Dirt: How aware were the UCI of the 29inch wheels prior to the Lourdes World Cup?

SB: Obviously I was aware that the technology was being developed but we hadn’t been approached by anybody about it at all. From our point of view, it’s quite open for people to do anything they want on the bikes. The only rules we’ve got are the wheels have to be the same size and no road handlebars.

I was never thinking that it was going to cause any big issues in the same way that 650bs didn’t or 29ers when they came into cross country.

The only team that contacted me was Mondraker They basically just sent me a mail three or four weeks before Lourdes purely checking if the UCI was thinking about changing the ruling.

Why do you think more teams weren’t in contact with the UCI?

Historically they’ve always been quite wary of the UCI, it’s not been a great relationship but that’s definitely changed in the past few years.

If I was a team manager I’d be looking at the regs, seeing there was nothing in place and working to that. You’re trying to push the limits of what you can do based on what the regulations are. 

So the ball is generally always in their court?

Yeah, and I think that’s one of the beauties of what we’re doing. I think that manufacturers tend to use mountain bikers as the first port of call for developing stuff because they know that they can – then they roll it out into other disciplines after mountain bikes.

What would it take for the UCI to cap the wheelsizes of downhill race bikes?

I think from my point of view it would probably need to be quite industry led or quite industry involved to put a reg in place that would limit development. 

Unless the industry is the one that’s really pushing to say: “come on UCI we need a reg because we can’t keep up with the requests from the sport,” it’s not likely to happen. 

What might that regulation look like?

This is purely a speculation but I don’t think we could take a backwards step. We’ll draw a line under where we are now so you can go to 29ers the biggest but you can’t go any further.

What I can’t do, and I don’t think it would be fair to anybody that has put time and money into R&D, is to say: “right, you can’t do 29 you’ve got to go back to 27.5 as the biggest.”

If there was anything happening in the future, and right now there isn’t until there’s a general opinion from the sport that we would benefit from having a limit on development of equipment, then we’re definitely not going to take a step back.

I personally like the idea that people can do what they want to try and go faster and it’s not like the road where there are tonnes of rules about what you can and can’t use.