Buying a Bike for Commuting

Edith_Bagot-Dix

I'm trying to find ways of making my lifestyle a bit healthier, and I'm looking at commuting to work on a bike. It's about a 10 km journey from my home to the office, and involves some hills and a bridge. Right now I own a 3 speed "cruiser" bike (Giant Simple Three for those interested) but it's a real pain to get it up a hill. I don't know if this is me or the bike, but I work out about an hour a day every weekday so I'm not in horrible shape. The prospect of going 20 km a day on that bike is not appealing. So I am throwing it out there: any thoughts on improving the situation?

Boutros

Frankly that bike doesn't look like the best commuter to me.

I suggest trying to find a used touring road bike or cyclocross bike on craigslist that will fit you and that you can mount fenders on. It will be lighter, faster, and climb better with a much wider variety of gears. Don't get a racing type road bike, they sometimes can't fit front fenders and have less comfortable geometry. And don't get a mountain bike, they are lousy commuters unless you live in Vancouver or somewhere where you can ride sweet singletrack to and from work.

Orogogus

I don't know how bad the hills in question are, but how long have you been doing this commute? It should get easier after the first three or four days. My commute has shortened over the years from 21 km to 13 to 4, on a clunker I bought used for $20 when I was in college. The 13 km commute was the hilliest, and the first two days were kind of hellish, but it wasn't too bad after I acclimated.

What helps me a lot are MP3 player/sunglasses, but they're the shoddiest things I've ever owned. I've gone through 3 or 4 of them, bought through various vendors selling Chinese goods featuring Engrish manuals and packaging, and they're always defective in different ways and eventually break. I should probably just use a normal MP3 player and look into comfortable earbuds paired with regular old sunglasses. I was worried about them decreasing my situational awareness, but it doesn't seem to me that they have that much impact (I'm not blasting them or anything).

Edith_Bagot-Dix

Boutros wrote: »

Frankly that bike doesn't look like the best commuter to me.

I suggest trying to find a used touring road bike or cyclocross bike on craigslist that will fit you and that you can mount fenders on. It will be lighter, faster, and climb better with a much wider variety of gears. Don't get a racing type road bike, they sometimes can't fit front fenders and have less comfortable geometry. And don't get a mountain bike, they are lousy commuters unless you live in Vancouver or somewhere where you can ride sweet singletrack to and from work.

Oddly enough, Vancouver is where I bought the cruiser bike, but my commute was about 2.5 km on bike paths nearly the whole way.

Edith_Bagot-Dix

Orogogus wrote: »

I don't know how bad the hills in question are, but how long have you been doing this commute? It should get easier after the first three or four days. My commute has shortened over the years from 21 km to 13 to 4, on a clunker I bought used for $20 when I was in college. The 13 km commute was the hilliest, and the first two days were kind of hellish, but it wasn't too bad after I acclimated.

I haven't done it yet. I'm planning to start next week as I'll finally get a break from driving my girlfriend to school in the morning (a chore I hate as it involves downtown traffic that I normally avoid, as well as driving around the university campus which would be a mass pedestrian grave site in a city where drivers were less attentive and polite than Halifax). I started taking my bike out on weekends when the weather perked up a few weeks ago, and it's a struggle just to tootle around up to the top of the hill on the street I live on, which isn't the steepest hill.

What helps me a lot are MP3 player/sunglasses, but they're the shoddiest things I've ever owned. I've gone through 3 or 4 of them, bought through various vendors selling Chinese goods featuring Engrish manuals and packaging, and they're always defective in different ways and eventually break. I should probably just use a normal MP3 player and look into comfortable earbuds paired with regular old sunglasses. I was worried about them decreasing my situational awareness, but it doesn't seem to me that they have that much impact (I'm not blasting them or anything).

Interesting, not sure if I'd be comfortable with the MP3 player until I get used to the ride though.

Orogogus

Ah. On my first commute on the 13 km stretch there's a pretty steep hill, and going up I thought I was going to die and by the time I go to the top I wished I was dead. The toughest part was doing it again, voluntarily, but it was only half as bad the next day and then not really all that onerous by the next week. Not fun, but not a horrific struggle with my respiratory system trying to claw its way out of my throat, either.

So I guess my advice is to pick 5 days to just do it, hell or high water, and then reassess whether you need a new bike or anything after that.

japan

To be fair, that does not look like the best bike for riding anywhere hilly. Very relaxed angles, very upright seating position.