Red Bull’s Behind The Bike: Matt Jones
Words: Matt Jones/Red Bull. Photos: Miles Holden
Early on in my career I realized I wanted to work on my bike myself. I knew I wanted to have direct input into how my bike feels, and have the ability to play around with my own ideas to make my bike as suited to me as possible. I would say my mechanic skills are somewhat limited, but the bike is pretty simple, and my skills are tailored towards the needs of a slopestyle rider. I’m very consistent and have developed a set up that really works, it’s the little tweaks I do to customize it so it doesn’t feel like it’s straight out of the box that make the difference to me.
REAR BRAKE HOSE
I bled a 2.5m (70cm longer than standard) hose onto the rear brake, this allows me to coil the hose seven times around the head tube, this means when I start a contest run I can plan the run to ensure I have enough coil for all the tracks I am going to do. Some guys use a BMX gyro but I love the feel of a conventional hydraulic, so this set up ticks all the boxes for me.
BIKE TYRE SPACER
This is the most ghetto invention yet, I use a piece of cut tyre as a spacer between the chain ring and the bottom bracket. This means when tightening the cranks onto the tyre I generate additional friction which stops the cranks turning in the air when I take my feet off. This addition really helps with tricks such as Flip Whips and Decades.
CRANK ARM GRIP TAPE
I came up with this at a contest in the snow called White Style, it basically opens up the option to allow me to land on the cranks if needed, this is quite commonly needed on tail whip tricks. This little piece of tape has helped many times and kept me on the bike between tricks in a run. This is very cost effective piece of equipment.
BIKE TYRE SPACER
This is the most ghetto invention yet, I use a piece of cut tyre as a spacer between the chain ring and the bottom bracket. This means when tightening the cranks onto the tyre I generate additional friction which stops the cranks turning in the air when I take my feet off. This addition really helps with tricks such as Flip Whips and Decades.
CRANK ARM GRIP TAPE
I came up with this at a contest in the snow called White Style, it basically opens up the option to allow me to land on the cranks if needed, this is quite commonly needed on tail whip tricks. This little piece of tape has helped many times and kept me on the bike between tricks in a run. This is very cost effective piece of equipment.
BIKE FRAME
This is a new custom frame that I have designed with Marin, at the moment it’s the only one in the world. I’ve taken all the best attributes from the bikes I have ridden over the years and factored them into one frame that suits my every need. It’s extremely short which allows you to rotate faster off the lip, this has opened some options for some new tricks for contests this year. I’m looking forward to riding this bike at Crankworx, it will be it’s first contest outing.
RIGHT HAND BRAKE LEVER
Growing up in the UK I always rode with the back break on the left side which is the same here in NZ. In the last two years I have switched it over to the right hand side which has helped massively with my bar spin tricks. Because I spin the bars counter clock wise it means the brake lever is caught directly with my right hand, instead of fumbling with the left. This does make it tricky though when riding my DH bike, as the set up is opposite.
MECHANICS KIT
This is my mechanics kit for a competition, it’s all I really need to perform most tasks and repairs on my bike. Super handy for traveling!
