If the latest headlines are anything to go by, we mountain bikers are currently digging our own graves. The bike industry is collectively wailing, bad news dominates the market, and now the new Baspo study is supposedly capping off this vale of tears: a 25 percent decline in mountain biking! It sounds dramatic. But anyone who reads the numbers calmly will quickly realize: We are victims of collective self-deception.

It’s an absurd claim that our sport is in decline just because we can no longer keep up with the inflated pandemic numbers. Anyone who uses the pandemic year as a benchmark has simply been asleep at the wheel when it comes to statistics. Back then, for lack of alternatives, the population flooded the forests and trails. It was already clear back then that this flash in the pan would fade.

What we’re experiencing is not a slump, not a nosedive, but simply a return to a healthy reality.

If you look at the BASPO data with a bit of perspective, the sober truth becomes clear: Mountain biking today is at a higher level than it was before the pandemic. What we’re seeing isn’t a slump or a nosedive, but simply a return to a healthy reality. The so-called crisis isn’t a problem of demand on the trails, but simply a misinterpretation of the statistics. I call it the “Corona lie” because that’s exactly what it is: a false claim triggered by the pandemic.

MTB is dead, long live gravel—what nonsense!

But even before the latest study, we’ve been unnecessarily downplaying mountain biking. For example, by constantly pitting it against gravel bikes. “MTB is dead, long live gravel!” shout the trend scouts. A look at the statistics exposes the absurdity of this debate: Gravel bikes are languishing at a meager 7 percent, while mountain bikes dominate with a whopping 35 percent. Gravel may be the loud favorite of marketing departments and a few shady tourism managers—but the backbone of cycling remains the knobby tire. The gravel hype was also only fueled by the pandemic, and it fits perfectly into my definition of the “COVID lie”: The discipline is not a sustainable megatrend, but rather a niche inflated by the pandemic.

In the bike industry, too, the post-COVID boom has all too often given way to gloom and doom. The situation—with excessive inventory, rock-bottom prices, and too many Excel managers—is admittedly difficult. I don’t envy a single product manager in the bicycle industry. But because most of them couldn’t get enough of the pandemic’s sales frenzy, the industry is now suffering from full warehouses and empty coffers. They, too, ultimately fell for a COVID-19 myth: that the market would keep skyrocketing indefinitely. And that big money could be made here forever.

We need stories, not lies

Our society has recovered well and steadily from the COVID-19 pandemic. With the exception of mountain biking. It’s suffering from a form of Long Covid. The symptoms manifest as distorted statistics and imploded business models. It’s a downward spiral that won’t let us go. Yet we practice one of the most dynamic, beautiful, and life-affirming sports there is. Instead of this self-flagellation, we need great stories, real adventures, and pure joy of life again. And no COVID-19 lies.