Fixed gear downhill ("cross-country"? Riding up and down mountains, just not quite as enthusiastically on people do on full DH bikes) is certainly possible, just not very fun.
I rode one year singlespeed and that was fine (if a bit rough on the knees and I wound up walking up more uphills), then the next year tried switching it to a fixed-gear, and made it for like three rides before going back. Uphill's not very different, but downhill, ugh. It made any sort of rock garden pretty hair-raising because if your pedals are going to be in the wrong place when a rock's coming up, that's that, you can't do a lot about it except deal with pedal strike, so I switched from clipless to flats to give me a bit more scope to use my feet to get over things. Same with even small dropoffs or logs, I just couldn't get the technique together because I couldn't move my weight around enough while also keeping pedalling.
(on the flat / city riding it's okay, I have enough time to get up/down curbs, but on trails there was just too much to do too often)
yes, it is an advert for bikes. and the retrogrouch in me can't help but feel like it really ought to have been a steel frame if they're going to advertise it like that, sheesh
+1
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Lost Salientblink twiceif you'd like me to mercy kill youRegistered Userregular
Don't mind me, I'm just sitting here making what's effectively a mood board for the bike I want to buy that is currently on pause
"Sandra has a good solid anti-murderer vibe. My skin felt very secure and sufficiently attached to my body when I met her. Also my organs." HAIL SATAN
I love everything about that. I wish when I was buying mine Giant were doing more colours than "black" or "red and black." I'd have everything various shades of purple / pink like that
The one about the fucking space hairdresser and the cowboy. He's got a tinfoil pal and a pedal bin
Downhill hardtail just makes my back hurt thinking about it, but definitely did it in the past (azonic steelhead with a fox 36) at a lower scale. My current favorite ride is a 27.5 kona explosif steel hardtail single-speed. Super fun through most trails. You just never.stop.pedaling.
Also just ordered my son his first real bike. So psyched to ride with him.
The only negative I'm noticing is a lack of feedback when clipping in. Most of the time I only know I'm clipped in when my shoes are suddenly stuck to the pedals. This could easily be a function of me not knowing how to adjust them however.
Fixed gear downhill ("cross-country"? Riding up and down mountains, just not quite as enthusiastically on people do on full DH bikes) is certainly possible, just not very fun.
I rode one year singlespeed and that was fine (if a bit rough on the knees and I wound up walking up more uphills), then the next year tried switching it to a fixed-gear, and made it for like three rides before going back. Uphill's not very different, but downhill, ugh. It made any sort of rock garden pretty hair-raising because if your pedals are going to be in the wrong place when a rock's coming up, that's that, you can't do a lot about it except deal with pedal strike, so I switched from clipless to flats to give me a bit more scope to use my feet to get over things. Same with even small dropoffs or logs, I just couldn't get the technique together because I couldn't move my weight around enough while also keeping pedalling.
(on the flat / city riding it's okay, I have enough time to get up/down curbs, but on trails there was just too much to do too often)
Yeah, single speed is unpleasant but fixed-gear just sounds awful outside of pretty controlled situations, and I don't think I'd want to be going so fast on a bike anywhere around here that I'd actually benefit from having fixed-gear and huge legs over multiple gears.
I was directed here after a post in H/A asking about bikes, so here's what I need to ask. It looks like you guys can point me in the right direction. I'm going to mostly just copy/paste what I asked for there since it has all the info.
It's time to add biking to my exercise to augment my running and let my legs have a day or two off of being pounded into the pavement. I have a few wants/requirements here. Suggest some likely decent bikes and a size for me. Used or new is fine. I'm impatient, so I'm likely to end up buying new, but I have nothing against used other than the wait for the right thing to become available near me.
* Most riding will be done in the city for exercise to augment running
* Want to be able to go offroad, fairly rough, when life allows
* Want to be able to do dumb stuff - jumping things, etc. I'm old, so nothing crazy, but I also never really grew up
* Trying to keep it under $1000. Ideally WAY under, but I don't want to spend $500 and not have something that makes me happy. 100% open to buying used as well once I know what I am looking for.
* I'm 6'2" or just under, 32-34" inseam (seems to vary) - I've read everything from needing a 19" to 22" frame plus many just say "large" or "x-large". What size frame do I need? I'm guessing that may vary some from brand to brand on things like "large".
It seems bike terms have changed some since I last purchased a bike a million years ago. It looks like I am looking at something in the realm of Trail Bike, Hybrid Bike, or possibly Cyclocross (but those seem to get expensive quick and may be a bit too road oriented). Last time I bought a bike the term Trail Bike meant one of those things that mostly looked like a mountain bike, but wasn't intended to ever jump or otherwise leave the ground or ride anything much rougher than a well groomed, family day out oriented bike trail.
