GhostSS

Their humor can be lost on some because they don't watch a lot of the videos. Matt Stephen's antics are a bit of a running joke on their channel. He has trouble getting into clipless pedals as well, falls a lot going up hills (he recently entered into cyclocross and this is a running gag), and that he's old and slow (despite being former champion).

It's all just British humor style jokes, not to be taken seriously.

Their "How to make a cafe stop like a pro" video caused some waves with cyclists because they thought the video was serious instead of being tongue in cheek.

iab

So you take his view that a vintage bike is a struggle to use? Then why exactly do you ride one?

jiangshi

Talk about twisting a statement...why are you so difficult and judgemental? Call a National Champion a Fred?

Must be nice at the top of the pedestal.

dddd

With some adaptation acquired from say one week of riding, and with de-rigeur post-ride tuning sessions, the old bike/rider would no doubt have been smoother, quicker and more efficient, but it was obvious from the video (perhaps the point of the video?) that said adaptation is indeed a requirement of riding fast on the bike one abandoned 30 years ago, even more so when it isn't even your own old trusty steed.

I remember finding a Masi GC at a garage sale back around 2001, first vintage bike that I had ever even tried to keep as stock as possible, and my first ride on that thing was a whole lot sloppier than this pro was!
I was very uncomfortable, and it took some time and experimentation to figure out how to even get fitted to the thing, much less to be in synch with it.

I just wasn't used to the shifting/gearing via old Italian chain and cogs, it was pretty terrible actually. Yes, I did find myself trying to shift for every uphill, and kept running out of time to complete each shift as I quickly lost momentum, so it was like it's just easier and better to slam across three cogs at a go, if not the whole stack at once!
It didn't take me long to abandon the original pedals, as I wasn't able to even find a good and good-fitting pair of shoes that would allow me to ride on them.

This video perhaps only enhances the mystique of using an old bike to chase modern pelotons, in that others don't have to notice the hot-rodding, things like modern chain and 20+ years of tinkering experience can allow on any 30+ year old bike. I hope that all of my riding companions watch it.

GhostSS

You didn't read anyone else's responses did you? You're clearly unfamiliar with their channel, humor, and their running gags. You've somehow taken personal offense to anyone having anything bad to say about vintage bikes that you've completely shut your brain off and drawn conclusion from the wrong places.

The joke here is (and I'll explain it to you because you keep missing it) is that Matthew Stephens is a former national pro, but he has trouble with falling over and clipping in and out (both clipless and straps with clips). It's supposed to be ironic. Irony. He's blaming the bike rather than his (ironic) inability to ride well anymore. Which is probably an act.
There I explained it for you. Sheesh.

Both Daniel Lloyd (also a former pro) and Stephens have self deprecating senses of humor about their "former glory days as a pro". And Simon, the the fellow he's riding with is a former Cyclocross pro, so going up a muddy hill is his forte.

Making Matt Stephens look bad on purpose is par for the course.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_act

dddd

For me at least, because it's a challenge. Same reason that I often go mountain biking on a touring bike, instead of on a true off-roader.

The mechanical aspect of it all is a challenge as well, whether it's finding an optimum ratio spread of only 4, 5 or 6 cogs, getting an Allvit's shifting sorted, or determining the lowest safe pressure that I can get away with when riding road tires off road.

iab

No. I didn't know the "joke".

Apparently, neither did you.

jiangshi

A wise man would quit digging once he's found himself in a deep hole.

rootboy 

... dropping this thread like a bag of hot potatoes…packed in sand.

iab

But really, how much of a "challenge" is it?

I have 2 Cinellis separated by 50 years, 10 pounds and 14 gears. If I go for a lively 4:00 hour ride on one, the same ride on the other is 4:10. At the end of the ride, in both cases, I am tired, sore but feel great nonetheless.

