Light bikes

I ride my road bike a lot. It's a good way to train, and I love getting out and getting lost in the backwoods and side roads around Portland. Plus, being a mountain biker in Portland it's pretty much a hour and a half drive to get anywhere you would want to ride, and sometimes you just need to ride right now. Riding your ride bike out of your driveway is a huge upgrade over three hours in a car. I'm a baller on a budget, so I've been riding my Dad's 61cm 1983 Fuji Team,

One of the most productive things I've done in a long time was riding Diamondback's top of the line road bike, the Podium 7. It's a full carbon frame designed by Kevin Quan, who apparently is like the Dave Weagle of carbon road bikes, it's got full Campy Super Record, Carbon wheels, and the complete bike weight is 14 and some change. Basically it's baller as shit.

Really the only thing that could make it better is Dura Ace 11 speed, which a) I have no idea whether it's actually better or not but I am required by contract to say it, and b) is a pretty small difference in the grand scheme of thing. Campy 11 speed vs. Shimano 11 speed is sort of like choosing between Mountain Dew Baja Blast and a Mountain Dew Baja Blast Icee at Taco Bell. Which is better? It doesn't really matter, you're so close to perfection already that the difference is negligible.

Anyway, Verg and I went on a ride through the Berkeley hills last week on our bourgy-ass Diamondback bikes, and surprise- those hills are really steep. The ride ended up taking almost three hours, and we only rode about 20 miles. That means we weren't going very fast, because it was pretty much climbing the whole time. Here's a quick breakdown of my experience in Berkeley:

But here's the most important thing I learned on that ride: being tired on an $8500 wonderbike with carbon rims feels exactly the same as being tired on my 30 year old steel clunker.

That feeling, when you just know your tires flat or your brake must be rubbing or maybe you broke a spoke? No, that's just you being a dumbass. You're just weak, and you're looking for an excuse. And that feeling- the feeling of being tired and weak and needing an excuse- it feels exactly the same on the best bike in the world as it does on a crappy bike.

So get a bike that fits, get a bike that will be dependable, and get a bike that you like to ride.

The bike isn't riding like shit.

I'm riding like shit.