the Heckler is great so why change it.
So then, why is it that there is a new On-One 456 frame sat next to me as I type this? Well, itchy feet really. Bob swapped her Yeti DJ for a Cotic Soul a month or so back and it got me thinking about trying a hard tail again. I’d been following Brant Richards’ new ventures too, and his Blue Pig made a lot of sense, and if it wasn’t for it not being available and being twice the price of the 456 (£55 cheaper these days than when I last looked is the 456! Cracking value!) I’d have had one of them. But, at 125 quid and just coming back into stock, I kinda half impulse, half plan purchased the 456. At the price if it doesn’t work it won’t break the bank. At 5.8lbs it won’t save me much weight, but that’s not the plan. The plan is to try something new, have a new riding experience, get back to more XC riding… we’ll see. Hopefully she’ll be built up by the weekend (just swapping everything over from the Heckler) and I can take her for a spin.
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