SurlyLaika

So my bike is something of a heifer. I think it weighs about 27lbs. I recently took off my Brooks Flyer for a little proofide maintenance for the first time since I got it and I realized how heavy it is compared to my synthetic saddles. That got me thinking about where I could shed some weight. I could shave about 50 grams off the seat-post for about $70 and the Brooks B17 instead of the sprung Flyer could take off 170 grams, but is it worth it? What difference does having a lighter bike make? I've heard that it makes a difference when climbing hills, when accelerating from a stop and I would think it would reduce rolling resistance. OTOH, would a heavier bike act like a flywheel and keep on rolling and rolling good once it got going?

Instead of taking mere grams of your bike, [B]wouldn't losing 5lbs or roughly 2,250 grams,[B/] losing fat and gaining muscle mass make more of a difference in your speed?

Personally, I stand to lose 20 lbs at 174 and 5'11. What's your opinion? If you watch your own weight carefully, why and how do you do it? I want to lose weight, not only for appearance's sake, but I also want to be a stronger, faster rider with more stamina and endurance. IMO, maintaining and building your own athlete's body is a more cost-effective way of improving your speed and bike handling skills. Maybe I'm just missing something about the benefits of being a weight weenie. I totally understand if you're into competitive events, but as a commuter, maybe the costs outweigh the benefits. This a classic indian or the arrow argument. Begin!

vuduchyld5

I don't really see what there would be to argue about? There is no difference- Your weight+ bike weight+ clothing/gear = total weight. You already stated some of the reasons why a lighter bike is more efficient...And if you want to lose weight- RIDE the $%&* outta your bike and have a healthy diet, simply put. Only difference would be..The leaner and more fit YOU are the more you will be likely to ride and the better you will perform. Right?

SurlyLaika

I guess what I'm saying is the 50 grams taken off the bike by buying a carbon seat post for $70 seems like nothing compared to a single lb of dead weight on your own body. I know being lighter is better, in general. I meant to ask what is the most efficient way to shave weight and get faster, though. If you have the money to drop on carbon or titanium, by all means...but I personally don't have that kind of money and I just like some of my heavier components. No need to argue, I just want to hear different opinions on the topic. For you, it just seems to be a closed subject.


Edit: Does anyone own the Time Crunched Cyclist? Is it worth buying?

vuduchyld5

Nah- I didn't mean to come off like that, sorry if I did. I think the "weight weenie" stuff applies mainly to serious racers and just plain compulsive folks who like to giggle as they lift their bikes with their pinky fingers in front of their friends (guilty) :-b. But seriously- I think you already know the answer to your own question..It is obviously better for the rider to be fit and at the proper weight. I have seen a pretty drastic change in my weight since I got serious about this sport and it feels great. Taking a little time to research the right diet and nutrition is also key, no doubt. But I would think for now, if losing weight is your MO then you would want a heavier bike because it would work you harder therefore burning off more calories. Am I wrong?

SeñorPantalones

this is really simple.

stop eating bread and sugars. even beer.

you'll lose 15-20 lbs faster than you ever realized. your time on hills will improve by minutes, not seconds, and you'll feel better than having spent $70 on a seat. you'll feel more energized at the end of the ride and healthier overall.

weight is not the only reason people buy carbon -- it's a great material for riding. but there are people who buy it for the weight benefit while ignoring their own fat ass, and they are only fooling themselves.

my commuter bike weighs about 22. i try to keep the weight down, but i know every extra dollar i spend in doing so will transform into tears of regret when some dumb**** smashes his huffy into my derailleur on caltrain. it's more important to keep your own weight optimal, for more than just cycling.

Antaresia

pfft, my beater is over 40lbs fully loaded.

My new bike is 10 pounds lighter, and it doesn't matter one little bit to me. It has more "go", mostly due to geometry and better tires, but really. I still enjoy riding my mixte just as much, and if anything my lighter bike is making me go soft. I'll be huffing up a hill now and think "why am I in the easiest gear out of 27? I used to do this with only 5 gears and 10 extra pounds!" and I don't even seem to go any faster.

Don't sweat the weight. Riding a heavier bike makes you hard-core, you push yourself more.

