Eric F 

Just out of curiosity, I weighed the heaviest of my on-bike tool/tube kits. This is the one for my gravel bike…

2 TPU tubes, CO2 nozzle with 3 cartridges, 2 levers, multi-tool, and Dynaplug tool.

Total weight, including seat bag…

rsbob 

1.34 lbs for the unwashed, like myself. Looks like my seat bag.

Eric F 

My road bike kit is 366g, but I don’t carry as much stuff in it because I can rely on my cell phone more easily in the urban/suburban area I tend to ride.

livedarklions

That's just wrong. He's saying only that wheels do not go out of true without some sort of mishap unless they are defective. "Proper" in his construction is just a synonym for non-defective.

The no true Scotsman fallacy is adding a basically meaningless term to save the conclusion from a successful counterexample, that isn't the case here.

By your reasoning, the following is a fallacy:

Proper bulletproof glass cannot be penetrated by a single small caliber bullet.
Window pane x was penetrated by a 9mm bullet.
Window pane x is not constructed of proper bulletproof glass.

Also:
A good bicycle mechanic can properly adjust a derailleur.
Bill cannot adjust any derailleurs.
Bill is not a good bike mechanic.




Good luck with that.

Jughed

Lets put this in terms of gram dollars.

If a 2k bike weighs 9.5kg, and a 12k bike weighs 7kg. Thats $4 per gram if my fuzzy math is correct.

That bag is $2,432 worth of gram dollars.

Jeff Neese

So even though bikes of today aren't necessarily faster (despite all the new tech), they are at least safer. I don't know about that, but perhaps there's some data that shows that's true. I hardly think that's why people buy new bikes.

Most of the arguments in favor of newer tech is oriented toward "faster". So in the racer-boy mentality, faster = better, and that's where the marketing is targeted. And it doesn't even have to actually be faster, it just has to make you FEEL faster, or maybe LOOK faster. The reality is that unlike cars, it's the rider not the bike.

Again, we're talking about modern bikes, something made since about 1995. TDF winners rode just as fast in the mid-90s as they do today. That may not matter to you, but it certainly does to me. It tells me literally everything I need to know, in fact, about the value of most of the "innovations" since then, at least as far as performance goes. If there are features that make bikes easier for the average Joe, or increase reliability, safety, serviceability, usefulness or fun, I'm all for it. Indexed shifting, for example, was an innovation that was genuinely useful and allowed more people to easily use a derailluer-equipped bike. Or when V-brakes came out they were easier to adjust for most people. I respect true innovation.

There's also nothing wrong with buying a new bike just because you want it. It's usually discretionary spending anyway, which means it's at your discretion. If a particular new feature or design makes you want it, and you have the money, go for it. Nobody says there's anything wrong with that.

And despite your disparaging remarks about C&V bikes, that's where a lot of the best frames are.

Jeff Neese

Hopefully no one from the Ann Arbor Bicycle Touring Society minds that I stole their picture. These folks ride all sorts of bikes, as you can see. My wife and I have ridden in the One Helluva Ride and you definitely see plenty of vintage bikes, including ours.

We also see plenty of vintage bikes on our local MUPs.

Obviously you're going to see more modern bikes than vintage bikes, simply because most people buy bikes brand new and the vintage bikes are aging out. You have to go out of your way to find and restore a vintage bike, and that's not for everyone, certainly not the average Joe or average club rider.

big john

This past TDF winning rider posted the fastest average speed ever. But comparing the event speed from year to year can be misleading because the route changes and there may be a lot more climbing some years, more TTing, weather, etc. Plus, it's not a 2000 mile time trial. The riders are not racing the whole time and there may be significant amount of "tempo" riding.
That said, Jonas Vingegaard said they were going pretty hard last year.

Using TDF average speeds as a measure of bicycle speed capabilities is flawed.

And obviously any increase in speed with new tech is going to come in very small increments, if at all.

smd4

I think that's pretty much Neese's point.

Jeff Neese

And yet with all those variables and changes from year to year, the average speed of TDF winners has remained surprisingly consistent since about 1995. TDF speeds may not be a perfect measure or the only measure, but is definitely meaningful data.

