Cyclists?

[djwesp]

Doesn't sound like snobbery.

Sounds like you like to ride for all the right reasons to me. I'm exactly like you in the instrument world, guess I fall on the opposite side of the tracks in the bike world.

Saying that doesn't make you a snob and if people are that easily offended on a message board, they are in for a rough life.

I imagine I've been made fun of on the bike. Probably more for other reasons. Cars scare the bejesus out of me here, as they don't seem very aware of what is going on, and if they do, they'd much rather roll the window down and make a great example of what harassment sounds like.


By no means am I a burner, and that is why it is nice to have this discussion.

[tubatooter1940]

I had the opposite problem. When I sold my motorcycle and started biking more, I started gaining weight.

Doc

Then that weight gain was probably muscle unless you ate all those yummy dishes you used to post. That would make the weight gain be what'cha call "table muscle".

[Rick Denney]

I always try to avoid riding/racing with folks who spend more time buying then riding equipment.

Rant mode = ON.

Is there a shortage of good bikes? Will someone more deserving (by your standards) go without because your fat friend buys the latest and greatest?

Let me ask it another way: How many innovations in bicycle technology would trickle down to average racers if slow, rich, fat suburbanites didn't buy them?

How many good Bb tubas would be off the market but for once-a-week hacks (like me) who have more money than skill?

Nice golf clubs? Hasselblad cameras? None of these things are paid for by pros. They are all paid for by well-off amateurs who rarely exploit the qualities these items can bring to pros.

And however many miles you ride, there are guys who ride many more who point at guys like you and laugh.

Now, try to be a little less judgmental of your chubby riding mate. If he gets dropped, he pays a higher price than you do, because he has to demonstrate the determination required to ride the remaining 90 miles by himself. If he's doing that sort of thing regularly, then he's not fat because of sloth. So what if part of what he enjoys about the hobby is collecting slick equipment? That just puts more of it on the market for you to enjoy.

Rick "a fat guy who owns a Trek 5500 among other bikes" Denney

[Rick Denney]

There was far more kudos given to a well maintained traditional steel bike than having the latest bike made out of unobtainium. Indeed, the fancier your bike, the more we'd laugh as we passed. I guess I'm a jerk.

You sound like a charter member of the Anti-Snob Snobs. I've also been a high-ranking member in that club.

It's the same club that has people who are not world-class tuba players removing perfectly good lacquer "because it sounds better".

But it's snobbery all the same. The fellow who looks down his nose at the equipment freak is still looking down his nose, even if he's in good company.

I have always infused a healthy dose of science in my own equipment freakery, so you won't find me weighing derailleur hanger bolts. But you will find me using aerobars in a contest against the clock because it does make a difference.

I was once asked why I had aero wheels on my time-trial bike that I used at the Ironman, given that I was happy just to be there and ecstatic to finish without having to be carried away on a stretcher. My answer was simple: In an Ironman triathlon, you have 17 hours to go 2.4 miles in the water, 112 miles on a bike, and 26.2 miles on foot. If you take five minutes too long, you get to read "DNF" next to your name in the results. I had a friend who, in the previous year's IMUSA, had missed finishing by 3 minutes. I calculated, with considerable scientific care, that those aero wheels would save me 5 minutes in an Ironman. Does it matter in a club century? No. But it mattered to me.

Here's a picture of me riding my titanium, forward-position triathlon bike at Lake Placid:



There were folks there on old Nishiki commuter bikes. Some of them finished before I did. Some didn't finish at all. Some on state-of-the-art stuff didn't finish, either. Not a few high-end cyclists looked at me with a titanium time-trial bike with $700 wheels and a triple chainset and laughed.

In my old age, I've decided I don't like the view down my nose. It's too hard to live up to in the long run.

Rick "a former proud member of A.S.S." Denney

[lgb&dtuba]

.... if slow, rich, fat suburbanites didn't buy them?

Hey!

Jim 'not rich' Wagner

[Gorilla Tuba]

Rick said:

"You sound like a charter member of the Anti-Snob Snobs. I've also been a high-ranking member in that club."

Indeed, I fully admit to my snobbery. I am an official retro-grouch. It really is sad, becuse I'm stuck in the past and no longer fit or fast.

My disdain is less for the riders of the latest gadgetry and more at the apparent loss of artisanship in manufacture. I truly lament the demise of good fillet brazing. yes, I know that a clover cut out of the bottom bracket had no positive value, but it was nice to see the attention to detail. Bikes can be beautiful works of art... with soul.

[tofu]

--

[Rick Denney]

My disdain is less for the riders of the latest gadgetry and more at the apparent loss of artisanship in manufacture.

Believe me, there are still retro-grouches and even non-retro-grouches who appreciate a well-made steel frame. And not one that is fillet-brazed, but rather silver-soldered with tubes fitted into lugs. Colnago (the main source of lugs with clover-shaped cutouts) silver-soldered their frames to avoid damaging the tubes with the heat of brazing. The lugs provided enough surface area to make them strong, and the cutouts told them for sure that the solder had flowed.

