Cannondale bike demo part 1

In the pursuit of the perfect bike, I demo'ed a new Cannondale Prophet 4 this past weekend. I currently own a Cannondale Jekyll that has seen better days and plan to upgrade to a new bike this summer. I have narrowed the search down to either the Prophet 5 or the Rush 5. I have researched tons of bikes and due to cost, component spec and many other factors I know I want a Cannondale in this price range. My riding style falls somewhere between the Scalpel-Cannondale's cross country race bike- and the Judge-Cannondale's downhiller. The Prophet and the Rush fill in the gap between these extremes.

When I found out my local shop Golden Bear Bikes in Broomfield CO was starting a demo program that would include a Prophet 4 and a Rush 4 I knew I had to take advantage of the opportunity. I was 90% convinced the Rush was the bike for me, but with all the good reviews of both bikes I needed further research. And I believe the best way to test a bike for your particular riding style is on a trail that is familiar. Not in the parking lot of the bike shop. It may work for road bikes, but mountain bikes are designed to be ridden in the dirt and after riding the Prophet on a local trail I am very happy with the results.

The Prophet is Cannondale's all mountain bike with 140mm of travel front and back. It also has two settings for the rear swingarm that changes the head angle. It takes two 5mm allen wrenches and about a minute of time to change the setting from cross country to free ride.

The trail was Heil Ranch just North of Boulder CO. A lollipop with approximately 2.5 miles up to the 2.5 mile loop. Very rocky and loose in places but overall a slow and gradual climb over fun singletrack. I have ridden this trail dozens of times on my Jekyll. The Prophet was surprisingly agile on the climbs and powered over the rocky sections with ease, considering the large frame bike weighed in at 31.5 pounds. The FSA handlebars felt very wide but seemed to add to the stability of the bike through these rocky sections. Pulling up on the handlebars to hop the front tire over an obstacle was not intuitive and required some effort. Bunny hopping obstacles was also not easy but I think the bike was designed to roll over obstacles rather that hop over them.

I decided to ride the loop at the top twice. First in the cross country setting and then switch it to the free ride setting to compare. It changes the effective head angle 1.5 degrees but the ride was very different. The first time around the bike descended some short rocky sections like a trail bike should, but the second time around I found myself flying over those same sections with ease. Now, I am not a free rider but I could see taking this bike down some steep trails with confidence. I left the bike in this setting all the way down to my vehicle. There were a couple of gradual climbs along the way back down and even in this setting it felt comfortable to find a gear and pedal. I also tried pushing the bike fast around a corner or two with so-so results. My Jekyll steers very quick with its Lefty, but the Prophet felt sluggish in the corners. Again, it felt better to go over the rocks than try to quickly steer around them.

I was impressed with the Prophet. It is a very comfortable bike going up or down. I want to base my bike decision on both bikes so I will have to wait until I demo the Rush. The Prophet is definitely a possibility for me. 04/30/07