RobbieTunes

OK, I've read the article. That dude would be pretty comfortable on L'Ombra. I think rhm's Fathergill is as cool as Heine's Rene Herse.
The guys on C&V at the Dare and Bartali and L'Ombra are easily having as good a time as can be had, on freewheel and friction.
I always wondered if that kind of stuff catches on, will it get so popular that it's no longer fun?

Having met a multiple winner of the Tour Divide (the guy from the documentary), I can say that he's not about the bike; if it rolls it works.
He basically won his Tours because he knew what to do, where to go, and how to get there; equal parts capable rider, savvy traveler and enjoyer of the trip.
Seriously, do the intense hammering guys stop to put coffee grounds on a Sarah Lee cherry pie and savor it? Chris would ride a Trek 820 any day, and like it.

I figure sooner or later, most of us have the light-bulb moment. We turn to N+maybe-if-it-works-better. Pure collecting is a bit different.

Our C&V cheap niche bikes have yet to really give up much to the latest greatest gotta have-a new thing 'cause I don't want to fall behind.
If the gap were far greater, perhaps we'd be a bit less smug. Perhaps if we were all younger, but some of the biggest C&V fans I know are young.
Don't get me wrong, I think it's probably just as much fun to play in that sandbox, too. For me it would be like sub-Christmas, over and over.

I have a friend, started on a Trek 330 Elance. He's had the best bikes you can get in his home shop, ridden, re-sold, parted out, etc.
Carbon wheels, 2x11 SRAM Red, DA9000, Di2, and bikes from Dogma to R5 to Propel to Altimura, Madone 7's, and an SL4 Tarmac.
Tonight, I'll be pulling the 2x6 group off of his "new" Trek 400 Elance so he can mount 2x10 DT shifters on it. I just have the BB tool.
He's coming around. He'll always have modern bikes, but the light bulb is coming on.
He still gets a little ticked, less self-confident when someone at the Road Forum says his bike is obsolete.
He is starting to laugh about it, though. Bikes are fun again.

When I was younger, and a bit smarter, I had 4 Ironman bikes, to the exclusion of other bikes at the time. They were not expensive.
Some guy at a charity ride asked me why I rode an old steel bike, and I honestly answered that it was about all I could handle.
To think I made my point and didn't know it, well, that's funny.

What keeps me on older, simpler (relatively) bikes, and coming back to them even when I deviate, is not the technology, or lack of it.
The familiarity is so much easier to deal with, and the challenges are less if you know someone, somewhere, has fixed that a thousand times already.

The people that hover around C&V ice that particular cake. That is not an understatement, or any attempt to slap backs here. It's fact.
I've run competitively and hung out with people who rode the same way, or swam, or all three. OK while I was in it, but embarrassing to look back on.
I just did perhaps my last triathlon. The conversation afterwards was almost unbearable. I don't care what someone's VO2 max is, or their mileage, anymore.
Charity rides are often a lower rung on the same ladder, but what's nicer is that many of the folks don't have a clue about their bike, and don't care. They ride.
It's fun to assemble at rest stops with people you don't know and decide who's going to do the next leg together, just because we're all the same slow.
Now, if I could just get those strangers onto some of these cooler old bikes and let them realize it's just as easy, but more fun, somehow.

I've not done 100 charity-type rides yet, maybe 60-65. I've had more fun at Bartali and L'Ombra, and the Dairyland Dare than the rest, combined.
It's the people, of course, but underneath that is "it's an old bike; relax, have fun." Now, to package that, and offer it up to the unenlightened....

Nice timing on this thread, as I'm collecting bike stuff for a swap meet in Richmond. Keeping the tubulars, selling the Garmin mounts.
Thinking about "reducing" a 2x10 Campy setup to 2x7 Suntour. The bike would look just as good, and I might like it more. You never know.

I constantly look at other people's bikes while I ride. My glance stays a little longer on older bikes, and I watch them work.

Once you've followed a Di2 for about 2 miles, it's just another bunch of cogs and fairly ugly cranksets.
Bike tech will be around, but I think it was more embraceable when it was more like what everyone else was riding.
The differences now, driven by consumerism, are more mental work than I want to do.

The article was a good read.