SurlyLaika

I don't drink too often, but when I do, I do. I tried watching my diet and avoiding carbs and sugars last week for a day. I was dying by the end of the day. It's an addiction. I don't think I'm seriously overweight but I know I could afford to lose some weight...and I thought I'd lose it on tour. Nope, haha...exactly the same, give or take a lb. I think the only way is the gym. I lost 40 lbs over 4 months about 3 years ago on the elliptical machines--cardio that saves your knees. I will buy a nice carbon seat post when I can afford it. I'm not against that. I know good stuff lasts and performs well and is used every day so it's a good value, but I just can't afford it at this point.

SurlyLaika

geesh, yea...I need to get myself a beater. I'm going to start volunteering at the bike kitchen here in LA. Maybe I'll take on a project frame there and throw on all the spare parts I've accumulated. What is your new bike, btw? I think 30lbs is the highest I'd be happy with my bike being. It goes fast enough for me. I know I can push it to go faster. It just takes more out of me.

SurlyLaika

Yea, I definitely want to be a better rider. I need to get into some training and nutrition. I'll probably go visit that forum sometime. I know where I stand on the question. I just want to know others' motivations for keeping the bike's weight low and how far they would go to do that. I know a good portion of the commuting forum crowd likes steel as a frame material and I knoww that isn't the lightest material, but weight could be reduced on other parts of the bike.

azesty

I own a cheap Giant mountain bike, with heavy non-functioning shock forks, though I am about to change them. I have fenders, rear rack, two heavy locks and a Brooks saddle. I carry a fairly hefty toolkit. All up it is a heavy setup.

I do 24 km per day, 5 days a week, averaging 29 to 32 kmph (18 - 20 mph) on my 12 km rides.

Having such a heavy bike makes me work harder. However I dont seem to lose much weight, I just eat more. I have, being a teacher, frequent holidays, where I dont cut back on eating, so put on the weight. When I get back down to normal, it is time for holidays again!

Still, I like riding, no matter what the weather (no snow here really).

z

Rion

if you wanna lose weight, wouldn't a heavy bike be better? I'm a clydes and when I'm not commuting I'm spinning up hills with my 50lbs bike.

Azesty: losing weight has a lot more to do with diet than exercise. cycling for 15 minutes burns anywhere between 200-600 calories. to put it into perspective, 4 oreos have 220cals. and a bag of chips could easily have 600cals. Meaning that it's much easier to watch what you eat than it is to work it off with exercise.

tarwheel 

I've lost about 30 lbs since last December and it has definitely made me faster. However, the speed difference has not been as big as I would have imagined, so I cannot believe that shaving a few ounces here and there makes much difference at all. That said, I just swapped all of the parts from my Bob Jackson touring frame to a Waterford sport touring frame with lighter wheels, consciously trying to reduce the weight, and my average commute speeds are about 1 mph faster. The biggest contributor to the faster speed, I suspect, are the wheels. My touring bike had 36-spoke Velocity Dyads and my sport tourer has 32H Open Pros.

tjspiel

If we're just talking about weight, then it's better to take it off the bike assuming the bike has no suspension. It's the whole "sprung vs. unsprung" thing. People will argue that it doesn't make a difference at the weights we're talking about but that's a different debate.

Of course a stronger rider is going to make more difference than losing a few grams no matter where the grams comes from.

Then too, it's not an either/or proposition. You can both lighten the bike and lighten the rider. One advantage of lightening the bike is that it will typically stay lighter. The rider ?

FunkyStickman

Losing weight is much better than getting a lighter bike. Is there a difference? Yes, but unless you are at your body's optimum weight, a lighter bike is still going to be slower than you could possibly go.

Plus, it's fun to go on group rides with a 35# heiffer bike and crush people's souls.

Steely Dan

taking weight out of the wheels will help them spin up faster allowing for faster acceleration. something to consider for the stop n' go urban commuter interested in making good time.

colleen c

Shaving off 170 gram swapping seat and 50gram off the seat post ain't gonna do much. Experiment by trying to see if there is any difference riding with a full bottle of water or 1/2 empty.

