Regular readers of this site know that one thing I really like about bicycles is all the ingenious tech and stuff that comes with the hobby-slash-sport. Just look at all the things I’ve reviewed over the eight or so years I’ve been keeping up this blog.
That said, sometimes I do stop and think of just how expensive things have to be in order for one to call oneself a cyclist, or to enjoy his/her riding.
Quite unusually, I reviewed the anime “Long Riders!” for this blog a few years ago. Central to that show was the steady transformation of your typical college girl main character into an accomplished, confident road cyclist, along with her same-age friends. I distinctly remember the multiple times the main cast went to a bike shop, bought new gear, and just giggled the sheer cost of it away – as though it was borderline inevitable to say goodbye to at least some of your cash if you let the cycling bug bite more and more of your brain.
Yes, Hinako, the struggle is real
It was a low-key tongue-in-cheek sort of joke, and to be fair, the ladies of “Long Riders!” did spend their money well on what I’d consider essential equipment, such as helmets and a good, powerful-enough set of lights. Cheekily, though, watching the opening credits reminds you seconds at a time that the show is indeed sponsored by Y’s Road, which is a chain of bicycle and cycling goods stores in Japan.
Make no mistake: as cutesy as it looks, and as much as I liked it as a show, “Long Riders!” was created deliberately to attract new people into becoming cyclists…which would in turn increase the customer base of local bike shops and chain stores like Y’s Road. Which isn’t bad in itself, really. Anything that supports cycling is a win in my book.
What I take issue with is the pricing.
The problem I keep seeing is that cycling – road cycling in particular – just won’t distance itself from being a rich person’s sport.
If this is the groupset plucky Hinako is eyeing…I wish her good luck, and bid her paychecks goodbye.
That previous paragraph was just groupsets. This price inflation has made its way into helmets, wheelsets, tires…even rear derailleur jockey wheels. Many of these things incorporate bling features that don’t serve a meaningful purpose for most people – it’s either they benefit only the pros, or they just exist as a flex at the group ride, a passive-aggressive way of saying “I can outspend you.”
It’s tiring. It’s distasteful. And worse, it doesn’t accomplish the goal of converting more people into cyclists. All of this just serves to keep on selling higher and higher priced stuff to the same people, inclusion and friendliness to potential new cyclists be damned.
I still maintain: these are fightin’ words, Microshift.
What answers can I give? I don’t have any. All I know for sure is that whatever this is, isn’t working. The bicycle industry can’t keep prostrating itself to the whims of the moneyed and expect a growth in adoption and customers.
A while back, I opened the floor for questions in an “ask me anything” post. I was half-expecting to be embarrassed with zero responses, but to my surprise I did get a couple.
I will be answering them today, below. Who am I to disappoint, right?
FIXIES
Brian asks: “What do you think about including fixed gear riding (with brakes, of course) as part of an overall cycling program?“
I don’t feel like I can comment sufficiently on this as I have never ridden a fixed-gear bicycle. That said, I think I have enough of an idea of how they work. The basic concept is that the bike has only one gear, and you never really stop pedaling because there is no freewheel mechanism in the rear hub, and that braking at the rear is a matter of pushing back against the pedals as they want to roll forward. A front brake can be added as normal.
Honestly, fixed-gear riding has always carried an air of high-level technique for me. The late Sheldon Brown had advocated for it as a way of furthering your skill as a cyclist, because you are effectively handicapping yourself if you ride a fixed-gear bike on the road. You have no other gears to shift into, no coasting that can be done, and it’s all down to you and your fitness as a rider – cycling at its purest.
All this is hard to reconcile with its status as a cheap way of getting into cycling. Because of their mechanical simplicity, fixed-gear bikes are largely inexpensive, and they are an absolute doddle to maintain. It’s all a sweet, defiant middle finger to cycling’s steady rise as a sport for rich folks with big money permanently burning holes in their pockets.
Yet, I don’t think I can recommend them as an entry point into the hobby/sport. Perhaps this is a misplaced perspective, but riding a normal bike with gears and brakes is already a pretty taxing mental task when done on the mean streets of Manila, what with the hyper-vigilance and situational awareness required. Adding the challenge of a fixed-gear bike may be overwhelming for someone starting out.
I think fixed-gear riding has its place. I don’t think it’s with absolute newbies. I certainly would not recommend it to my son when he grows up and first wants to learn how to ride; I’d get him accustomed to a normal bike first. But for experienced riders who want to level up their skills and/or try something new? I’m with Sheldon Brown on this one. Try it at your own risk, but who knows – you might find it rewarding.
FENDERS
Mike asks: “I am trying to decide if I should mount fixed fenders or just get the Speedrockers and call it a day. What are your thoughts?”
This is an interesting question, and a lot depends on what bike frame we’re talking about to begin with.
If your bike has no threaded bosses or mounts for fenders (or mudguards, for any Brits reading this), then the SKS Speedrockers or some other clip-on set are really the only way to go. It just so happens that I think the Speedrockers are the best quick-fit/clip-on fender set around, because they have practically the same level of security that a more permanent full-coverage fender set has.
Now, if your bike does have threaded bosses or mounts for fenders…surprise: it’s not always a straightforward answer.
