I live in the Midwest (bear with me here) and my parents bought a small place in the mountains of Washington near the Canadian border. A few years back, I decided to go visit them and I mailed my $3500 completely custom Cannondale Super-V to them a week ahead of time so it would be there when I got there.

Well, I arrived a week later and my bike hadn't made it there yet. I waited 3 days and finally it showed up at the foot of their mountian driveway in a beat-up box that brought a tear to my eye. There were dents in the frame, the headshock was somehow knocked out of the frame, and you can imagine how the wheels fared.

I was all excited about riding and now I was crushed. My dad went up to his house and got out his Huffy mountain bike, air'd up the tires, and said "C'mon, get in the Bronco".

He drove me up to the very top of a mountain road and dumped me off to ride down it while he followed me down. Ya know at one point he clocked me at over 55mph on that poor little old Huffy. I will remember that ride for the rest of my life. What a thrill to get a bike like that up to 55-60 mph. My adrenaline was pumping for more reasons than one. (thinking about mechanical failure hehe)

My point is that I don't remember too many rides that I did on my Cannondale. All the trails that I took it on kinda meld together. The one trip I did on this Huffy will be forever burned into my happy memories. My dad went out of his way to put his bike in danger (he knows how hard I am on bikes) just so I could experience a thrill flying down a mountain road.

This guy is obviously just going to ride the bike on paths and light trails. The Mongoose given to him by his girlfriend will be adequate. (I would get it checked by a shop to make sure everything's tight, though) Props to your girlfriend for supporting your involvement in such a wonderful sport.