When I was sixteen my mother bought me a Raleigh Memphis Mountainbike. Up until then I had been cycling a bike that had originally belonged to her, a "Marlborough Woodstock". It was a beautiful looking holland style ladies bike, handled dreadfully, but had 28" Wheels and was relatively light. It had a sturmey archer 3-speed and green and white mudguards and rear carrier to suit the style of the whole bike. By the time I was finished with it there were no mudguards, no carrier and the whole bike was scarred by numerous crashes and incidents I would dread today like having the front rim rolled over by the rear wheel of a car.

In my neglect for gratitude at being able to cycle her bike I threw a tantrum caused the frustration and mostly by the humiliation of having to cycle this bike and demanded a new bike.

Now that I have children of my own I understand why my mother took me to Tralee Gas Supplies (they sold bike as a sideline - now that's diversification) and let me pick out a bike. I chose a Raleigh Memphis. A mountainbike fully rigid as were all MTBs then (it must have been 1989 or so). It was quite big, about 52cm and didn't have a sloping geometry: It had 18 Gears and Biopace so I'm pretty sure the rest was Exage of some sort.
I loved this bike I took it everywhere to school, up the mountains (Scotia's Glen for those who know Tralee), and to the pub (Abbey Inn) where it eventually was stolen.

Until last week (2nd week in march 2007) almost 20 years later I had not owned another MTB. Partly because I never liked the suspension idea and partly because I stilll had a burning love for sports bikes.

But the Memphis was a sporty bike on the road road I could easily keep up with people on racers.

When I saw pictures of the Bridgestone MB1 on the net about 2 Years ago I new this would be a MTB I'd enjoy cycling. So I kept a lookout on Ebay. In Germany only two MB1s went on offer in that time and I scooped the 2nd but only by putting in a bid in the last seconds for €400.

That's much more than I or most other people would be willing to pay for a used bike on Ebay as you could end up with a bike that's of no use at all.

I had a feeling however that it would be worth it here and I was rewarded beyond all respects. The bike is in it's complete original condition. It has new tyres but the previous owner included the original tyres which are practically new.



Cycling the bike is just as I'd imagined - a dream. It's fast, extremly manouverable, light, quiet and comfy. Grant Petersen said something like - a mountainbike should be a silent companion - and this is very true of the MB1. Theres hardly any clicking (simple sis thumb levers), no suspension huffing and the saddle is leather and doesn't squeek. When you get up to high speeds (above 35kmh) it feels more like a racer than a MTB.

There was quite a bit of discussion about this auction in a german MTB forum as to whether this would be a suitable bike for a beginner. I would say for anybody who has sporting ambtions i.e. Crossing, MTB or even middle distance spots cycling (you might want to change the tyres) the MB1 is more than suitable. It only weighs about 12kg and even for €400 for an almost 20 year-old bike it was well worth the money compared to the aluminium junk lying around in shops at the moment.