My Knolly Endorphin Review

I have been on the endorphin for a bit over 2 months now. A little about me, I came off a carbon tallboy lt ( shocker switch I know), and decided I wanted a bit more playful bike. After trying a buds endo, I knew it was for me. The first thing I noticed riding the endo was how playful it was. It ripped side to side, and wanted to be pushed faster. It begged to have the brakes let off and fly down trails, jumpinging and whipping off of every feature big or small.The slack head angle with the low bottom bracket and great standover clearance made it even more of a ripper. My home trails are laguna, and trails can get hairy and steep fast. The endo with a vengence up front gave me the plowability, without sacrificing some of the nimbleness I felt was lost with the chili. The chili I felt would be an amazing bike if I lived next to a park, but with our only park being big bear, and knowing how much I needed to climb daily to get to our trails, I knew the endo would be a great bike (no offense to chili owners,Chilis a great bike and one that I dont think i could ever push to its knarly limits). Speaking about climbing, the ccdba cs I feel is an amazing shock for this bike. Where my tallboy always had a pedal assist feature on (vpp) the knolly lacks that which contributes to its amazing traction and bottomless feeling. However, this can be brutal without somewhat of a lock out for fire roads. The climb switch turn my bike from a descending shredder, to a 6 mile fireroad climb eater. Compared to my tallboyt ltc, Im not going to sit here and try to convince you that its a better overall climber, because Id be lying. The tallboy was a lighter bike, and vpp is an amazing pedal platform. But like I said before, you can never turn it off, and that bike never felt bottomless. With the endo I have the choice to turn the pedal assist off and enjoy the fruits of my labor. Techy climbs? No question, hands down the knolly 4 bar kills vpp. Sometimes I feel like Im stuck to the ground and all I have to do is pedal on rocky rooted climbs. So far Ive done OC park runs, santa ana adventures, snow summit dh runs, epic night rides, and kernville epics! I really like to call this my adventure bike. When I dont know what were riding, whether its brutal climbs, or chunky descents, this bike more than steps up to the plate. And did I mention how nimble it was!!! The most important thing, everytime I look at this bike, it makes me want to ride. It just begs for you to skip work, class, or whatever you have and just go shred!

 

The only drawback to your Endo I saw at Kern was when it was tired it would just lay itself down...(giggling)!!...with you still on it.

 

But do you like it?

I rode with Mo when he had his Tallboy and he was passive and a bit timid (but pretty fast uphill). The next time I rode with him about a month after getting his Endo (as we call the Endorphin) he was a completely different rider - popping off everything, pumping the trail, leading with his chin and hitting extra credit on the sides. Granted it wasn't all about the bike, he gained skills regardless, but I think the bike helped change his approach mentally.

The Endo is not "buttery plush" like a coil sprung 6" travel bike, and it's not the fastest fireroad climber, but it does rip when the going gets rough or twisty.

Like I said before - aluminum 26ers are all the rage!

 

Mo ripped it up at Camp Nelson; I didn't ride the Plunge w him and the boys bc they wanted to bag the peak...me, not so much.

It's an inside joke about Mo's bike laying itself down; maybe he'll tell you his oopsie when you guys ride next.

 

OMG is that one of those icky 26 inch wheeled bikes... get a grip man

 

hahaha moral of the story, not all shoes are compatible with all pedals, and not being able to unclip is no buenos haha

 

I want one

 

Saw this bike and owner shredding San Juan today. I thought the mountain would literally, light on fire!

Good riding with you Mo.

 

Might need to add some spacers/washers or cut some shoe material or both.

 

Only because the rider was going to burst into flames trying to keep up with you. As always good riding with you!

Problem is they make that 5.10 sole so damn strong that its a long tedious process cutting out!

 

Slight thread derail - Mo - what does your Avatar say about Kashima? I hope you are not dissin' it because I can tell you first hand, it absolutely, 100% makes a fork or shock way more...cool looking.

And now, back to untrendy goodness...

 

Classic.. looks like it says "this year let's color it gold and call it Kashima".. never even noticed it before.. funny.. hey wait a minute that's not funny at all, I just blew some big coin on a Kashima fork for Ryan's bike..

 

If I don't start getting invites to these weekend rides, my feelings are gonna be hurt.

 

"Pick your favorite wheel size and be a d!ck about it"

HAHA! My favorite step! 650b FTMFW!

 

Awesome !!!

:lol:

 

Was wondering what he meant. I know what you mean, literally. I was in your shoes a while back too. He made a comment about how I was basically in a "crazy" sweatsuit with my pads and layers, when it was still summer. I was so dehydrated that I couldn't get any saliva in my mouth to refuel at cocktail rock, despite sucking down much of what I had in my water bottle and camelbak. On the bright side, I made a PR that shattered my last ride up to cocktail rock by about 20 minutes.

 

Glad you've found true love, Mo. So good becoming one with your steed... Hope to actually ride with you sometime after the couple of close calls. Bell Ridge? I got that urge again. Where's vino?!

Rubber down, bro

 

Yo Dusty - I've been laying low helping my spousal unit to recover, but Mo has been killin' it all over the place. I'm riding locally this weekend again (Aliso) so feel free to come down and abuse me! I was this close to getting Tami to come to her sister's cabin in Big Bear this weekend, but she came down with a nasty cold to go with her surgery recovery. D'oh!

The Podium is weeping for some attention. Laguna shuttles will have to suffice.

C'mon down - we're always open!