The Zinn Master

The 5th edition of Zinn & the Art of Mountain Bike Maintenance, the world’s best-selling book on mountain bike care and repair, hit the shelves late last year. Don’t have one yet? Shhh, that’s blasphemy in these parts. Go pick one up at REI before the cycling season really kicks in. Lennard Zinn’s latest update in nearly five years covers the newest components including BB30, BB92, PF24 cranksets, inertial valve suspension forks and 2 x 10 drivetrains. Weighing in at a whopping 464 pages with 600 illustrations, the book offers complete coverage of mountain bike technology for a mere $25.

Boulder resident and Renaissance man Zinn, has been riding and fixing bikes for nearly 50 years. A professional frame builder and bike designer, “Leonardo da Zinnski” is also the technical writer for VeloNews magazine and Singletrack.com, and hosts the popular Q&A column on VeloNews.com. In the 5th edition, he’s most excited about going into more depth on how a consumer can overhaul the damping part of a rear shock. In the past, consumers were discouraged from doing this by manufacturers, and tools weren’t available. “But now you can do both the piston part and damper.” Zinn says, “So you take care of the rear shock completely by yourself instead of having to send it in for maintenance.”