Bikes & Big Ideas

4.8 (131)
Sports
Updated Weekly

Bikes & Big Ideas is the weekly podcast from BLISTER that's dedicated to bringing you the most interesting conversations, news, and developments in the bike world. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

6d ago

Ashley King of Significant Other Bikes on Full-Suspension Frame Development, Production vs. Custom Frames, & More

Like most small framebuilders, Ashley King launched Significant Other making custom rigid frames, but she turned that model on its head by launching the Ded Reckin full-suspension XC/Trail bike, and taking it to serial production. And if that’s not enough, she’s already built prototypes of two more full-suspension models, too. So we brought Ashley back on the show to tell the whole story, from deciding to build the original Ded Reckin show bike to offering it as a production model, material selection and opting for a mix of steel and titanium, developing the Doom Scroll Prophecy prototypes, and a whole lot more. And for a lot more on Ashley’s background, the founding of Significant Other, and her path into frame building, check out Ep.253 of Bikes & Big Ideas. Note: We Want to Hear From You! Please share with us the questions, topics, or stories you’d like us to cover on Bikes & Big Ideas. You can email us at: info@blisterreview.com RELATED LINKS: Blister Mountain Bike Buyer’s Guide BLISTER+ Get Yourself Covered TOPICS & TIMES: Moving from custom rigid frames to production full-suspension bikes (3:00) The Ded Reckin show bike (10:37) Design brief & details (17:30) Looking like a Significant Other (21:43) Production readiness & refining the details (25:05) 3D printed parts & mixing construction techniques (31:27) The preorder model (35:41) The Doom Scroll Prophecy (38:27) Naming the bikes (52:19) CHECK OUT OUR OTHER PODCASTS: Blister Cinematic CRAFTED GEAR:30 Blister Podcast Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

58 min
Jun 4

Reviewing the News w/ Mike Ferrentino & Simon Stewart (June 2026)

Mike had to make a trip back to Mexico to help his 97-year-old Mom move, and amidst spider bites, broken windows, explosive dog diarrhea, and the usual technical issues (he needs his own full-time tech support department), he miraculously joined Simon to go over a very busy month — from racing to the courtroom, they have a lot to get through. Paragon Machine Works' reopening is the best news, and looks poised to keep frame builders stocked with crucial parts. Niner Bikes has been “paused”, whatever that means. Kona has a new boss (Mike is skeptical). The Loudenvielle DH World Cup was a crash-fest, but Luca Shaw emerged from the carnage on the top step, and Vali Holl continued her dominance on the notoriously tricky track. SRAM’s legal win against the UCI sets a precedent, and tons more. Note: We Want to Hear From You! Please let us know if there’s a topic you’d like us to cover or a guest you’d like us to have on Bikes and Big Ideas. Email us at info@blisterreview.com to weigh in. RELATED LINKS: Blister Mountain Bike Buyer’s Guide Get Our Free Newsletter & Gear Giveaways BLISTER+ Get Yourself Covered Mike’s The Grimy Handshake Substack Manitou on the New Mezzer & Mezzer LT (Ep.328) TOPICS & TIMES: Mike’s Dumpster Fire Loudenville World Cup Highlights Luca Shaw Finally Gets a Win Vali Holl Dominates Nova Mesto XC World Cup Insights Tom Pidcock Owns the Nova Mesto Course Giro D’Italia Recap & Durango’s Sepp Kuss’ Stage Win SRAM’s Precedent-Setting Legal Victory Leadership Changes at Kona Industry News: Company Closures and Reopenings New Products: Manitou’s New Mezzer Upcoming RockShox Flight Attendant Video Teaser CHECK OUT OUR OTHER PODCASTS: Blister Cinematic CRAFTED GEAR:30 Blister Podcast Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

55 min
May 28

Manitou on the New Mezzer & Mezzer LT

The long-travel single-crown fork landscape has shifted a ton since Manitou unveiled the original Mezzer in 2019, and the new second-generation version has seen a lot of changes to better match modern bikes — including splitting the lineup into the standard Mezzer and the beefier Mezzer LT. Both get a host of intriguing performance-oriented changes, too, so we brought Manitou Product Manager Phil Ott back on the show to discuss them, and tell the development story of the new forks. Note: We Want to Hear From You! Please share with us the questions, topics, or stories you’d like us to cover on Bikes & Big Ideas. You can email us at: info@blisterreview.com RELATED LINKS: Blister Mountain Bike Buyer’s Guide BLISTER+ Get Yourself Covered TOPICS & TIMES: Goals for the Updated Mezzer (2:29) Versions & Splitting the Lineup (4:39) Chassis Stiffness & Friction (8:50) Dropouts & Alignment (21:41) Spring Design (28:14) Damper (35:42) Adding High-Speed Rebound Adjuster (42:20) Compression Damping (47:35) CHECK OUT OUR OTHER PODCASTS: Blister Cinematic CRAFTED GEAR:30 Blister Podcast Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

