Originally Posted by
njkayaker
The lines between bicycle types are fuzzy. It appears that, now, "classic" hybrids are "tamer" than mountain bikes for more casual riders. And that "performance hybrids" like the Quick are more for less casual riders who (for some reason) need or want a more upright position than a road bike or don't like dropped bars. (Note that the default position of the Quick is less upright than the Anventure.)
And the line between a hard tail MTB and "hybrid" can be non-existent. I know a guy who built up one of the old hard tail Kona Hei Hei's as a 17lb singlespeed - with off road tyres. So you certainly can't say the difference is weight. (The bike I most want in the world is a 17" Hei Hei with pre suspension adjusted geometry - I'll then fit it with Sala Bell Lap drops, Campag road shifters, and Rubino Pro slicks, a Nexus hub and JTEK shifter. Big fat cost aside, pre-suspension Hei Heis are very rare, so I'll probably never get to do this! I am building up a cromo Lava Dome with the same geometry as a derailered 26 drop handle bike.)
Reviews are very enthusiastic. The geometry is very close to a classic Kona Hei Hei or Lava Dome, btw.
The 7.x FX series looks OK to me and appears to be very similar to the Quick line.
I think the lower end 7 series are the default safe to buy, easy to find bike.
A bike with drops isn't faster unless you ride in the drops, which most people appear to do only occasionally.
Indeed. Possibly because today's race bikes are over-demanding on average body types, making the drops much less usable.
But a more-skillful rider is hopefully going to make this occurance [hitting a pot hole while evading a truck] a rare one!
Certainly. Cycling isn't dangerous enough to that your primary focus in buying a bike should be safety. However, most riders - even people who have spent $3000 on a road bike - have very poor skills, and even fewer understand the performance characteristics of the bikes they ride. (A good example would be that so many people can't manage a decent emergency braking manouver, as Sheldon Brown said.)
Still, if a friend of mine was going to start riding in NY or London with no previous experience, I'd recommend a flat barbike with fast but wide tyres (and wide tyres can be very fast, if you're willing to pay for that much low hysteresis rubber).
I think the a suspension fork on a hybrid appeals to people who think that it will make the bike more comfortable.
They're pure marketing and to be despised for that reason. I understand the Cannondales with sus-forks do ride well. I still hate them for adding an expensive unnecessary component just to sell the bike - a totally rigid bike could give the same quality ride for much less.