Old passion reborn

I've been reconsidering cycling for quite sometime now. I'm not really sure why but the most appealing factor of cycling is to promote a healthy life style. I used to crank the old Shimano road bike that weighted almost 11kg everyday back in my student years.

I also read some local mountain bikers blogs and watched some thrilling off-road cycling videos over the Youtube. The sense of freedom in hilly uncharted jungle trail sparked my adrenaline, well almost. Since then, I knew that I need to get one of those mountain bike or most popular word is MTB bike. There is no way a road bike could jump off the dirt & mud.

When deciding which brand to buy, I remembered that my brother-in-law bought a hardtail Merida bike recently. I thought to myself, what a heck, any bike will do. So Merida it is.


To look for Merida bike shop is fairly easy. There are a few in the town and one them, KSH Bike located just near by my office. The sales person managed to convince me to buy the Merida TFS Trail 100-D model with Shimano Deore XT group set. "This bike is considered best suited for an enthusiast, a one step ahead from the beginner level", said the sales person.

For me it is hard to categorize any mtb bike. I think too much jargon won't interest any beginner. For instance they are term or categories like XC (cross country), Aggressive XC, Trail, AM (all mountain), Full Suspension and the list goes on. And the trouble of choosing continues with the brand of groupset and fork that you want to fix on the bike.

Alas this is how my bike looks like.