Alpkit design, manufacture and source pretty much anything and everything you need for a good time in the hills — from socks and sporks to tents and torches. The company was started by a group of friends with a mutual lust for mountains who went from ogling Alpine peaks in books and magazines, to working in outdoor shops so they could afford to travel to those same peaks. Along the way they found their kit — bought at a discount from the outdoor shops they worked in — was starting to come apart. With hard-won experience of what worked and what didn’t and a vision of producing decent kit at prices even outdoor bums like themselves could afford, Alpkit was born.
Creating its own bike brand, then, was a natural progression for the business. Alpkit’s bike brand, Sonder Bikes, launched in 2016 and has grown into an 11-bike range covering road, gravel and mountain bikes — not that it likes to pigeon-hole things. Alpkit — and Sonder — may have its head in the Alps, but its feet are very much in the UK, where mountains are rarer.
Mountain biking in the UK happens in all kinds of places. Mountains, hills and dales may be the obvious ones, but not always the most common. Often riding is found in the in-between places that others have forgotten or deliberately ignored. The scraps of waste ground and slivers of woodland that have been written off as unusable and ugly have become as much the home of mountain biking as any Alpine trail.
Denne historien er fra March 2020-utgaven av Mountain Bike Rider.
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Denne historien er fra March 2020-utgaven av Mountain Bike Rider.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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Best places to ride with your kids
Five top venues to keep the nippers entertained this summer
CANNONDALE MOTERRA NEO CARBON 2
It’s got more suspension tunes than a Hitchcock movie, but will this Moterra thrill us or chill us?
100% GLENDALE GLASSES
When it comes to eyewear, having a large lens not only offers a lot more protection from trail splatter, it puts the frames further out from your field of view, allowing you to focus on the terrain in front of you. The Glendale is absolutely vast, and actually has a lens size akin to a full downhill goggle, so you literally can’t see the top or sides of the frame.
DMR STAGE 2 MTB RAIL SADDLE
DMR's new Stage 2 MTB Rail is one of those new/old products. The shape and construction are identical to the existing Oi Oi saddle, but the company has wrapped it in a new skin and added some harder-wearing reinforcement to the edges. It's also toned down the lairy graphics; this saddle only comes in plain black.
STRAIGHT TORQUING - GUY KESTEVEN
Has tech taken the hard work and fun out of mountain biking, or should we embrace evolution and roll with it?
STORM FORCE
Manon Carpenter may have retired from downhill competition, but her new role as a trail advocate is achieving results far beyond the race track
SWEAT AND SLATE
We ride 140 miles through Snowdonia on Cycling UK's newest and gnarliest long-distance trail
HEAD SPACE
New guidance reveals how to spot concussion, and how best to treat it
LATE SUMMER LOVIN'
Classic UK holiday hotspots that really shine when the crowds have gone
HOT STUFF
WHAT WE'RE EXCITED ABOUT THIS MONTH