[Closed] Fad for Carrera bikes

When I talk to kids at school about mountain biking, the only brand they know is Carrera. For the demographic my school serves, Carrera IS mountain biking and is perceived as a quality brand - they would be way more impressed if I told them I had a Carrera than a Cotic. May well be different in more affluent areas (I teach in a secondary school where pretty much 50% of students are Pupil Premium).

Edited for SPAG!

Round here it's all Boardmans with the occasional Voodoo.

Living in Peebles, most of the bikes outside my kids primary school are better than mine..

#edit: ridden by kids who are mostly better riders than me.. 😯 🙂

colournoise - sounds like we have similar demographics then. As for mountain biking, I'm not sure many of our kids take them off road, they use them for bombing about the streets.

It's a sort of fashion thing, Carrera seems very popular near me too, poor kid up the road has a nice mid-spec Norco HT, it probably cost twice what his mates bikes did, but he's the odd one out on the 'crap' bike - when my Son was younger there was always 'the in thing' and it was never the fanciest one that was the one to have you had to have the one the most confident kid in class had as he was the one who managed to convince everyone his was best.

It's great to see MTBing is popular again with kids, but for your average non-cycling parent what do you do when your kid wants one? Find that little obscure LBS in town that's probably really expensive and full nerdy bike types who'll laugh at you - or go the massive Halfords outside town, there's always one, they’ll be cheap and easy to deal with – the kids should count themselves lucky they haven’t ended up with some BSO from their £100 range. Once one kid has one the other kids want the same and their parents are happy to take advice from the first parent who jumped in.

I miss my Carrera Banshee, it had the mass of a neutron star

Yep, there are gangs of kids on Carrera bikes round where I live, usually pulling wheelies in front of oncoming traffic.

Yep, there are gangs of kids on Carrera bikes round where I live, usually pulling wheelies in front of oncoming traffic.

I wish I could do wheelies, and those little buggers seem like they were born on a back wheel. 😀

I agree with the wheelies too.

We had an assembly at the beginning of the year about what we hope for in 2017. The teacher running the assembly asked the teachers, I replied "getting better at wheelies, jumps and drops." The teacher has said she might do a catch up at the end of the school year for us to show how successful we've been.

I'm going to end up with hundreds of 5-9 year olds laughing at my inability to wheelie more than 20cm!

hammerite - Member
I'm going to end up with hundreds of 5-9 year olds laughing at my inability to wheelie more than 20cm!

It's not a fad. A lot of parents take their kids to Halford to buy bikes, and have been doing so for many years.

I remember 'newish/youngish' riders on Carrera bikes 25 years ago. That was mainly road bikes then, and since about 20 years ago, MTBs too.

Halford then started stocking Boardman about 10 years ago, and then Voodoo, hence you see them as well.

Nothing wrong with any of those makes. They're at least as good as anything made by Trek/Specialized/Giant at the same price.

Sorry, but you can't compare a bike to a Segway (you mean Hoverboard BTW).

H1ghland3r - Member
Living in Peebles, most of the bikes outside my kids primary school are better than mine..

#edit: ridden by kids who are mostly better riders than me..

Yup.

Yep, loads round here.

We have a decent branch of Halfords and an LBS that seems to focus on high end bikes, not surprising really.

colournoise - Member
When I talk to kids at school about mountain biking, the only brand they know is Carrera. For the demographic my school serves, Carrera IS mountain biking and is perceived as a quality brand - they would be way more impressed if I told them I had a Carrera than a Cotic.

My wife mentioned the make of MTB she owns to the kids in her class.
One of them Googled it, then attempted to steal it once they found out how much it was worth.

Tell them you have an Apollo.
😐

DiscJockey - No I compared it to a Swegway, not a Segway, they're different things. They're not hoverboards, they have wheels and don't hover!

I remember 25 years ago kids riding Carrera bikes too, but back then we pretty much all had bikes of some sort (I had a Raleigh Lizard when I was 12).

Lots of kids these days don't have bikes. The difference I've seen this year is that lots of kids are asking for bikes over other things they might otherwise want - especially for birthdays. They're also specifically asking for a Carrera. I don't often hear "I'm getting a bike," it's nearly always "I'm getting a Carrera."

c2w making better bikes more affordable is probably helping as well in all fairness.

Only bike I've had nicked was a Carrera... To make matters worse it was my sisters mountain bike as my Raleigh was knackered, second week of uni

My mate's just bought a Carrera, Sunday afternoon, pretty much insisted I go to Halfords with him to get a bike, just wanted one there and then. I'd recommended a Voodoo, got there, saw the Hoodoo, perfect - this one:

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Anyway, wasn't in stock, Friday they said, and he was determined he was going home with a bike, so got a Carrera Kraken:
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http://www.halfords.com/cycling/bikes/mountain-bikes/carrera-kraken-mountain-bike

£450, shimano 3x9, shimano hydraulic brakes, doesn't weigh an absolute ton, and actually looks alright in the flesh. Suntour forks, preload adjust, lockout, it'll be plenty good enough for him. Left home, drove 15 miles to the store, got it home, built it and did a 6 mile ride within 2 hrs.

