tg16

I was at a Tango once and someone said, "So many dances, I wish I could dance them all." I think we could replace dances and dance with bikes and ride.

All 3 of my bikes have Campy but only one came with it and that was the beginning of my love affair with Campagnolo components. That said, my fascination, fantasies and eyes roam to frames and wheels. So many frames! Like my daughters dressing up their dolls, I love taking a bare frame and dressing it up with components. Cranksets, cassettes, derailleurs are like silk stockings and split sheath skirts on a beautiful woman. The finishing touches are stiletto shoes and jewelry in the form of pedals and cables. Don't forget wheels that are akin to a beautiful pair of legs.

Yes, a beautiful frame can catch the eye and bring out the artist that resides within. Riding, encompasses science, art and emotion. Forget that my signature is illegible and stick figures are a challenge. My repair stand is an easel and doorway to unlimited possibilities. With frame and components, I am able to transcend those limitations.

Afterwards, I can mount that creation and ride. I feel the wind, my heart beating and my muscles contracting and find peace, serenity and discipline in the ride.

Gerryattrick

So you dress your bike like a woman and mount it !

There must be a specific forum for that sort of thing.

badger1

D'you smoke a cigarette after each ride?

tg16

I don't smoke, so I just roll over and go to sleep.

tg16

They sent me here.

badger1

That's the spirit!

badger1

... thread's got me thinking about a pastiche I wrote a year or two back ... sort of puts me in mind of the anti-expensive faction on BF. Tune is Lorde's Royals (convenient link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LFasFq4GJYM).


I’ve never seen a Cervelo in the flesh,
I cut my teeth on mtbs … in the ‘Shore films
And I’m not proud of my souplesse,
On a banged-up bike, no Rapha envy

But every song’s like Tarmac, Venge, disc brakes on your road bike,
Assos, shaved legs, dope in the hotel room,
We don’t care, we’re riding Surlys in our dreams.
But everybody’s like Garmin, Strava, meters in your crankset,
Carbon, aero, wattage that you output,
We don’t care, we aren’t caught up in your love affair.

And we’ll never meet the Rules (rules)
It don’t run in our blood,
That kind of luxe just ain’t for us,
We crave a different kind of buzz.
Let me be your rouleur (rouleur)
You can call me randonneur
And baby I’ll roule (I’ll roule, I’ll roule, I’ll roule)
Let me live that fantasy.

Gerryattrick

tg16, I thought of this when I read your post. Are you sure you are not Swiss Tony?

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=UxWnQBbIDgQ

badger1

Perfect!
Does a great spiv, doesn't he; up there with Eric Idle.

OldsCOOL

Depends on how fast I ride.

1989Pre 

I think that maybe the most important thing I've learned in this life is the difference between what I want and what I need. I love the fact that I don't have the $5,000 for a Co-Motion Espresso or a Pinarello Dogma 2, because it shows that a "guiding hand' is trying to inform and coach me as to what is important in life, and what is not only unimportant, but detrimental to my progress as a spirit.
Come on! I have a 20 lb bike that I originally spent $319.00 on. In March I'll have had it for 26 years. It's better now than ever. How much is enough?
It ain't the meat, it's the motion.

Maelochs

I hate you totally and utterly.

I have been wrestling with exactly this issue for many months. I had the money and the desire ... the lust, in fact ... for a Chinese carbon bike. I knew (and still know) I didn't and don't need it ... I have so much fun on my 25-lb aluminum bargain bike I really don't need anything more. But ... I finally succumbed to lust, and started buying parts for the new build.

Why couldn't you have posted this a few days ago and saved both my bank account and my soul?

Kindaslow

For discussion, not argument. How is what you are saying any different than someone with a Dogma (convenient choice I might add) saying that enjoying their earnings is what is important in life? And, with that, saying you are totally misguided by this mystery hand...Why earn it if you never spend it, especially on something that "you" are passionate about?

Is it just me, or are the people at the extremes of the price continuum the most extreme in their prejudices toward the other end of the continuum?

StanSeven

I think you're on to something there about people at the extremes. I know I'm at one end of the continuum - as I learn about a new hobby or interest and can see the benefits of the best, I go for it. I don't have many passions but cycling is one. I enjoy cycling more knowing and admiring what I have. I clearly at the opposite end from the recent poster.

Maelochs

If I had the money for a stable of high-end bikes, and much more important the time to enjoy them all, I certainly would. I think the point here is that there is some level of spending beyond which the enjoyment of using (not the enjoyment of owning) fails to keep pace with the price. obviously this is different for everyone, but (for an imaginary example) while I might ride a bike that cost $5000 and feel that it is excellent, I might then ride a bike which costs only $500 and think that it is still a ball to ride.

Did I enjoy the $5000 bike more? Yes ... By Comparison. But since I no longer have that $5K bike but still have the $500 bike, am I enjoying riding just as much? Yes. I hope---Hope--that by building up a Chinese carbon frame I can end up with a bike which has most of the positives of the $5000 bike for less than half the price because that is my current discretionary budget. I bet I will still love my other bikes.

