Many of the experienced bike messengers in Houston prefer mountain bikes. They find that with light weight slick tires, a mountain bike is about as fast as a road bike for the one, two or three mile trips they are taking. And, if a mountain bike is properly fitted to the rider, the looong wheelbase soaks up road shock and makes for a stable ride no matter how terrible the road conditions...gravel, dirt, debris, rain, ice...

But, unlike road bikes, mountain bikes can handle the broken concrete, potholes and other problems that exist on the bombed out streets of inner city Houston. The guy on the road bike must go around those obstacles, or even avoid certain streets entirely. The guy on the mountain bike can ride in a straight line from "A" to "B", no matter how bad the streets are in between.

I had a regular twenty mile circuit that I was riding four or five times a week. My times on a mountain bike were more or less the same as on a road bike. The only days I regretted being on the mountain bike were days I was riding into a powerful headwind...a mountain bike makes a little harder to stay in an aero position for long periods of time.