NOT NINO’S BIKE

I am not Nino Schurter. Just in case you were wondering. It’s true that, between us, Nino and I hold 8 cross-country world championships and 7 overall UCI World Cup wins, but take one look at me, and you can see that I’m not Nino. It’d be even more obvious if you saw me riding. Why then, you might ask, did I watch a YouTube video of Nino showing us how low he sets the air pressure in his tubeless tyres and decide that I should use the same approach? That would be a very good question, and perhaps a blindingly obvious opportunity to consider that what works for the pros does not necessarily work for us punters. Nevertheless, I didn’t ask that question, and instead dropped my tyre pressures waaaaay down before heading out on an unfamiliar and very rocky trail.

Things went smoothly enough and, it must be said, with lots of traction from my squidgy tyres. But it all turned pear-shaped when I took a sizeable drop, with my