I prefer simple lugs, like the old Prugnat S lugs with no decoration. That's what Bill Moore used on the bike I rode in college. Ask Joy Boone about Bill Moore.

But there are still those who make the frames the old way. Hans Schneider, who is close to you in Houston, does so. Skip Huysak does in Austin, if he hasn't moved since I knew him. And there are others. I think the respect for traditional steel frames is probably strongest among we fat suburbanites, heh, heh.

It's not the loss of artisanship, it's the loss of respect for same by the younger guys that gets us old farts twisted. And I'm right there with you.

Rick "who once wrote an article for Triathlete Magazine about the sould of a bicycle" Denney

[Rick Denney]

You seem to read in the post what you want to. I said I don't like to ride with folks who in reality spend more time on equipment than being better riders. My perogative.

Yes, it's your perogative. But it's my perogative to think it judgmental.

But you also said that the fat guy you mentioned would get dropped in the first little while of a century or a double-metric century. If he's riding centuries, then he's not unfit, and I don't care how fat he is. That's what set me off.

The bicycle world, like the tuba world, is a big place. There's room for people to approach it from a variety of directions, and there's plenty of room within it for people to pursue their own interest. It's a hobby, for Pete's sake. If a guy appreciates the engineering required to make ultra-light reliable parts, then that's what makes him happy.

If he looks down his nose at you because you don't go that way, then feel free to put the hammer down and let him feel superior from behind you. But that would be his deal.

Putting that aside, however, your comments about bike shops who put a club rider on a criterium frame are right on the mark. There are plenty of folks who demand an ultra-short Cannondale, get their teeth rattled out, and then blame aluminum. Most of the time, though, bike shops will not suggest a frame of more appropriate dimensions to people who are wanting a bike like they see on TV. My own favorite road bike is an Eddy Merckx MX-Leader, which has a long wheelbase (for a road bike intended for racing), very stiff and by today's standards heavy steel tubes, and huge torsional stiffness. The long wheelbase makes it a pleasure to ride, and the torsional stiffness makes it a pleasure to ride fast. But it wouldn't sell in the U.S.--too heavy--despite that it was used by the Deutsche Telekom team (now T-Mobile) as recently as '95. That would be the bike for a big guy who wants something high-end with a racing pedigree, and I agree that such alternatives are too rarely offered or suggested.

Rick "who has been snubbed for having a clean bicycle on more than one occasion" Denney

[Getzeng50s]

i ride a 2006 tarmac expert with upgraded wheels. its a lot of fun. in the spring/summer i usually ride 2000. in the fall ill do another 1,000. i dont ride over the winter, i usually sit aorund eat a lot.

[trseaman]

Okay... I've been avoiding this thread and finally decided to jump in!

I used to ride mountain bike with a group of friends when we lived in Oregon. Our favorite spot was the trails around Hagg Lake which is west of Portland near Forest Grove. Here's a link to a description and there's also a few pics but the event their talking about is for runners. Lots of hills, streams, fallen trees and blackberry bushes! Unbelievable leg burn on some of those hills! It was a blast!

2 kids + 2 states later = I don't ride anymore!

Tim

Not us but a cool video!
Check this out!

[Leland]

As it is my first year here in the lonely state of Nebraska, I'm trying to con as many people as possible into doing the B.R.A.N. (Bike Ride Across Nebraska) that they have up here every year. Apparently this summer it is 510 miles (over a 7 day span) in the Northern part of the state (the only area that isn't as flat as a pancake)

I rode a bunch while at UNK, but never for very far at a time. I liked riding down the canal from campus to the reservoir and onto the trails in the woods, first on my early 80's Huffy "ATB" (basically an overbuilt 10-speed road frame with big tires and 3'-wide handlebars), then, after that got stolen, a brand new Schwinn midlevel mountain bike (bought it at the shop on Central Ave.).

I commute daily and sometimes take the really long way home to get a good workout in. We're lucky to have lots of cyclists in the band now. Makes it easy to find a riding partner.

You're in Heidelberg? My sister is there now, pursuing a PhD at the U of H while her hubby does research up the hill at Max Planck. During a visit this past Christmas, we came into the train station and saw a large brass group playing Christmas carols. It was like a TubaChristmas, but there was only one tuba in the group; sound familiar?

I've never gotten hardcore into biking for biking's sake, I'll admit. It's certainly more fun sometimes than driving, and I did it a LOT before I could drive myself, sometimes going God knows how far after school with some of my best friends. The costs of the high-end parts, though, seemed just astronomical compared to their benefits, especially when I still weighed a whole lot more than a bike anyway. That didn't stop me from drooling over them in the display cases, though.

Just bought myself a Cannondale Bad Boy Disc for futzing around town (going to put the rack back on the Schwinn and turn it into a mule), hence my doing a search and finding this thread.

