robncircus

It's funny to think that at the turn of the 20th century cycling was the biggest and most popular sport in the US. Throughout the century popularity declined and things like baseball, basketball, and football took over (I do like football though). With the current trend in fixed gear culture, cycling seems to be coming back more popular than ever. Sure Lance helped too but the reality is it's still not cool to wear spandex in HS so fixies winout. Does anyone think we may see a cycling revival? Can you tell it's a slow day at work?

Thanks for your thoughts.

Rob

cuski

Whatever it is you're smoking, it must be good.

gsteinb

urapissah

ScarcelyAware

Though I'm all for this 'revival' for the love of cycling, I wish it wouldn't be through the fixed-gear culture. No beef against fixies, just some of the hipsters who ride them.

roccobike

From what I can see, the Fixie craze is has settled down. They still get listed on CL around here, but the prices have dropped dramatically. (Sold mine just in time)
I do believe cycling is on the rise. I monitor the prices of used bikes on CL around here. They are at an all time high, especially road bikes and mountain bikes. That tells me folks want to get into cycling and are looking for those bargains.

TVS_SS

hmm.. i guess im out of the loop, seems like cycling has been more or less constant in popularity for the past 10 years or so..

patentcad

fixed gear culture

oxymoron

AEO

if you get rid of the bad reputation FG culture has, then probably.


If one wanted to revive cycling culture in the US, you'd implement convenient mass transportation and add a steep fuel tax.

patentcad

convenient mass transportation

oxymoron



add a steep fuel tax


This will spur the development of plug-in hybrids and electric cars, not bicycling.

grolby

Fixed-gear riding is not a sport anymore than riding a mountain bike on the bike path is. Most of those kids have no interest in bicycle racing, if they even have any real knowledge of it. That's not a criticism, it just is. Participation in basketball, baseball, etc is always playing a sport. Bicycles aren't like that. Most of these kids are just riding bikes. Nothing wrong with that.

That said, there may be some marginal benefit, as people realize that bicycle riding is fun, and look for ways to get out their competitive urges that aren't alleycats or bike polo.

AEO

ok then, the only way to revive cycling cuture in the US is to sell off states that have poor cycling demographics.

caloso

I doubt it. As far as I can tell, the hipsters have moved from crappy fixed gear bikes to crappy mopeds.

Walter

I'm old enough to have been a young participant in the '70s boom and the OP has got me thinking.

I agree that Armstrong has created a new interest in roadbikes (I'll lump fixies into that category) but most roadies seem to be into "training" and "group rides" if not actually racing. Outside of the fixie riders you don't see much of the spontaneous riding just to ride groups that I recall from back in the day.

That may because back in the day we knew very little about the sport. This was before LeMond much less Armstrong so for alot of people I hung out with "racing" was 200 yard or so sprints on the service road at Haulover Beach in Miami with a few bucks for the winner. When we saw a guy wearing "kit" we thought he was pretty weird and would "race" him for his gloves or something.

In a way these "alleycat" races seem to be alot like that. Fun, semi-organized at best and maybe a bit rebellious all at the same time.

I like the organized sport an awful lot but if something more spontaneous popped up with the current generation of kids I'd try to go have some fun and lose a few dollars.

Not at Haulover though. Some time ago that part of the beach became an unofficial nude beach for rather unappealing Canadians. Can't race in that environment.

grolby

Honestly, one of my theories* about why messengers got annoyed by others "co-opting" their culture and showing up to alleycats is that the roadies with track bikes starting showing up and cleaning up.

My point being that spontaneity is great, but that scene is kind of like road racing in the U.S. before the Raleigh Boys: slow.

*Made up on the spot, so take that as you will

Walter

Agreed. I remember when those "roadies" in "kit" (terms which would've been meaningless back in 1977) would tell us that our sprints weren't racing and instead why don't we hit the road and go down to Coconut Grove where "they really raced" we'd tell him he was crazy.

My larger point was that we, or at least I, don't see much on the road except roadies who are at least trying to be serious (myself included) or people on cruisers/hybrids. No kids trying to do something different with their bikes.

c0lnago

Butt crack is going in the wrong direction.

robncircus

While I have no stats to back up my theory I'm willing to bet there is more track racing happening now than in the last 15 years or so. I know a lot of "fixie" riders tacking a stab at track.

Rob

nazzo

Have a run in with the the 'moped army' hipster-*******s, eh?



What sort of cycling culture do you want to have be revived?

mmmdonuts

Build velodromes and allow betting. That will revive it.

caloso

Nah. They seemed perfectly nice, it's just that their machines were loud and smoky (like untuned chainsaws). I thought I'd try to catch a draft from the moto-peloton but had to give up after a block. I was coughing too hard to stay on their wheels.

cyclefreaksix

I'm for just about anything that puts more bikes on the road. I don't care if it's Fixies, BMX, cruisers, whatever.

Incidentally, some of those Fixed Gear riders will return to the sport. It will be years down the line and I'm thinking that they will probably be riding road bikes.

How many of us started riding and fell in love with riding on a BMX bike?

chipcom 

Fixie culture my ass. The popularity of cycling is being driven by them cheap hybrids and wally-world bikes.

Loose Chain

Americans are too large to ride bicycles and getting larger. I think bike prices are up somewhat on lower end used bikes (less than 250 dollars) because so many people are trying to save money on fuel or are out of work etc. People who are interested in bicycles for transportation often are not interested in the sporting aspects of cycling. I do remember the "tend speed" boom of the 70s and the "English Racer" boom of the 50s and 60s (OK, I read about it).

Some kids on fixies will migrate to road bikes probably at a slightly greater rate than do the BMXer kids, which is pretty low.

I have no idea nor have I ever seen a good explanation for why the turn of the century (19-20) fascination with bicycles and bike racing died out in the USA. Perhaps because unlike in Europe, within a few years most Americans had cars and that the car culture here just exploded and enveloped cycling.

Laws requiring roads to have bike lanes, bike paths (multi-use) would help a lot, only a few of us have the stomach for doing battle with 5,000 pounds of steel on twenty pounds of biicycle.

roccobike

+1, Must be true, all those hybrids racing on those rails to trails is getting a lot of attention.

AEO

Japan and Western Europe invested in nationwide rail, US invested in interstate highways.
owning a car in Japan and Western Europe is more expensive than US.

now Japan and W. Europe have an amazing rail system allowing multi modal transportation with bike and train, the roads aren't as wide or extensive as US. US you can get everywhere with your car with it's extensive road network that allows a lot of car traffic, but train service is lacking.

there's also the consideration of how far you live from work and how dispersed US is compared to Japan and Western European countries.

suburbs, living far away from work. Cities, not designed for 21st century traffic volume. etc.