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	Photos ©: Steve Medcroft

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Only two rings

Wicks runs the Fox Float R

The Kona team ran Nokian tires

The Race Face Dues XC stem

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We liked the detail

Wicks says he switched

Shimano's hydraulic disc brake

6ft 4in, 170lb Kona Les Gets cross-country pro Barry Wicks

Full suspension for the big guy

By Steve Medcroft

What's tall and fast and orange all over? No, this isn't one of those jokes you find in the Big Book of Gags for Seven Year Olds, but it is a trick question; one that has two answers. Because depending on what race you're watching, the answer could be Ryan Trebon or Barry Wicks, Kona's basketball team-sized pro mountain bike and cyclocross racers.

In cyclocross, the first orange alien you usually see is Trebon. After winning the U. S. Gran Prix of Cyclocross last year, he has come into the 2005/06 season in strong form, winning several times already and planning to head to Europe in December to take on the World Cup field. In 2005 NORBA mountain bike races, you were more likely to see Wicks though; especially since Trebon spent the last half of the season rehabilitating a wrist he broke on a crash during the International Tour de 'Toona..

These two riders present an interesting challenge for Kona engineers, one that any tall cyclist knows well; traditional bikes are not designed around riders well over six feet tall. Trebon is six feet five and Wicks six feet four. Both their 'cross and mountain bikes had to be custom made (63cm 'cross frames and 23" mountain-bikes). Even with the super-tall frames, the pair still runs six inches or more of seat post above the seat tube.

To understand the choices the tall boys make in their bike setup, we got a closer look at Barry Wicks' Kona 'The King' Scandium-framed full-suspension mountain bike at U.S. Nationals back in September.

Kona provides its cross-country factory team with both a hardtail and full-suspension bike but Wicks' says he prefers the full suspension. "This was a new bike for Kona in 2005. It's set up with two and a half inches of travel (the stock setup is four inches). I got it in Texas for the first NORBA and the only places I didn't race it were the couple of super-flat, high altitude NORBA's."

Wicks says the bike weighs about two pounds more than his hardtail "but with the full suspension I feel like I have better efficiency; I save a ton of energy in small percentages throughout the course of a whole race." The travel setup is a lot smaller than we thought a tall rider would prefer. "I ran the 100mm fork at Angel Fire because the course was so rough but the rest of the time I keep it at two inches in the front (80mm Marzocchi Marathon) and 2 1/2 (Fox Float RP3) in the rear."

Although many of the components on Wicks' race bike are standard-issue with the production model, Wicks said that the team, "runs full Shimano XTR kits (including Shimano's XTR tubeless wheels and hydraulic disc brake setup) instead of the mixture of components that keeps the production bike reasonably priced. We run the stock Race Face bar, stems and posts; they're super light and you just don't have to worry about them."

Wicks 23-inch full-suspension frame is custom built. "There is a 23-inch hardtail now but there was no 23-inch version of the full suspension when it first came. Kona made one for me, one for Ryan and probably one spare." The rider's extra height required no geometry adjustments. "The bikes we were getting we spec'd for a 100mm fork so since we run the 80mm fork, we've steepened up the hardtail a little bit over the years, but the full-suspension geometry is the same as the smaller production bike."

Wicks runs Shimano tubeless rimsshod with Nokian clinchers converted with Stan's No-Tubes. "And I'm so used to running tubeless now," he says, "I can't run tubes any more; every time I run tubes, I get a flat tire."

With that, Wicks turned our attention to the Genuine Innovations inflation canister mounted on the inside of his downtube. "This, I'm most proud of," he said. "It's a custom, limited edition Singlespeed World Championships inflator tip. "They were giving them out at singlespeed worlds. There's only a few in the world and I have one on my race bike."

Photos

For a thumbnail gallery of these images, click here

Images by Steve Medcroft

• Barry Wicks' Kona The King full-suspension race bike. Pictured here at the U.S. National Championships in Mammoth, California in September.
• Shimano XTR components power the Kona / Les Gets race team.
• Only two rings are needed on the XTR crank on Barry Wicks race bike.
• Wicks runs the Fox Float R for about 2-1/2 inches of travel; just enough to take the edge off rough terrain without introducing pedal bob, he says.
• The Kona team ran Nokian tires in 2005. Wicks says he uses Stan's No-Tubes to convert the tube-style tire for use on the Shimano XTR tubeless rim.
• Behind the Scandium front end - the Scandium rear triangle features carbon seat stays.
• The Race Face Dues XC stem makes a perfect hidey-hole for a just-in-case tube.
• Race Face Next XC LR (low rise), XTR dual-control levers and grips from Titec make up the cockpit.
• We liked the detail in the cut-out on Wicks' Race Face Dues XC stem.
• Wicks says he switched from the 100mm Fox fork that comes with the production bike to Marzocchi's 80mm Marathon fork. In his race bike setup, he says he looks for efficiency and control and doesn't need more travel than the Marathon provides.
• Shimano's hydraulic disc brake caliper and rotor.
• 6ft 4in, 170lb Kona Les Gets cross-country pro Barry Wicks and his 23in full-suspension Kona The King.