Some recent light research on random blogs and looking at local bike shops and rei online suggest that something along the lines of the Canondale Quick or Canondale Trail series bikes may be a good fit. Obviously there are a lot more options than those out there, though.
So, models I shoud be looking at? Specific names of bike styles I may have overlooked or be wrong about? Frame size I should be aiming for?
If you're looking for a swiss army knife that can do road, bike paths and dorking around on light trails - something like a gravel grinder would be good. https://www.bicycling.com/bikes-gear/a27021852/gravel-biking/
These are road-centric hardtails that veer into cyclocross to make them more flexible. I'd personally recommend something with a steel frame as they'll be invincible and more comfortable than aluminum to ride. Surly makes some great ones. Perhaps even look into two sets of wheels to make the trail/road switch a five minute affair.
If you want more FUN for dorking around, perhaps look at a hardtail like these: https://www.redbull.com/us-en/10-best-trail-hardtail-mountain-bikes-for-2017
However, these are absolutely built around mountain bike/trialsy type stuff that involves jumping off of things, which will get you hurt (generally) and they'll suck out loud to pedal on tar unless you change the tires. That said, aggressive hardtails are some of the best fun there is.
yeah, two sets of wheels was definitely something I was considering. Not necessary at first, 95%+ of my riding will be city and residential areas and the sorts of light trails that are in those areas. Definitely want it to be able to take a little beating, though, because I'll still find stuff to be jumping, etc.
Just trying to find a few suggestions of specific models which are reasonably priced and are known to hold up to some abuse while also not being miserable on the road. The marketing info of course always says every bike is great for everything. I have looked at several of the "best bikes of X year" deals. I'll check out what's on that redbull one, but on many of them the prices are closer to what I'd want to pay for a car than a bike.
Donovan PuppyfuckerA dagger in the dark isworth a thousand swords in the morningRegistered Userregular
Eh, you might not need two wheelsets. You can get a surprising amount of off-roading done on 32c tyres, as long as you stay away from soft dirt and loose deep gravel. Regular hard-packed dirt trails are fine, and if you're running tyres that aren't too knobby and you pump the pressure up for sidewalks/roads, they're not exactly abysmal for road riding either.
I have last year's Breezer Radar Cafe in Large; I'm 6'1, and it fits me just fine. I'm currently using some Schwalbe Land Cruiser tyres and went poking around our neighborhood yesterday on road, gravel-covered road, construction site debris, wet grass, mud, and dried-out JCB tracks through mud, and they were fine for grip and comfortable enough under the circumstances.
I've had it for a year and a half or so and it's stood up to that much time of relatively abusive commuting / bits of off-roading through parks along the way, and it's as fast as I need it to be on roads, though I wouldn't want to actually race it against people on drop bars or anything.
So far, it's needed various flat tire replacements (and I switched out the tires it came with), new brake pads, and that's been it, everything else is fine. The QRs are a bit persnickety but otherwise there's nothing I'd change.
Got out today for 18.5 miles. Was good to get out and blow away the cobwebs but the long hill up Beachy Head was also directly into a headwind. That were a wee bit painful. Lovely weather otherwise though.
Yeah, so why do most gravel bikes I see have drop bars? I thought those were about speed, to improve aerodynamics.
I'm still on a long timeline to think about a new bike (what with not being able to properly shop right now) but I like the idea of not going full road bike. I'm never going to race. I might do some "fun" event rides, general road riding for exercise, a modest amount of trail riding, and if I can get it together, mild touring. I imagine cyclocross, and frankly a road bike as well could do those, but the touring and trail riding aspects of what I listed interest me the most.
Don't think I'll find too many of them on Facebook marketplace though, too hot and recent of a trend.
For me drop bars are more about the change in posture and wrist position. I'm almost always on the hoods, barely touch my actual drops. I don't think this is a rare thing, and I kind of find it weird that dropless hood bars aren't more of a thing
Lost Salientblink twiceif you'd like me to mercy kill youRegistered Userregular
Same for me; it's nice to be able to change your positioning, especially if you do long rides.
Septus you may be surprised, my friend in Michigan found both a Surly Bridge Club and a Salsa Marrakesh on resale lately. I think in part the popularity means that people are grabbing new bikes and realizing they don't want them/they don't work/they aren't going to really pick up the hobby.