58 min
May 21

Spot’s Ryan Palmer on their New Lightweight Trail Bike

Spot’s Ryan Palmer and Simon Stewart have been talking about bikes for years, so when Spot dropped their new Diggity 125 Trail bike, Simon quickly wound him up for a chat. Ryan shares details about their design decisions, why Spot’s Living Link suspension layout gives them more kinematic control throughout the travel, their interesting take on size-specific chainstay length, the lightweight Trail bike trend, and a whole lot more. Note: We Want to Hear From You! Please share with us the questions, topics, or stories you’d like us to cover on Bikes & Big Ideas. You can email us at: info@blisterreview.com RELATED LINKS: Spot Bikes Outerbike Blister Mountain Bike Buyer’s Guide BLISTER+ Get Yourself Covered TOPICS & TIMES: What’s With the Name Diggity? (2:40) What Were the Design Goals? (8:13) How Did You Land on 125 mm? (13:06) How Important was Weight? (14:35) Why it's More Than a Shorter Travel Mayhem 140 (23:17) Geometry (29:43) Spot’s Take on Size-Specific Chainstays (32:44) Where Can You Ride One (50:47) Spot’s 30 Day Return Guarantee (53:15) CHECK OUT OUR OTHER PODCASTS: Blister Cinematic CRAFTED GEAR:30 Blister Podcast Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

1 hr
May 14

Gravel Hall of Famer Yuri Hauswald on His Unbound Return & Racing for Charity

Gravel Hall of Famer Yuri Hauswald is coming out of retirement at age 55 to raise money for the Life Time Foundation by racing the Unbound Gravel 200, a race he won over a decade ago. Tune in to find out why he’s starting dead last, what’s changed in his training approach, his bike setup, and why he’s passionate about kids’ charities, plus some bonus gravel tips & tricks for one of the most challenging gravel races in the world, by one of the best to ever do it. Don’t miss this one. Note: We Want to Hear From You! Please share with us the questions, topics, or stories you’d like us to cover on Bikes & Big Ideas. You can email us at: info@blisterreview.com RELATED LINKS: Donate to Chase The Race with Yuri Hauswald Lifetime Foundation Blister Mountain Bike Buyer’s Guide BLISTER+ Get Yourself Covered TOPICS & TIMES: Specialized’s Ride to Vegas (1:18) Yuri’s Bike Racing History (3:13) Winning the Unbound 200 in 2015 (5:35) Why Come out of Retirement to Race it Again (9:23) Why Emporia Kansas Changed Yuri’s Like (11:53) Training & Fundraising (18:37) Having a Coach and Fueling (26:43) What the Hell is a Mud Stick (30:21) Yuri’s Unbound Gravel 200 Tips & Tricks (33:16) Bike Setup & Tire Choice (41:47) How Can We Find You in the Race (46:52) CHECK OUT OUR OTHER PODCASTS: Blister Cinematic CRAFTED GEAR:30 Blister Podcast Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

56 min
May 7

Reviewing the News w/ Mike Ferrentino & Simon Stewart (May, 2026)

Mike and Simon unpack the first DH and XC World Cup of the season, and there’s a whole lot to talk about, including course drama, fast Frenchies, DH hardtails, belt drives, tons of flats, just as many crashes, and Vali Holl and Asa Vermette's insane winning runs, not to mention the XC race mudfest the day after. Plus, we sprinkle in a bit of industry news, and Mike lays out his plan to make poison oak pepper spray. Note: We Want to Hear From You! Please let us know if there’s a topic you’d like us to cover or a guest you’d like us to have on Bikes and Big Ideas. Email us at info@blisterreview.com to weigh in. RELATED LINKS: Blister Mountain Bike Buyer’s Guide Get Our Free Newsletter & Gear Giveaways BLISTER+ Get Yourself Covered Mike’s The Grimy Handshake Substack TOPICS & TIMES: Air Travel & Spirit Airlines (2:36) Mike’s Poison Oak Spray (13:20) The 1st World Cup DH of the Season (17:00) Course Drama (30:56) Asa Veremette has Arrived (31:37) Women’s Elite (34:52) Vali Holl’s Run (39:18) The XC Race Mudder (43:18) Mike’s Sea Otter Recap (50:21) The Evolving eMTB Landscape (57:44) Another Surron Parent Charged (1:08:15) CHECK OUT OUR OTHER PODCASTS: Blister Cinematic CRAFTED GEAR:30 Blister Podcast Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