I now have another riding buddy, so as much as I've turned into a total bike snob the last few years, can't really fault it so far. And I was actually pretty taken with the Voodoo myself, a lot of bike for £440 that. My mate couldn't believe it that my frame alone new is £150 more than his entire bike, puts things into perspective a bit.....

Right, I see what you mean. I think it's just this odd situation where most of us know all the 100s of different makes of bike, and what pro teams use, and we're spoilt for choice when you think about it - much more than most people are in other sports, despite cycling seemingly being a minority sport still in the UK.

But although cycling seems more fashionable, or less 'uncool' at present, many newcomers don't realise there's an amazing amount of choice, or perhaps they simply don't care and think whatever other kids are riding is cool. Having said that, I love some of the paint-jobs on Voodoos.

I can imagine my own kids saying to me they'd like a Carrera simply because they've seen others at school. They're also very much aware of the makes of my own bikes they see in the garage (mainly Canadian and British makes), but won't appreciate the heritage we associate with those manufacturers. So it's all the same to them....which seems outrageous to us !

Love all the comments about kids being more skillful. I'm always envious at the ones riding round corners no-handed, or doing constant wheelies, and wonder if they're McAskills waiting to be discovered.

I'll look into Swegways before my kids do 😉

[i]It's not a fad. A lot of parents take their kids to Halford to buy bikes[/i]

It's the only place most people know to buy bikes.
Most kids in DezBJr's school have Carerras but they do admire his Spesh and he's always asked if they can have a go. It's the Shimano brakes most are impressed with, but I bought those to put on his Boardman and moved them over to the Spesh.

I've got two in my back garden, 90's steel jobbies.
Along with another steel BOS, they are for my Tall Bike project. 😉

Our youngest wants a carerra for her birthday later this month, mainly because her sisters have all got one. Too be fair to the brand they're pretty light with decent enough components so I'm happy to buy them.

Has the OP not seen all the bling Carerra Blast threads on here? 😉

BTW I've got nothing against Carrera bikes, some of them look quite nice and are a step up on BSOs. I think most of the kids are overbiked for what they use them for - one handed wheelies being the exception!

It does bother me that seemingly so many kids (teens) are having these bikes nicked or taken off them though.

That red carrera looks pretty boss. They are good bikes for the money, what else can you buy for £250 - £400, not many school kids are going to have bikes any more expensive than that

My 11 year old has outgrown his Islabike and we are currently looking around for a replacement. He just wants a carrera, doesn't matter which one. They look good for the price (20% off at the moment). We have looked at Specialized, Trek and Voodoo, but the Carrera is the one he's chosen.

Bought my Carrera Banshee X in 2009 and it's been a very reliable bike.Best £580.00 I,ve ever spent.Only got the bombers serviced last year because I had a few bob spare.Anybody else still running a BansheeX or XX?

I bought my vengeance a few years ago brand new for £250 on special offer as I knew I was about to be made redundant and I needed something to occupy myself with inbetween looking for a new job.

After doing a bit of research it was literally the best bike available in my budget and the best £250 I've ever spent, its kept me sane and will always have a special place in my heart. We've been through thick and thin together.

I've done some upgrades to it since then, and it's literally got thousands of miles on it and I've just bought a cube frame to do a swap over as the carrera frame is looking a bit tatty now, but I feel a bit sad about it as it's like an old friend..

You really can't knock them for the money.

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I know how you feel matty.

..... No different from us wanting the latest Raleigh Burner or Raleigh 'ATB' when we were that age

Bought my Carrera Banshee X in 2009 and it's been a very reliable bike.Best £580.00 I,ve ever spent.Only got the bombers serviced last year because I had a few bob spare.Anybody else still running a BansheeX or XX?

I had the same model, increased the bombers to 160mm and dropped the outer ring for a bash. t'was my first full susser.

miss it a little, sniff

No different from us wanting the latest Raleigh Burner or Raleigh 'ATB' when we were that age

This is true.

My nephew was going on about his mate getting a Boardman something-or-other one christmas like it was a (insert your desirable brand of choice here)!

Alot of people on here (me included) have a level of bike snobbery and are inflicted with upgradeitus. We are a small demographic of people who care about such things as it's our hobby.

To most casual cyclists £400 would be an insane amount of money to spend on a bike...at this level its all about the name and number of gears. Funny how the friends of my kids (who have isla and frog bikes) say our bikes are not good as they only have 10 (or 8 in the case of the kids) gears. They have 27 shimano gearz! So must be better.