I strongly believe you gain better efficiency from losing lbs through excercise from your body than off your bike. When you lose those lbs, you make you lungs process oxygen better, your heart strengthen and is more efficient. If you drop 10lbs off your bike, you only loss 10lbs of weight but does little to your body. If you drop 10lbs from your body, you gain better cadio stanima.

I used to be very overweight. I was well over 200 lbs, I cannot ride anywhere even if my bike was 18lbs. I would be short of breathe by the second block. When I lost over 50 lbs, I can ride my commuter bike fully loaded at 45+ lbs with ease.

Lose the weight off yourself first, afterwards any weight shed off the bike make a bigger difference.

Mithrandir

Personally for me, I don't care how heavy my bike is. I have a long way to go with myself first. To put it another way:

I'll start taking weight off of my bike when I can no longer take weight off of myself.

idc

A lighter bike
- is easier to climb on
- is easier to lift to put on racks, walk up stairs with, etc.
- has a higher centre of gravity (once you're on it)

Personally I would like a lighter commuter so that when I add all the lights/accessories and my winter clothes, it won't be 40 lbs. My wet/winter commuter is a 30 lbs MTB with front shocks.

pdlamb

My bike's heavy. But I need to lose TWO bike weights!

OTOH, I can take 8-10 pounds of total weight off with judicious (or is that injudicious?) application of a credit card.

Maybe I'll go for a lighter bike when I'm a lighter rider on top of it.

SurlyLaika

Running is much more effective at burning calories than bicycling. I just know that 90 minutes a day on the elliptical cardio machines at the gym helped me drop weight like a bad habit whereas 6, 7, sometimes 8 hours a day on tour, hauling 50 lbs of junk up hills did nothing for me. Then again, I was eating a lot to keep up my energy and probably more than I needed. So yes, diet is important but other forms of exercise are probably more effective for weight loss. Besides, I read that bicyclists are more prone to bone loss (deossification) than people who mix up their exercise routine. The idea is that biking is a low impact exercise, thereby letting your bones deteriorate over time. That was the gist of the article. I'm not a scientist so don't quote me! Of course, bike commuters probably get more physical activity than your average cager. =]

SurlyLaika

That's my sentiment exactly.
Why fret over 100 extra grams on a component when one lb of my fatness could save 2,250 grams. If I were as fit as can be, the bike would be next but for now, I'll just worry about my own body weight. That being said, if I do upgrade a component for better performance, it would certainly be lighter, too.

SurlyLaika

I made my 7 grain cereal (a kind of oatmeal) with half the brown sugar as usual. Tastes like gruel. Yum. -_-

SeñorPantalones

+1.

the whole "i ride a 35 lb bike and get stronger, that's how i'll lose weight" is false logic. you will continually optimize your body to lug itself and your 35 lb bike around. no amount of accessories or weight shed on the bike is going to make as much impact as getting the parasitic weight off your own body.

jeffpoulin

Shaving 200 grams off a few components is minuscule. A full water bottle weighs about 3 times that much. Save weight by not carrying water.

Seriously, though, it's easy (but expensive) to cut weight on a bike. It's harder (but less expensive) to cut weight on your body. When all is said and done, which one would be more satisfying to you? If you like both options, well, you can do that too.

Kojak

Pretty much what Steely Dan here is the heart of the issue. Lighter wheel/tire combinations mean more to "performance" than weight anywhere else.

However, depending on the weight and skill of the rider, this may be a dubious place to start shaving weight. Lightweight wheelsets need to be ridden "lightly". That's not to say that you need to be 150lbs. or less, but the skill to ride a bike without pounding through potholes or running over bumps and curbs. When I first started riding a fairly nice bike (about 20 years ago now), I destroyed the rims because I didn't know how to ride, or more accurately, I didn't know how to ride a nice road bike. My previous experience had been on a Schwinn Varsity and a very heavy Nishiki. Both bikes could be ridden/pounded without concern. Point being, unless I'm an experienced rider with a deft touch on the saddle, this is not where I start shaving pounds.

Where I think a lighter bike matters is purely in the enjoyment factor; a 20lb. bike will feel much more lively than a 27 lb. bike, even picking it up to go riding somehow feels better. Something that is more enjoyable is something that a person is more likely to stick with for the long haul. If one continues to ride their bike regularly, the body weight is going to take care of itself.