I’ll start with my bike, a Giant TCX. It has threaded bosses around the rear dropout area, but these do not necessarily guarantee that a full-coverage fender set will fit up fine.
This is because the threaded bosses at the rear dropout area are just one-third of the mounting equation for proper fitment of a rear fender. You will need two more points of connection to the frame.
The first one is some connection to the seat stays, to prop up the middle span of the rear fender and keep it from rubbing on the rear tire. As a cyclocross bike, the TCX does away with a seatstay bridge – ostensibly to eliminate one potential “shelf” area where mud can build up during a cyclocross race scenario and bring you to a halt. On my first set of SKS Longboards, I had to bodge this by reusing a rear reflector mount.
Later, on my matte 53 mm SKS Bluemels, the build kit includes a plastic arch piece which can mount to your bike either by bolting onto its seatstay bridge, or by using two zip ties to hold the two ends fast against either seatstay. I used the latter method.
The second remaining mount point is down by the chain stay junction. The forward end of the rear fender should be secured here. Otherwise it may rattle and flop around uncontrollably, and rub on your rear tire.
On the TCX, there is no threaded boss on the chainstay junction behind the bottom bracket shell. So really, the frame was missing two of the three mounting points necessary for a full-length rear fender to work.
Again, zip ties to the rescue. I bodged this by threading zip ties through the hole on the forward edge of the rear fender and pulled them against the frame, centering the whole thing carefully as I tensioned the zip ties.
Going the zip tie route can be done, but it introduces long-term problems. All that plastic now rubs against your frame and its paint, and it’s a rather thin strip of it. There, thus, is a possibility of either the zip ties or parts of the fender itself rubbing against your frame over time, and this will happen due to road vibration.
I have another bike that will serve as an example for answering your question.
Compared to my TCX, my wife’s bike, a Liv Alight DD, is a much better candidate for full-coverage fender mounting…at least on paper. There are threaded bosses on the rear dropouts, as on my bike, but there also exists a seat stay bridge with its own threaded boss, and a proper threaded boss on the chainstay junction which is also part of a center-mounted kickstand mounting plate.
Indeed, I bought her a set of SKS Bluemels Reflective 45 mm fenders, and fitting these to the Alight was almost perfect. The only place I needed zip ties was at the seat stay bridge, because the threaded boss on the frame is perpendicular to where it should have been.
Things are a bit less ideal up front, though.
A full-coverage front fender requires two sets of mounting points to the fork. First is the pair of threaded bosses somewhere on the fork blades. The Alight’s aluminum fork has these eyelets on the dropout area which will serve the purpose.
The second mounting point is around the fork crown. This is where my our personal use case for our bikes starts to get in the way. See, these days, we normally have to bring our bikes to our riding destination. To do that, we’ve been using the Minoura Vergo-TF2 bike transport rack, which goes inside our cars and requires removal of the front wheel and fender to work.
Unlike on the TCX’s fork, which does have complete mounting points for a front fender, the Alight’s fork crown fender mount is not threaded. It’s simply a hole in the metal. As such, dismounting and remounting the front fender for mounting into our cars is quite a bit more involved and time-consuming than just turning a 4 mm hex key at three places, like I would do on the TCX.
I have a Problem Solvers Fender Flute on the Alight’s fork crown to bring the front fender closer to the tire, but that doesn’t help one bit with quick dismounting of the fender from the bike. If anything, it makes it a little fiddlier.
This has been a long-winded answer to what is really a short question, but I felt I needed to get into the weeds to explain. In sum: If you’re after ultimate coverage, and your bike has all the mounts for it, a full-length fender set is an awesome option. You will be the darling of the rainy day group ride, as folks will love drafting behind you in the rain. That said, they work best if you fit them on the bike and forget all about them. Part of mounting a full-length fender set is cutting the metal stays to length so that they are effectively “married” to your bike – chances are high that they will not be able to fit another bicycle unless you buy another set of stays. For all intents and purposes, they are a permanent-fit item and should be treated that way.
Now, if your bike frame and fork has all the mounts for fenders, but you foresee regular instances where you’d have to get them off the bike, I’m inclined to say the Speedrockers are the better option. You definitely lose out on ultimate coverage. You will be fine, but your bottom bracket and lower headset bearings won’t be as protected, and other cyclists will perhaps not be as enthusiastic to sit on your back wheel in the rain.
Another win for the Speedrockers is that they are perfectly acceptable to mount on a second bike because of the flexibility of their stays. Instead of cutting them down to size, they can simply lash onto the frame or fork at a different area or angle because they can telescope and freely spin around at the fender itself. Sealing the deal is that, despite their nature as “quick-release” or “clip-on” fenders, the Speedrockers have been as stiff and as sturdy as a full-length fender set, if not even stiffer; the two sets of Longboards I’ve had were definitely much floppier.
ANY MORE QUESTIONS?
Leave them in the comments or drop me an email. I’ll see if I can help you out. Cheers and safe riding.
It’s been a while, and I realize I might fall flat on my face here if I get no responses, but I’m opening up the floor for any questions you may want to ask me.
Just head on over to the comments section and drop your questions there. I’ll answer them in a later post.
the accidental randonneur 