"Sandra has a good solid anti-murderer vibe. My skin felt very secure and sufficiently attached to my body when I met her. Also my organs." HAIL SATAN
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Tynnanseldom correct, never unsureRegistered Userregular
So I just did maybe my deepest clean ever of a bike, though that's probably relative and not actually super clean. I scraped each and every tooth clean of the derailleur cogs, and pretty well each tooth of the rear cassette cogs, and the central space right around the hub of the wheel where the quick release skewer goes. I don't really need to worry about reapplying grease I hope if I didn't touch anything tightly wound like a screw or seatpost do I? I just did soapy water, scrubbed, washed off, and lubed the chain.
For me drop bars are more about the change in posture and wrist position. I'm almost always on the hoods, barely touch my actual drops. I don't think this is a rare thing, and I kind of find it weird that dropless hood bars aren't more of a thing
For me drop bars are more about the change in posture and wrist position. I'm almost always on the hoods, barely touch my actual drops. I don't think this is a rare thing, and I kind of find it weird that dropless hood bars aren't more of a thing
... Bullhorns?
Yeah they exist (though I didn’t know the proper name for them), I’d just expect to see them more
I think it's a fashion thing? I remember them being much more widespread when I was younger, but now everybody seems to have single speeds and drop bars instead.
I should have done some gardening today. But the weather was too good to just waste like that. So I went out for three and half hours in the sun and cycled 37 miles round the lanes. And what with the pubs being shut for some reason I had the good sense to stuff a beer in the saddlebag.
This was Sunday but I went out for 43 miles which is now my longest ride of the year. Bloody lovely it was and I didn't let lockdown stop me having a beer at my favourite pub. Hooray for capacious saddlebags!
Did my first serious ride on the west coast, Berkeley to San Rafael and back. That bridge is a slog in hot weather, I expect I’ll be feeling it tomorrow.
Did my first serious ride on the west coast, Berkeley to San Rafael and back. That bridge is a slog in hot weather, I expect I’ll be feeling it tomorrow.
I had to google that. Hell of a ride, about 35 miles total give or take a couple? Is it a scenic ride?
Yeah about that - was 60km round trip from my friends house, then another ten for me out to their place and back. But it’s really pretty, especially if you take the north end of the bay path up to Richmond.
I took almost no photos because my phone hates me and opening the camera often crashes it completely, but I did grab a couple at the halfway point over the bay
Edit: this is the photo I should have taken, it’s an amazing bit of architecture. Also a 14% steady incline for about 2km.
Posts
I want a DH bike with 12 inches of travel.
It's one of those things where you look at it and realize, why DO I need this much bike??
I rode one year singlespeed and that was fine (if a bit rough on the knees and I wound up walking up more uphills), then the next year tried switching it to a fixed-gear, and made it for like three rides before going back. Uphill's not very different, but downhill, ugh. It made any sort of rock garden pretty hair-raising because if your pedals are going to be in the wrong place when a rock's coming up, that's that, you can't do a lot about it except deal with pedal strike, so I switched from clipless to flats to give me a bit more scope to use my feet to get over things. Same with even small dropoffs or logs, I just couldn't get the technique together because I couldn't move my weight around enough while also keeping pedalling.
(on the flat / city riding it's okay, I have enough time to get up/down curbs, but on trails there was just too much to do too often)
yes, it is an advert for bikes. and the retrogrouch in me can't help but feel like it really ought to have been a steel frame if they're going to advertise it like that, sheesh
"Sandra has a good solid anti-murderer vibe. My skin felt very secure and sufficiently attached to my body when I met her. Also my organs." HAIL SATAN
Nice.
Downhill hardtail just makes my back hurt thinking about it, but definitely did it in the past (azonic steelhead with a fox 36) at a lower scale. My current favorite ride is a 27.5 kona explosif steel hardtail single-speed. Super fun through most trails. You just never.stop.pedaling.
Also just ordered my son his first real bike. So psyched to ride with him.
The only negative I'm noticing is a lack of feedback when clipping in. Most of the time I only know I'm clipped in when my shoes are suddenly stuck to the pedals. This could easily be a function of me not knowing how to adjust them however.
Yeah, single speed is unpleasant but fixed-gear just sounds awful outside of pretty controlled situations, and I don't think I'd want to be going so fast on a bike anywhere around here that I'd actually benefit from having fixed-gear and huge legs over multiple gears.
It's time to add biking to my exercise to augment my running and let my legs have a day or two off of being pounded into the pavement. I have a few wants/requirements here. Suggest some likely decent bikes and a size for me. Used or new is fine. I'm impatient, so I'm likely to end up buying new, but I have nothing against used other than the wait for the right thing to become available near me.