For me, that 10 minutes difference in time is completely insignificant. I can't imagine a case unless it was putting food on the table, where that 10 minutes would matter to anyone. Can you?

jiangshi

Dave, the thing is, it CAN be a challenge for someone, no matter how experienced (or faster than you) they are, to get on a bike with toe straps and DT, non indexed shifters, if they haven't ridden one for 25 years. Same with strapping on a hairnet with a buckle. The 'holier than thou' attitude shown at times by people some of us look up to, is of no help whatsoever. To call a National Champion a 'Fred', is more telling of the name caller than the person being called a name.

You may have cooler bikes than most here, and maybe even be faster than most, like that matters at all, and you may do a lot for the vintage cycling community, but your pretentiousness really is a bit of a buzz kill.

OP, cool video, thanks for posting.

dddd

Ok, I'll put it this way, the extra ten minutes, if that what it comes out to, is ten minutes of extra riding that I really enjoy and appreciate.

But when the challenge is seeing if this 54-yr-old can hang with this or that group's ride, any extra slowness on my bike's part presents a challenge in terms of how much extra power, for how long, that I might have to, and be able to, put out. Strategizing then ensues.
And as I said, I appreciate the challenge, it makes my day more interesting and serves to improve the limits of my fitness.

GhostSS

Oh geez. Here were go. Pointing at other people doesn't make you any less wrong buddy. You need to just let this thread go and let other's enjoy it. You've gotten to the point of being contradictory for the heck of it.

iab

But does the bike matter?

Correct me if I am wrong, but hanging onto a group ride depends on you and the composition of the group. At the local "A" ride, somes days I can hang for the full ride, sometimes for half the ride and sometimes I'm dropped in the first 10 minutes. And I can't say that any of those challenges were do to the bike. 95% of the time, getting dropped quicker was entirely do to who was riding that day. There are some really fast people out there. The other 5% (and I am probably being very generous with that number) depends on how I am feeling that day.

For me, it has never been about the bike. Armstrong was absolutely correct.

iab

Sure. Out of the millions of videos posted to the internet, I got it completely wrong. Everyone knows that these guys purposely act like a Fred and the bike matters. My bad. Next time, I will accept every video posted in the interwebz is clever and witty.

To quote you, "sheesh".

seypat

I thought the video was spot on with the message I got from it. The clips were a bit harder to get into but just as effective. The old bike as it was set up back in the day would still hold its own except for the limited(which could be changed) gearing on the hill. I actually thought the hill scene might have been a tribute to the past and how strong the riders were back then. The summary was good. If all out performance was more important, he would opt for the modern shifters, pedals and helmet. But, if he was out to have fun and enjoy himself, he would opt for the old ride. Who knows, maybe when he gets the retro bike and changes the gears and maybe pedals, and wears his modern helmet, the retro becomes his main ride.

repechage

It is all an elaborate set up for a reasonable excuse on the next group ride where he gets dropped. "It's the bike, it's holding me back"

dddd

The idea that the old bike "would hold it's own" is flawed when we're talking about a competitive situation, where riders test each other.

It only takes a very small difference in weight or in the ease of shifting to put one rider at an (albeit very small) disadvantage in terms of needed effort (watts) which the now-slower rider cannot maintain.
When two riders go at it, head-to-head, they are seen to be equal for a time, but as one rider exceeds their sustainable effort threshold by even the slightest amount, the body (muscles) suddenly becomes grossly-inefficient in terms of oxygen usage and the ever-so-slightly "slower" rider suddenly must cease their effort in order to recover, their challenge at out-climbing the other rider having dramatically failed as a huge gap suddenly appears and the slower rider is dropped for good.

And this is just what happens on a typical fast training ride, and although such limits might not reached until late in the ride, the slightly heavier, slower-shifting bike can bring this "sad" fate on at some point. Sometimes the only hope for the slightly-disadvantaged rider is that the ride isn't long enough for the rider to get dropped.

I believe that even a couple of pounds less weight and the ability to shift instantly, under power across a wide spread of closely-spaced cogs, are advantages that can be easily noticed over the course of a few rides among familiar competitors, not that one's personal health, fitness and general physical variability doesn't also play a big role in terms of being able to hang with close competition.