[chhite]

I commute daily and sometimes take the really long way home to get a good workout in. We're lucky to have lots of cyclists in the band now. Makes it easy to find a riding partner.

You're in Heidelberg? My sister is there now, pursuing a PhD at the U of H while her hubby does research up the hill at Max Planck. During a visit this past Christmas, we came into the train station and saw a large brass group playing Christmas carols. It was like a TubaChristmas, but there was only one tuba in the group; sound familiar?

I was in the States for a school from Oct to Jan so I missed Christmas over here. I don't think any of our guys played at the bahnhof but it was probably a group from a community band. There's one in Leimen which is a small town next to, almost part of, Heidelberg.

[tbn.al]

Check this out! Merle Knotts, an avid cyclist and runner, and a pretty good Bass Trombone player to boot, is riding a trike from Atlanta to Seattle for his 50th HS class reunion. That's right, the guy is almost 70, and suffers from MS. Why do I complain about a head cold?

http://www.crazyguyonabike.com/doc/page ... =48188&v=c

[Rick Denney]

f.w.i.w. I like fancy lugs

That looks like an old Hetchins or something. Maybe an early Bruce Gordon. The British always liked carving those Nervex lugs into even more fanciful shapes.

I go the other way. I like the minimalist lugs. My Bill Moore has Prugnat S lugs with only the single long tapered points on top and bottom of each tube.

My Merckx MX-Leader, which is not more than a dozen years old, also has lugs. That surprised me, actually.

The lugs on the old British bikes are pretty but the bikes themselves are like riding wet noodles. They were definitely not into torsional stiffness. Even when I wasn't that fat, I still weighed over 200, and I don't like hearing the chain rub the front derailleur cage on each downstroke. Give me those modern Columbus MAX 1.5"-tall chain stays any day.

Rick "who still has nearly all his 70's race kit" Denney

[Leland]

I got myself clipless pedals earlier this week (Crank Bros.; wanted something mechanically simple) and some proper cycling clothing. Also, rather than driving, I rode to a hotel across the river for a birthday dinner a couple weekends ago (which made me want the clipless pedals).

This is getting fun. I might see how far I can ride out of town this weekend.

[SRanney]

...and some proper cycling clothing.

This will definitely improve your comfort level!

I've recently aquired two new steel frames, one that's currently getting built as an "all-rounder" while the other was rescued from the dumpster and is now hanging outside my front door. If I can clean it up, it may become a light tourer.

I'm just glad it's finally warming up in the great white north! I can finally get off my trainer.

SR

[Leland]

...and some proper cycling clothing.

This will definitely improve your comfort level!

Oh, absolutely. The jersey stays in one place and doesn't bunch up on my shoulders, and although I've already got several bike shorts (you know, the skin-tight ones that only look "correct" while on the bike ), I picked up a pair of baggier shorts with a gel cushion. The seat itself is comfortable enough so far, but with the added cushioning, I might not even bother with finding a shock-absorbing seatpost of some kind (like I have on the Schwinn mountain bike).

[Rick Denney]

Oh, absolutely. The jersey stays in one place and doesn't bunch up on my shoulders, and although I've already got several bike shorts (you know, the skin-tight ones that only look "correct" while on the bike ), I picked up a pair of baggier shorts with a gel cushion. The seat itself is comfortable enough so far, but with the added cushioning, I might not even bother with finding a shock-absorbing seatpost of some kind (like I have on the Schwinn mountain bike).

Hey! You don't need no stinking gel-padded shorts. Man up! I rode thousands of miles on an Ideale leather saddle with wool shorts lined with a scrap of chamois leather. And I press the saddle harder than you do. A shock absorbing seat post on a road bike? Sheesh!

(Seriously, I find the gel padding to be squirmy and uncomfortable, even in premium-brand shorts like Assos. Your butt will hurt less the more miles you put on it. We used to think it took 1000 miles to break in a Brooks Pro or Ideal 2000 saddle--but really it was our butts we were breaking in. Get a decent saddle like a Selle Italia Turbo and good shorts like Pearl Izumi Ultrasensor and then ride the bike.)

Rick "whose mountain bike--an early Yeti-made Schwinn Homegrown--doesn't even have rear suspension" Denney

[Leland]

Hey! You don't need no stinking gel-padded shorts. Man up! I rode thousands of miles on an Ideale leather saddle with wool shorts lined with a scrap of chamois leather. And I press the saddle harder than you do. A shock absorbing seat post on a road bike? Sheesh!

Careful, man, you're starting to sound old....

Rick "whose mountain bike--an early Yeti-made Schwinn Homegrown--doesn't even have rear suspension" Denney

I'm still not sold on having rear suspension on anything but downhill & singletrack bikes. I'd have to really want to put up with the extra weight & complexity. Until then, I'd rather stick with hardtails.