Great article. I'm nearing 30 and spent the last 12 years of my life racing (kayaks, not mountain bikes). Now it is back-country skiing and mountain biking that are my new time-eating obsessions. I've been really worried for the past few years that I need to grow up and that all that time spent training and racing was a huge trade off in terms of working time and potential money saved. Anyways, I'm glad I read your article because it reminds me of all the experiences I have had that all my working serious pals never got. I can drink and watch TV when I have arthritis in the hips and can't do sports. Until then I'm going to keep sports an important part of my life and be satisfied that the trade-off is well worth it. Thanks Robert!

I would love enduro. I'm a competitive kind of guy, but XC is too much just fitness and not enough "mountain biking". Don't get me wrong-- mad respect to XC-- those guys rip and I wish I had their lungs and legs, but this seems like what mountain biking is more about. Climb up and rip down singletrack-- not ride some gravel road.