And certainly it is also better to have a shoe that maintains it's exact shape under various levels of pedal force, if only to maintain one's seat-height requirement but also to spare one's foot from stress and not absorb power through flexing.

repechage

Yes, but when one stays with the group on an old steel bike... It messes with the carbon riders minds.

seypat

The seriousness on some of these threads never ceases to amaze me! Let me rephrase my reply:


I thought the video was spot on with the message I got from it. The clips were a bit harder to get into but just as effective. The old bike as it was set up back in the day will be a little slower because of the heavier weight, DT shifters and limited(which could be changed) gearing on the hill. I actually thought the hill scene might have been a tribute to the past and how strong the riders were back then. The summary was good. If all out performance was more important, he would opt for the modern shifters, pedals and helmet. But, if he was out to have fun and enjoy himself, or riding in the saddle all day he would opt for the old ride. To him, the old one was comfortable, a blast to ride and he liked the riding position. Who knows, maybe when he gets the retro bike and changes the gears and maybe pedals, and wears his modern helmet, the retro becomes his main ride.

His summary is just about the same reason I ride C & V. The bikes are heavier, but so is that 10-15lb gut I carry. If I were racing, then I would probably have a modern bike for that. And the gut would have to go. But I'm not and the old bikes work for me. That is what I think he is saying in the video. I think he does a very good job of communicating those points.

dddd

I should have also said that the old bikes are particularly good for some of the less-challenging group/training rides, such that I can choose to ride the heaviest bike that I anticipate will allow me to hang with the group/ride that I am heading to, taking into account not only the course and riders but also my own physical preparedness and whether I might want to do a longer/harder ride on the subsequent day.

This spares the more precious/rare/expensive bikes from unwanted wear, so the "better" bikes are preserved and ready for more challenging rides in the future, and of course also nets the highest level of training-effort-benefit for any given ride.

I don't think that the steel bike being ridden well "messes with the carbon rider's minds" any more than any other mis-estimation of an unfamiliar, strong rider's abilities based on a first, visual sizing-up of the "new" rider, but the steel bike does elicit a range of mostly positive comments on the rider's ability, some of which are quite amusing! It gets even better when two riders on old bikes pull ahead on a climb.

As for the video, yes, well done imo. The viewer was informed early on that the rider was on another rider's bike, with all that this implies.

lostarchitect 

Italuminium

hey, it's journalism. The story has to be exaggerated. Nobody wants to hear that a 52/17 at 23mm tires is just as fast on an old steel racer as it is on the next carbon wunderbike.

And the selling point of classic bikes is the same as with classic cars: use them as sunny sunday conveyances to your nearest espresso outlet to talk nuts and bolts with fellow enthousiasts. Or don't ride at all and do all the talking on a dinky forum somewhere.

iab

This makes the assumption that the riders are equal in their physical ability. My experience shows that is the exception and not the rule. I know everyone who is faster than me. It doesn't matter which bike I ride, they will always be faster than me. Unless I do more training rides where the objective of the training ride is to increase my fitness. I don't understand why it matters how I go about increasing my fitness, with a retro or a new bike, that makes a difference.

While at the professional level, the grouping of fitness level is a lot tighter than the real world. But still in any given race, there are really only 5-10 real contenders to win the race out of the 150 entered. The other 140 have little to no hope of winning no matter what bike they are on.

dddd

Good points. I'm not even equal with myself on any typical 2 different rides!

The pro's are paid and expected to perform nearly at their best at every race, so no indulging in the usual (for us) fun the night before a race.
As well, their food is carefully chosen for them to avoid the sort of "heavy stomach" that might, at the least, prevent a good night's sleep.

But I'm all too aware that when a longer, faster ride presents itself among formidable riders, that I must at least take into consideration what bike I'm on with respect to doing significant "work" at the front, lest I find my muscular composure fading before this fate befalls those around me and ahead of me.

I think that the video perfectly described the dilemma of wanting "tight" gear ratios but having to forego "low" gearing to achieve this on the vintage bike. The very steep hill was realistically too much for the gearing compromise, though of course a lower and wider-spaced stack of cogs could have been installed. And make no mistake, pro riders need somewhat tight gear spacing.