Bike Forums - Introduction of Kilometer Eater

Hi all,

I am a 25 year old marine engineer from the Netherlands. I've been riding bicycles for as long as I can remember. It started off with several BMX bikes. After that I've owned a few mountain bikes, and a few ordinary boring city bikes.

I really love bikes that stand out from the crowd. In Holland you have so many, that you need to decorate the streets a little in my opinion.

Currently I am the proud owner of a Retrovelo Paul. I really love that bike! It´s a really beautiful design and a real head turner. It drives like a charm too. I have Retrovelo for about five years now, I still love it every time I drive it. I ride about a 100 kilometers a week, in any weather.

I am in the process of buying my first folding bike, that's how I ended up here. I have done test drives with several models of the Riese und Muller Birdy and with the Brompton. I'll be doing a test drive with the Riese und Muller Frog too, someday soon.

The Birdy is a little big when folded in, though it drives really really nice. I think the Birdy is not the most convenient bike for me, but definitely the one to go for if excellent driving characteristics are your main consideration. It's a little large to carry on a train on a day to day basis.
The Brompton folds down into a beautiful small packet, but drives a little shaky on bad roads. On flat roads, it's excellent. This is the one to go for if small folding size is your main considering.
But I hope that the bike in between the two, the Frog, fits me well. It's basically the same model as the Birdy, but folds down to just 70% the size of a Birdy. And the design of the bike and all it's components is simply brilliant. I really love the look of the Birdy and the Frog too.

So my main choice for now goes out to the Frog. If it proves to be too small, I'll go for the Brompton. I think the Brompton looks a bit traditional, but I think I'll just buy one in orange with titanium or something.

I dream of having a fully enclosed recumbent bike. I'd love to drive 60 km/h on a flat road. I love high tech bikes too, for example like the Biomega Copenhagen with the cardan drive shaft.