We do get a bit caught up in bling and expensive comoponentry and forget that you can have great fun on pretty much anything despite budget.

Funny how the friends of my kids (who have isla and frog bikes) say our bikes are not good as they only have 10 (or 8 in the case of the kids) gears. They have 27 shimano gearz! So must be better.

See Also: Suspension forks that do little little other than add a load of weight to (especially little) kids' bikes.

Mine owes me nothing.

My Carrera Fury was absolutely brilliant.

Ah, it was Raleigh Max in my day (mid 90's). I got one eventually. Got me in to mountain biking and then I soon realised it was a bit poo so upgraded it to a Trek 4500 a couple of years later.

The kids are buying Carreras for the same reason me and my mates all rode raleigh burners in the 80's - good enough quality and cheaper than a "pro" bike. Plus they are sold in halfords.

There's a massive cost entry barrier to mountain biking - I did a bit in the 90's, but despite being interested in getting back into mtbing for years, my mountain biking mates consistently told me there's no point in riding a "budget" hardtail from halfords, it won't be good enough - you HAVE to spend over a grand for an entry level bike or there's no point. So I just left it for years until 2015 before getting an mtb.

2.5 years of mountain biking later, with 2000+ trail miles under my belt, i'm now giving them a bloody good run for their money on a voodoo "budget" hardtail bought from halfords.

When I grow up (i'm only 43), i'd like to get a decent full-suss bike, but money is still a barrier, and might always be, so until then, i'll just have to carry on enjoying my cheap halfords hardtail.

Have been thinking about an upgrade to a Boardman or Voodoo myself.FS Pro or Zobop would be my choice.

My 14yr old son has an inbred 16" built up with a Marzocchi eta 120 fork, mavic rims lx/slx drive train with a mixture of Easton and Ritchey controls. It's a bitsa bike, rides superbly and does everything from jump tracks to all day rides. His mates think it's a pile of crap compared to their Carrera's.

I live in Wigan, work in Bolton
Btwin mtbs everywhere in Bolton , don't see Any in Wigan .

Rickonwheels, amusing point about being told you need a grand's worth to start out. Any of us who started on £150 raleighs in the late 80s know that MTB is fun on any bike to start with : ) it's often just the group ride arms-race that escalates cost of bikes..

We get loads of kids in the shop asking if we do carrera

"Why do u want a carrera?"

"Coz they're SICK man"

*sighs*

Just spent £100 on a Carrera Kraken for the Missus to commute on in town as her tope end Trek Madone or Capra would last about 30 Seconds in Bristol before it's nicked.

Tell hydraulic brakess, SRAM X5 3x9, not too heavy and Matt dull grey. Perfect for around town as looks cheap and boring.

It would probably be fine around FOD (although the forks are cheap Suntors). I was hoping it would be invisible and too dull for thieves but now you've got me worried that the kids will nick it over some of the other stuff parked there (which is the opposite of the reason I bought it!).

Tom KP

The first mountain bike I got was late 80s/early 90s. It was a Raleigh Lizard, most of my mates had Raleigh Mustangs (the black and white one, then the nasty purple one). We didn't really do a huge amount of mountain biking then, a few rides through the village woods and that was about it. Everyone wanted a Peugeot though, I think the distributor was local (Bedford) as there were loads round here and I remember going past an industrial unit as a kid quite a bit which had Peugeot Cycles signs up.

We used to ride up to Chicksands, but were so knackered by the time we got there we used to turn around and come home and never venture in to the woods (long before there would have been any trails in there).

That's a bit like rejecting a pair of Vans or Reebok Classics for a pair of trainers from George. Kids these days...

I was driving through Luton earlier and I saw about 20 kids riding around on Carreras. Seems it's not isolated to my neck of the woods! Saw a few pulling impressive wheelies too.

My Carrera(2008 BansheeX)has been a very reliable and enjoyable bike to own.£589.00 for Bomber forks,sram X7 gearing and mavic rims is unbelievable really.I,ve done thousands of miles on it and only had four punctures.When you consider all the problems on here with the posh bikes it makes you wonder who really is the mug?

Seems a bit marmite on the looks front however.The majority like it's Kona Coilair impression.

Back in 1999/2000 I was the idiot for having an Orange Clockwork because it had rigid forks and the V-Brakes were backwards......

Unless your into biking Halfords is a one-stop-shop, and the price is attractive for parents, especially with some kids ability (or lack of) to look after their stuff....

I'm quite surprised we don't see more Calibre out with the kids, Maybe not too many outlets as of yet? If I wanted to go FS I think I would look at a Bossnut as my 1st full suspension.... (I did have a Mr O but only rode it once and hated it...)

I know of a current xco world champion who owns a carrera...

Uses it to piss his club mates off mind.

Ancient bugaboo (the lrs one with 3 travel settings in fluorometallic green) built by merida bitd.

Lol