It's also only one sport - road racing - and we have over a century of data to look at. I suspect that newer sports, like Cyclocross or downhill MTB racing, would show different data regarding when a particular platform has plateaued, as road bikes did in the mid-90s.

big john

I think his point was that the average speed in the TDF was a meaningful metric. He concluded that since the average speed hasn't appreciably increased since 1995 that means bicycles aren't faster than they were in 1995.

Jughed

And you have to eliminate all of the dopers... which would be all of them, but I'm talking the Lance era dopers.

If you take Merckx - his typical TT was 46.5kph+/-. Pogs and some of the current guys are sitting at 50kph+/-. These guys, while probably not really clean, are on either end of the "doper" era. Advances in training, aero, bike tech = +/-4.5kph for the road. 4.5kph difference from a road bike to a full on TT bike. The road bike to road bike difference would be much smaller.

A bit more of a difference on the track - but that's not even apples to apples. Merckx was essentially on what would be a Walmart level road bike, and the track guys are on machines.


And you could easily say that the biggest tech advances come in the form of a TT bike for the road, and track bikes for the velo.

EJM73

That awesome. I never weighed that stuff. I'm an old college wrestler I just cut a lot of weight in the spring for the cycling season. LOL

genejockey 

I think his point is that he started from his conclusion, and found a metric that appears to support it, so he keeps flogging it even when others point out the flaws. That's not how you do science. It's how you do propaganda.

Maelochs

Maybe I am wrong but as I read it, his point is that modern bikes aren’t any better since they are not faster, and that TdF results are the best metric

His point is that he hates everything introduced since 1995 and his “justification “ is TdF results.

To me, the proper response is “whatever.”

I own two bikes more than 35 years old and a bunch much newer, but I will not engage because logic cannot refute emotion and taste is personal …. and people who sincerely believe they know the ultimate truth are impervious to logic or reason.

It’s flat if you need it to be flat.

tomato coupe

Yep, and he continually ignores any data that doesn’t support his conclusion.

https://www.cyclingtips.com/2022/06/...investigation/


He’s a broken record, incapable of objective thinking..

genejockey 

I also have old bikes, including a couple from 1982, and I love 'em. I love riding them, and I love taking them out for long rides, too. My belief is that if a bike was a good bike in 1982, and it's working today as well as it worked then, it's still a good bike. The fact that my newer bikes are better bikes - faster, stiffer yet more comfortable, and better suited to things like long climbs and descents - doesn't make my old bikes into bad bikes. But for some folks, new bikes can't be better than old bikes because that would mean old bikes are bad bikes. What foolishness!

EDIT: I also don't believe in babying the old bikes, apart from not taking them out in the rain. I love thrashing them for all they're worth, not just toodling along, because that would be like having an old sports car and never taking it on a twisty canyon drive.

Lombard

"A broken record"? That's so mid-20th century. Wouldn't a more currently appropriate expression be "a corrupted MP3"?

genejockey 

Oh, I don't know about that...

Eric F 

For Sale: Seat bag with tubes and tools - $1000. What a deal!!

Imma mess things up...I paid $3k for a 7.3kg bike, and $4k for a 9.6kg bike.

Eric F 

My original issue was with the comment that light bikes require the rider to carry more tools, which is nonsense.

I'm an old bike racer who spent 15 years away from riding. I cut a lot of weight by getting my fat @$$ back on the bike. It's always cycling season, even if it's relegated to being indoors.

elcruxio

Ah. I too might be doing it wrong. I paid 2200 € for a 9kg bike and 6500 € for a 40kg bike...

Lombard

Hmmmm. Who knows, maybe penny farthings will make a comback too, LOL!

Eric F 

Yes!

My oldest bike was a top-level race frame in 1977. When my dad (bike nut, but not a racer) was riding it as his daily commuter, it was a mixture of mostly-Campy parts. After he passed, the bike joined my stable, spent a short time as a singlespeed with a different mix of mostly-Shimano parts. In 2020, I stripped everything off it, and rebuilt it with full Suntour Superbe. I would say it rides and functions every bit as good as it ever has, since it was new. It's quick, agile, and smooth. However, it doesn't get ridden because I have newer bikes that I like to ride more, but that doesn't lessen what the old bike is.

bbbean 

How about looking at relevant data? Review TT and Hour Record stats where the bike itself plays a much larger role than in road racing. Once again, absolute speed doesn't matter in road racing. Only relative speed matters. On the other tand, the TT and the hour record are all about absolute speed.