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A bit of a proud moment for me! It taken a lot of hard work to get to this point but its all been worth it. The Travers "Fat Race" has been out on long term test BikeRadar (and is in the July issue of What Mountain Bike). 
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The Rudy Fat 29+ has been away on test/review duties for the last 3 months. Now I have it back it will go straight into cross country duties tomorrow at round 3 of the Whipstakes summer series. As it stands the Rudy Fat weighs in at 10.2kg, so will give those full sussers a bit of a shock! 
Wayne Elliott from EDS Bikes will be riding a traversbikes.com "Fat Race" Coast to Coast from Seascale to Whitby in one day. How fast can he do it? have a guess here (http://www.howfast.org/wayne-elliott/) and the 3 closest times will win a prize. The frame is a standard medium "Fat Race" frame with proper Fat Bike tyres (no slicks here). All proceeds will go to the charity JDRF Improving lives and curing Type 1 Diabetes'. The bike will be on display at Eds Bikes until the "Coast to Coast" ride then will feature at the Yorkshire Bicycle Show. The bike will then have flat bars fitted and become available to test from Eds Bikes (North Yorkshire). Thanks to Marco for sending me photos of his Rudy Fat 29+ in Italy at the top of "Monte Novegno" at 1691 meters. It looks stunning...and the scenery isn't too bad either! 
I have just got the Rudy Fat 29+ test bike back after its tour of European magazines and mountain bike websites and I thought I would do a little test with the Knards 29x3 to see what they look like on Stans Crest rims. Before I start I would like to point out a few things, Surly recommend 35mm rims as the minimum (the Crests are narrower than that at 24.4mm, the Northpaw rims are 48mm) and the tyre used for the Northpaw rim is used but still has plenty of tread and is the same version as the new one 29x3" 120tpi. The idea of the test was to see the profile of the tyre on the narrower rim and how much it decreased the tyre width. I pumped both tyres up to the same pressure (20 psi). I chose this pressure because it middle ground for the tyre with maximum pressure being 35psi and people going as low as 10psi. Also coincidentally it is the pressure the tyres popped into place on the Stans rims creating a seal. The other difference is I ran the Stans rims tubeless and a tube on the Northpaw rims. Okay I guess I should start with the installation of the tyres: The Stans Crest rim: the Knard tyre was tight but still possible to install with just your thumbs and with the addition of some Stans fluid created a good seal, it took 2 or 3 hard pumps to create an air tight seal and for the tyre bead to start moving towards the rim edge, from this point the tyre inflated as normal and popped into place at 20psi there were a few points where the Stans fluid was bubbling out but a quick spin of the wheel and wiggle of the tyre seemed to sort this. I left the tyre overnight and it was still inflated to 19psi the next day. The Northpaw rim: The tyre was much harder to put on because it was so floppy on the rim, the only way to get the tyre to stay on was to inflate the inner tube enough to hold the tyre in shape. Once the tyre was on it was just a matter of pumping it up. The tyre bead did rise up on the rim but I simply deflated it slightly manipulated the tyre and then re inflated the tyre again. The side by side photos of the tyres inflated to 20psi are below the used tyre is on the Northpaw rim and gives a slightly flatter profile while the new Knard is installed on the Stans Crest rim (on the right) and has a more rounded profile. Considering the Northpaw rims are nearly exactly double the width of the Stans Crest rims the Knard tyre width is remarkably similar. There is only a 4mm difference in carcass width and 3mm in outer knobs width...both larger on the Northpaw.  I have measured both the width of the carcass and the outer nobbles on both tyres. Even though the tyre on the Northpaw rim is used it still has the little rubber hairs bits proving that the outer nobbles have not worn down.  Knard 29x3 120tpi on Crest rim Carcass width 69.64mm  Knard 29x3 120tpi on Crest rim outer knobs width 73.89mm   Knard 29x3 120tpi on Northpaw rim Carcass width 73.79mm  Knard 29x3 120tpi on Northpaw rim outer knobs width 76.71mm  Its taken a while but they are starting to build the trails outside of the Olympic MTB venue at Hadleigh Essex. As you can see there are some single track and fireroad already contructed. There is more to come with tracks cut through the woods but not yet surfaced. The site inside the official Olympic MTB venue will be open at earlyish 2015 with a cafe and pump track plus a skills area. Weather you are small or tall we have titanium frames in stock, ready to ship today. Check out the Rudy 29er a light weight race bred frame ready to hit the XC circuit! Or maybe endurance riding is more your thing, if that's the case the you will be wanting the Rudy Fat 29+, it can handle tyres up to 3" so will insulate you from the worst the trails can throw at you. Maybe you are not into racing and want something more relaxed...maybe you are Fat bike curious...then take a look at the Fat Race out 26" fat bike. Did I mention they are all available in XL and Small off the shelf? Not sure what size is right for you? Check out the frames page for a visual guide. There is a 10% discount off Small and XL frames over the next month using code: SMALLXL  Some more customer photos of a Road Elite, custom ISP build with internal cables and Road Prong forks. Thanks to John for sending them in. You probably already know if you have been following this blog that Angus Edmond rode his Angus 29+ to a fine 2nd place in the Single Speed European Championships. The final part of his story outlines is race experience, gear choice and that of the eventual winners Corti Umberto plus the Pickled Egg eating contest! 
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