Originally Posted by PaulRivers

I had hoped this thread would just be informative for all the people (and every summer there's several) who start a thread asking "how can I put a bike rack on a bike without rack mounts?". I've done the research myself, and I figured it would help other people.

But since this thread has had a lot of the "Like OMG, I can't believe you're wearing that!" type replies, I'm going to try to clear them up. Then people will probably continue to post without the thread and ask 5 more times "Why would you put a rack on a lighweight bike", but hey, what can you do.

- Why would you put a rack on a lightweight bike?
Because WE DIDN'T BUY THE BIKE BECAUSE IT WAS LIGHTWEIGHT.

We bought it because it was comfortable. You could add 5 lbs to my bike - it's not going to make a difference. But my bike rides really, really, really smoothly over anything. I ride it over crushed limestone trail, over sidewalks (for a stretch), off curbs - there is 0% pain or discomfort for anything smaller than a curb.

Also, we bought it because it was fast. The speed difference between a $1500 bike and a $3000 bike? Negligible. Nothing. Zippo for us. The speed difference between a $500 bike and a $1500 bike? Noticeable. The difference between a fat tired "commuter" with a front shock, and our bike? Very noticeable. The thing is, we could be just as fast on a cheaper bike, but we could *not* be as fast and as comfortable at the same time. At least, I didn't find anything that would do that.

And we want something FUN TO RIDE! Those other 2 things help a lot with this. :-) But also, the bike fits well, handles well, leaves you feeling great after a ride.

So now that we've got this great bike, that's fast, comfortable, and fun to ride, you come along and and try to tell us we shouldn't ride it. That we should treat our bike like our grandmother treats her fine china where it sits in a case in the corner until that once time of the year that's a special occassion and gingerly eat off it, trying not to break it. Hell no!

We've got this great bike, and we're going to use it for everything we possibly can! We're cruising across town on it. We're doing a 100 mile ride on it. We're riding it 2 blocks to our neighbors. We're commuting to work on it. We're riding to the grocery store on it.

But we can't actually do half the stuff with that, for one reason. The bike doesn't have a rack to carry stuff. And you're trying to say we should spend hundreds of dollars on a second, crappy bike that we won't enjoy riding rather than putting a rack on the great bike we already own? That we should buy a crappy "beater" bike for commuting to work and spend 75% of our riding time on it, and end up only spending 25% of our biking time on the bike we actually like, like it's some sort luxury item that's to be thought about but not ridden? That we should deal with buying and storing an entire 2nd bike because adding a 1.5 pound rack on the back of our best bike is to much weight??? Can you be serious? Or what, because the serious, bib wearing, watch-my-diet-for-racing crowd thinks it doesn't "look cool" to have anything that's actually useful on a carbon frame?

Heck no! We didn't spend a couple of thousand dollars, 3 months of searching and test riding, 5 trips back to the store to pick up the bike and do the fitting, and 2 months of waiting to get a bike that's going to sit in the garage all the time. We're not going to let someone else's idea of "what's appropriate" to do with a racing bike (You should only race it! You shouldn't carry anything on it!) slow us down from enjoying it. We're not going to buy a 2nd "touring" bike so someone doesn't say "do you really need such a light bike to do touring with?". We're not going to let the fact that sometimes we carry a lot of stuff stop us from enjoying the speed of the bike when we're not carrying stuff. We're not going to buy several mediocre bikes, or spend thousands and thousands of dollars on extra good bikes just because someone doesn't think it's "appropriate" to pick up a half gallon of milk and a box of cereal on a carbon racing bike. We're not going to be afraid to go out biking when the weather looks iffy because we have no way to carry a rain jacket. And we're not going to drive across town when we could bike just because we don't want to wear road clipless shoes into a restaurant.

Heck no! We spend all this time, money and effort to get a bike that's fast AND comfortable AND fun. We're not going to let a 1.5 pound bike rack stop us from getting out there and enjoying biking! :-)