Wednesday, January 9, 2013

All About the Experience

Everyone has their quirks.

An online conversation drifted from broken components to modern v. classic bikes.

One side felt the performance advantage of modern carbon bicycles and state of the art components were superior, whereas the other  felt there are some intangibles of aesthetics that no amount of technology can compensate for.

Who's right?

They both are.

If the latest and greatest is what gets you excited about riding your bike that's awesome!

If  a hand-brazed (or tig'd) frame made by a local artisan is what gets your blood pumping; spectacular!

It's all about the rider, their perceptions and what makes them happy.  What makes me happy might not ring your bell.  I'm pretty lucky in that I'm not very particular.  It just has to work, and work silently.  I don't worry about aero-advantage or gram counting (well, not too concerned with grams); those things just aren't going to improve the experience for me (and let's face it, it's all about ME).  I want to flow, man and machine as one (hippy); what exactly that machine is is of less importance, but again, that's ME.

Go ride YOUR bike and have FUN.



3 comments:

TrevorW�� said...

I'm in full agreement here.....

-Trevor

christopheru said...

Well said.

Johnny said...

Although I agree with you that as long as you're having fun it doesn't matter what you ride, it would break my heart and wallet if that were my expensive Dura Ace crankset that busted like that. Thankfully, all I ride are square tapered, drop forged and non-hollow cranksets so I'll never have to worry about that happening to me. If it were not for owning cheap old bikes, I probably would of stop riding a long time ago. You can't have fun if you're constantly worrying about the next thing that can break.