Originally Posted by
BengeBoy
I never thought fenders were cool until I moved to Seattle...now I see them as signs of a rider who's ready to go all year.
Yes, agree. I started learning the craft of cycling in Berkeley, CA in 1972 before moving to Canada. Nobody in the East Bay used fenders, and they would look askance when I would show up every now and then with a fixed gear bike with fenders for winter training. Berkeley Wheelmen (that's what the club was called at the time) training rides would be cancelled if there was a 40% chance of rain. And then if it did rain in the middle of a ride, everybody just got really wet. When I moved to Canada and started using fenders, I was absolutely amazed by how dry you could stay. Now I just use the temporary clip-on Race Blades because you can use them with short-reach brakes, and I'm not concerned with getting the guy behind me wet. As I recall, Alex Stieda was one of the first guys back in the 80's to start using the super-long mudflaps as a courtesy on winter training rides.
Luis