On the other hand, I really don't see where a $10,000 bike could be All that much better than that $5K bike. The 5K bike was super-stiff yet still comfortable, shifted and braked unbelievably well, but didn't make me a better rider. A $10K bike really couldn't shift or brake significantly better (so close to instant that it seems to beat the speed of thought is a tough standard to surpass) and it really couldn't ride a whole lot better.

if that $10K bike had a super-custom paint job and diamond inly and gold plating and sold for $30,000 there would be people who would buy it and love it three times as much as a $10K bike ... but would the joy of use, the actual riding, be significantly better than the $5K bike?

I am into photography as well (another very expensive hobby where people can chase the latest, best, most exorbitantly priced gear forever.) At some point I had to decide that unless a specific piece of kit was going to substantially increase the quality of my photos, I was going to use what I had until it wore out.

Just as i have a multi-thousand=-dollar cycling wish list, I have a multi-thousand-dollar photo gear wish list. However, I know that even if I owned everything on each list I would not be better at either discipline---my real-world results would not be substantially improved.

Yet, if i had the cash, I would buy everything on both wish lists tomorrow. I want it, and logic be damned.

When it gets real is when I have more than one hobby, many responsibilities, long- and short-term necessities, and a limited income. I don't envy the guys with three 1DXs and every L-series lens or the Nikon equivalents. I don't envy the guys with $10K road or mountain bikes, nor the time and cash to go out and use them. it's simply not my life this time around.

That guy who won't buy a Dogma is probably doing math the way I do---how much in actual value of Use, versus value of Ownership, would he get out of that bike versus another? Would he have the time to use it and to develop himself to the fullest potential, or could he have just as much fun in the time and with the cash he has available, riding a slightly cheaper bike and spending that cash elsewhere?

And for me ... I take pride in what I own even if it is old, beat-up, a little dirty ... that gold-plated bike just wouldn't do much for me anyway. I'd prefer to leave it for someone who woulsd love to look at it, know s/he has it in the collection, and also rides it ... or not. Whatever suits each.

Jimbo47

That's what is so nice about this forum.
You can talk all the talk and ride all the rides on an expensive bike or a Walmart special, and nobody will ever know the difference unless you just want everyone to know what you ride.
Even at that nobody really cares to be honest about it!

Kindaslow

Unless....

They are a roadie and you ride a hybrid,

You are riding what they dream about (which makes you a jerk),

You are riding what they dream about, slowly. ( which makes you an ahole),

You are riding what they used to ride (which makes you a loser),

You are riding what they used to ride, but faster than them (which makes you ahole)

You are riding a SS and they are riding a FG ( which makes you a wannabe),

You are riding a SS or FG with MTB bars (which makes you hopelessly lost)

or, or, or....

Jimbo47

That doesn't bother me at all! It's the guy that passes me with his auto and tries to see how close he can get to me while I'm already up against the curb.....All the while he's thinking I'm all the above!

eatontkd

Bingo Jimbo47. Living in a rural area, with lot'sa pickup truck drivin' "Men", I hear ya...

StanSeven

Haha. I ride occassionally in southern Maryland. Once a car kept crowded me into the guard rail. I told someone who's a local and said cyclists are "clay pigeons" to them.

bruce19

This is what I bought for $6,000 when it was 2 yrs. old so I tend to think of a $5,000 bike as expensive.

Kindaslow

I have owned more motorcycles than I can remember, so at some levels I understand your contention. But, a high end guitar is $10,000-20,000, and is just a little wood and some strings. Making these comparisons just leads to more comparisons, and likely arguments even less logical then our arguments within the bike world.

ErichVonCartman

and I raced both Road Racing and Motocross, so I too also know first hand the cost of Motorcycles. I even won races Road Racing, and it takes a lot more effort and money to do that (as oppose to just showing up to the races with a factory bike).

Part for Part, I am finding bicycles to be much more value than motorycles. One example, Look at the Clutch and Brake Levers on the Top Road Racing Motorcycles on the show room floor, they are so cheaply made, about on par with Walmart bikes. Then go to a Bike Shop and check out the Levers on a $600 bicycle, much higher quality.

CrankyFranky

This.

But - this thread subject illuminates the entire spectrum of personal styles and values that people hold.

I have never had aspirations on becoming a high earner nor extravagant spender. I see utility in itself as being valuable. At age 20 I bought a three speed and experienced transcendence on it - the feeling of freedom. But in my next purchase in 1972 (with me barely above water financially) I spent the princely sum of $300 on an road bike, full Campag NR. It took a year of riding it to resolve my internal philosophical argument that the expense couldn't possibly be justified, even though I could ride further than on the three speed. But I used that bike to ride from London to Copenhagen and back, riding between hostels. I still have that bike. Took it to the UK when I moved there in 1980. By then I began thinking that I should use the opportunity to have a frame made for me. I think I paid ~180 quid for it - back then that was about $380. I swapped out the components from my first bike to the new frame, and it immediately felt its worth it to me - less twitchy, more stable. I rode the heck out of it, over much of northern Europe. I rode it over the years until I crashed it this summer. It sits waiting, fent bork, for me to arrive at what next with it. Meanwhile, I bought a fine used 30-speed so my old knees can make it up the hills I used to prance up when I was young.

I think what I'm getting at is that these machines have an intangible value that has nothing to do with initial cost. And it is each to one's own just how the relation of those two attributes gets resolved.

Amen.

cccorlew

The difference between a really crappy bike and a super high end bike is no where near as much as the difference between no bike and any bike.