* Most riding will be done in the city for exercise to augment running
* Want to be able to go offroad, fairly rough, when life allows
* Want to be able to do dumb stuff - jumping things, etc. I'm old, so nothing crazy, but I also never really grew up
* Trying to keep it under $1000. Ideally WAY under, but I don't want to spend $500 and not have something that makes me happy. 100% open to buying used as well once I know what I am looking for.
* I'm 6'2" or just under, 32-34" inseam (seems to vary) - I've read everything from needing a 19" to 22" frame plus many just say "large" or "x-large". What size frame do I need? I'm guessing that may vary some from brand to brand on things like "large".
It seems bike terms have changed some since I last purchased a bike a million years ago. It looks like I am looking at something in the realm of Trail Bike, Hybrid Bike, or possibly Cyclocross (but those seem to get expensive quick and may be a bit too road oriented). Last time I bought a bike the term Trail Bike meant one of those things that mostly looked like a mountain bike, but wasn't intended to ever jump or otherwise leave the ground or ride anything much rougher than a well groomed, family day out oriented bike trail.
Some recent light research on random blogs and looking at local bike shops and rei online suggest that something along the lines of the Canondale Quick or Canondale Trail series bikes may be a good fit. Obviously there are a lot more options than those out there, though.
So, models I shoud be looking at? Specific names of bike styles I may have overlooked or be wrong about? Frame size I should be aiming for?
These are road-centric hardtails that veer into cyclocross to make them more flexible. I'd personally recommend something with a steel frame as they'll be invincible and more comfortable than aluminum to ride. Surly makes some great ones. Perhaps even look into two sets of wheels to make the trail/road switch a five minute affair.
If you want more FUN for dorking around, perhaps look at a hardtail like these: https://www.redbull.com/us-en/10-best-trail-hardtail-mountain-bikes-for-2017
However, these are absolutely built around mountain bike/trialsy type stuff that involves jumping off of things, which will get you hurt (generally) and they'll suck out loud to pedal on tar unless you change the tires. That said, aggressive hardtails are some of the best fun there is.
Just trying to find a few suggestions of specific models which are reasonably priced and are known to hold up to some abuse while also not being miserable on the road. The marketing info of course always says every bike is great for everything. I have looked at several of the "best bikes of X year" deals. I'll check out what's on that redbull one, but on many of them the prices are closer to what I'd want to pay for a car than a bike.
https://surlybikes.com/bikes/bridge_club
https://salsacycles.com/bikes/vaya/2020_vaya_grx_600
https://www.konaworld.com/rove.cfm
I've had it for a year and a half or so and it's stood up to that much time of relatively abusive commuting / bits of off-roading through parks along the way, and it's as fast as I need it to be on roads, though I wouldn't want to actually race it against people on drop bars or anything.
So far, it's needed various flat tire replacements (and I switched out the tires it came with), new brake pads, and that's been it, everything else is fine. The QRs are a bit persnickety but otherwise there's nothing I'd change.
I'm still on a long timeline to think about a new bike (what with not being able to properly shop right now) but I like the idea of not going full road bike. I'm never going to race. I might do some "fun" event rides, general road riding for exercise, a modest amount of trail riding, and if I can get it together, mild touring. I imagine cyclocross, and frankly a road bike as well could do those, but the touring and trail riding aspects of what I listed interest me the most.
Don't think I'll find too many of them on Facebook marketplace though, too hot and recent of a trend.
PSN: Robo_Wizard1
Septus you may be surprised, my friend in Michigan found both a Surly Bridge Club and a Salsa Marrakesh on resale lately. I think in part the popularity means that people are grabbing new bikes and realizing they don't want them/they don't work/they aren't going to really pick up the hobby.
"Sandra has a good solid anti-murderer vibe. My skin felt very secure and sufficiently attached to my body when I met her. Also my organs." HAIL SATAN
Wouldn’t want pudental nerve compression from a seat that fit poorly
... Bullhorns?
Yeah they exist (though I didn’t know the proper name for them), I’d just expect to see them more
PSN: Robo_Wizard1
6/10 needs a set of time trial handlebars for extra impaling action.
And where's the BMX bars?
8.64 mile
The ape hanger style you see on choppers and the blinged out kid's bikes
I had to google that. Hell of a ride, about 35 miles total give or take a couple? Is it a scenic ride?
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
I took almost no photos because my phone hates me and opening the camera often crashes it completely, but I did grab a couple at the halfway point over the bay
Edit: this is the photo I should have taken, it’s an amazing bit of architecture. Also a 14% steady incline for about 2km.
Since it's Bay area, you need to add "while naked".
Critical Mass was always a sea of dongs