There were a lot of practical and well thought out bikes at this year’s Super Stoke Weekend and if time had allowed – short days and long ride agendas always make it hard – I would have shot them all. My methodology was to try to capture some of the themes present in the stable of steeds. With Gideon’s bike, I was able to shoot a 333 Fab. One of four present at the ride. With Spencer’s bike, it was about a similar approach to frame design but from an overseas production perspective. Black Mountain Cycles is a shop in Point Reyes Station, California. Mike Valey who owns the shop designs bikes for the brand after he spent years designing bikes for other companies in the industry. He and Sean from Soulcraft worked on this frame, dubbed the MCD, or Monster Cross Disc, with specially-designed dropouts for the thru-axles. While this bike is a departure from the traditional monster cross ideologies (700x45mm ish wheels with wide dirt drops,) it gets the point across and thrives off the ambiguity of mainstream monster cross definitions.

Spencer built his MCD (frameset MSRP of $695) up with a mix of staple brands and put the money where it’s most important, a good saddle, a dynamo, Yanco bags, a Porcelain Rocket half framebag and comfy, wide bars. Admittedly, I was attracted to his bike because the color is what I was hoping my Crust would look like, and the proportions were spot on. Spencer always had a knack for building up sweet rides and this one really resonated with me as an affordable frameset option for those looking to build something similar in usage. If you have an MCD, let’s see it in the comments!

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