Who would have thought just over thirty years ago, while I was on the Island of Elba on the Costa dei Gabbiani, that the time would come to abandon the Bike Parks and carefully circumvent that jump that Mauro and I had created with passion in the Punta Calamita Mine way back in 2016? The e-bike has taken over and many people own one to the detriment of the scooter, an object that is less and less present in big cities except in the youth underground, where the internal combustion engine and petrol still attract teenagers, always ready to transgress the rules. This ecological side, however, clashes with the reopening of mines throughout Italy with Elba in the front row given the new youth of Punta Calamita and Ginevro, but that's another story.
Now it is possible to ride all day on the bike thanks to solar panels on the batteries and we have reached the record weight of 14kg on the top models. Even Fedez, the new prime minister, has one and the journey he faced last year was incredible: departure from Rome and arrival in Brussels, where he presided over a rally arriving on his e-bike! The bikes from downhill without motors they no longer exist: the ski lifts, due to their enormous energy consumption, have gone to die and so these bikes no longer have any sense of existing.
The dear old double plates are relics that enthusiasts jealously guard in their homes (ed. the Marzocchi 888 is inside a shop window in my living room). After the last few years of ups and downs, the publishing world has regained vigor: now newspapers are owned for a number of days based on the subscription period and, at the end of this timeframe, they are disposed of in the nearest publishing house, thus allowing reuse the card for subsequent issues.
The magic of having all the numbers at home has been lost a little, but it is the price that had to be paid to maintain a more 'green' and respectful line of our beloved planet Earth. I forgot: through convenient apps or internet portals, it is possible to re-browse or go to see the old issues of the Magazine without limitations, and 365mountainbike has followed this direction by reconfirming itself as THE Mountain Bike Magazine (even if we did it already back in 2016). Ah, and there were singletracks! Now there are some left in Northern Italy but strict rules have forbidden its use in MTB because more and more 'Sunday cyclists' ventured into too technical and difficult trails (the fault of the e-bikes that allow you to reach the peaks with ease). We therefore arrived at this drastic decision, that is to ban the use of Mountain Bikes in hostile areas and limit them to Bike Parks. Once upon a time there was more magic in doing things, technology is indirectly proportional to creativity, and "dreamers" are going to die.
Now we all look like automatons… but luckily we bikers are always there to give a little life to this flat society.