1h 19m
Apr 30

Hannah Otto on the ‘Hardest Climb in the World’

Hannah Otto has been reeling off an impressive streak of mountain biking FKTs over the past few years, and now she’s added a road bike one to the list: the 14,000’ climb up Mauna Kea, Hawai’i. So we brought Hannah back on the show to tell the story behind the effort, discuss the differences in FKT culture across disciplines, and a whole lot more. Note: We Want to Hear From You! Please share with us the questions, topics, or stories you’d like us to cover on Bikes & Big Ideas. You can email us at: info@blisterreview.com RELATED LINKS: Hannah on the Whole Enchilada FKT (Ep.143) Hannah on the Kokopelli Trail FKT (Ep.232) ‘Chasing the Triple Crown’ (Blister Cinematic Ep.49) Blister Mountain Bike Buyer’s Guide BLISTER+ Get Yourself Covered TOPICS & TIMES: Taking on Mauna Kea (2:17) The route & elevation profile (6:43) Choosing which FKT to attempt (10:11) The Mauna Kea FKT history (13:15) Weather concerns (14:41) Pre-riding & prep (18:59) Pacing & power numbers (25:08) The turn & getting back on pace (28:25) Bike setup (33:06) Road vs. MTB FKT culture (35:13) Training on a road bike as a MTB / gravel racer (47:17) CHECK OUT OUR OTHER PODCASTS: Blister Cinematic CRAFTED GEAR:30 Blister Podcast Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

54 min
Apr 23

Reviewer Reports: Sea Otter Recap, eMTB Power Wars, & More

We’re back and (mostly) recovered from Sea Otter, so David and Simon sat down to discuss the highlights and main trends from the show. And we’re busy as ever testing bikes, so we give some updates on a bunch of them, from the Pivot Mach 4 SL to the Devinci Spartan, the Specialized Levo R to the Pivot Shuttle AMP’d, and more. Note: We Want to Hear From You! Please share with us the questions, topics, or stories you’d like us to cover on Bikes & Big Ideas. You can email us at: info@blisterreview.com RELATED LINKS: Blister Mountain Bike Buyer’s Guide BLISTER+ Get Yourself Covered Hans Rey (Ep.319) Chris Cocalis (Ep.321) TOPICS & TIMES: Sea Otter Recap (1:37) Transition Spur (9:31) Pivot Mach 4 SL (12:37) Atherton A.150.M (19:25) Specialized Turbo Levo R (26:29) Devinci Spartan (34:04) Pivot Shuttle AMP’d (39:54) CHECK OUT OUR OTHER PODCASTS: Blister Cinematic CRAFTED GEAR:30 Blister Podcast Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

53 min

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Trailer

Introducing: Bikes & Big Ideas

BIKES & BIG IDEAS is the new podcast from BLISTER that will be focusing on both of those things — bikes AND big ideas. The bike world is full of a lot of smart and fascinating people who are really passionate about bikes. But so many in our community are also really passionate about protecting and being good stewards of the places we love to ride, and finding ways to create a more sustainable future. So the aim of BIKES & BIG IDEAS is to bring you the most interesting conversations and stories from across the bike world, while also on occasion going way beyond bikes per se to take a look at some of the biggest ideas and potentially game-changing innovations in the areas of sustainable design, cleaner energy, biotech, and more. The one and only Claudio Caluori will be joining me regularly to co-host BIKES & BIG IDEAS, and we are going to be interviewing folks within the bike community — athletes, company founders, product managers, engineers, trail advocates et cetera — and then in some episodes, we’ll be taking a look at the latest developments, biggest breakthroughs, and emerging industries that could help to improve the present and the future. Our first episode of BIKES AND BIG IDEAS drops next week, and in episode #1, Claudio and I will talk more about the impetus for this podcast and how it came to be. So subscribe today where ever you get your podcasts to catch episode number 1 with me and Claudio, and we will talk to you next week. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

04/25/2019

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2 min

4.8

out of 5

131 Ratings

The ultimate story time for bikes, and other big ideas

Mar 20

rider-reader

Tired of sound bites and click bait? Listen to the B&BI podcast to dive deeper into the subject, with serious discussion for e]people who actual like to think about stuff
Best mtb podcast out there

Mar 10

Sven405

The range of guests on this podcast and honest technical depth David brings is unparalleled in the mtb world
Great Info

09/29/2023

Captain Pao

Anything and everything you never thought you needed to know. Great job David!
Stop with all the EMTB content

Feb 20

Pabl049

I subscribed because I’m a lifelong rider and 10+ years as a pro mechanic and want to stay up on new tech. I also don’t ride EMTBs by choice. They seem to always return to this EMoto BS. Blech