bicycle eccentric

 So there are the bike racers, in which I have no interest...

...and there's the mainstream bike industry, which sells mostly bikes like everybody else in the mainstream bike industry sells... which, for road bikes, are mostly bikes that look like the ones the racers use. Even the gravel bikes have gearing high enough that they could be competitive on the road...

...and then there are certain bicycle eccentrics. Like Russ Roca of Path Less Pedaled (although his Youtube channel is more active than his website). He's an advocate for the non-competitive side of cycling. He goes for low-geared, wide-tire bikes. One of his slogans is "party pace." He was one of the forces behind that extra-long-pull bar-end friction shifter with which I'm so enamored.

Or Ron Romance, aka Ronnie Ultraromance. His name was Wheeler (I've seen Benedict and Jonny both given for his old first name), back when he was a racer. Now he's kind of a performance artist (he's also got a Youtube channel). Frankly, I find him a little hard to take in large doses... but he does interesting things with Campagnolo shifters. He really likes Campagnolo shifters, and finds that, if he sticks to eight speed cassettes, he can make a ten- or eleven-speed Campagnolo shifter work with Shimano drivetrains. The limit screws on the rear derailleur keep him from shifting too far, and he gets gear-range by using a double chainring with a wide disparity between the front gears - say, a 48-tooth large ring couple with a 24-tooth small ring. It will work well enough.

Or Grant Petersen, the guy for whom the bike term "retrogrouch" was coined. He started Rivendell Bikes (they still host his blog, and he's still a factor there, even though he's no longer in charge). He's been a longtime critic of the stranglehold that the bike racing culture has on road bikes sold around the world. He's got no place for lycra, for clipped-in shoes, for drivetrains with more than nine speeds. He thinks if you aren't going to ride like a racer, you should be able to get bikes that let you ride the way you want to (and can). Not everybody likes his bikes, but he does make sense.

I'm not as smart, as famous, as anything as these guys... but I have to admit that I'm also a bicycle eccentric. I have a bike with a titanium frame with caliper rim brakes and exposed cables, and I love it. It's currently wired with bar-end, friction shifters (some of you won't even know what friction shifters are! I don't "snap" from one gear to the next; I slide, and I have to adjust to make sure the gear engages correctly), and flat pedals. 

I love it. I ride the bike I love. (I wrote a post about riding the bike you love in my old blog.)

I've made suggestions to fellow riders about changing bikes or components so that the bike would better suit their riding style. For example, you wouldn't need such a big gear in the back, if you'd be willing to have smaller gears up front (and be honest: other than rolling downhill, how often are you ever in that big chainring/smallest cog combination? Most of us are rarely above about the fourth-smallest cog we have when we're on the flats). Or if you really like a light bike, and never ride in the drops... how about a bullhorn bar, that would give you all the positions you'd have on the top of a drop bar, and save you the weight of the lower part that you never use anyway?

I use my drop bar (it's a 1980's vintage Cinelli Campione del Mondo, and I'll happily bore you by pointing out what makes it beautiful to me), but that big ring on the front was more of a hindrance than a help. I swapped out my 50-tooth big chainring for a 46. If I had it to do again, I might go for the wide-disparity double chainring like Ronnie Romance (god help me) and forego all the money I spent on extra-big cassettes and long-cage rear derailleurs.

As I said, I've made suggestions, and I don't think any of 'em have ever been taken. I'm giving up. Ride what you have.

As for me, with Candide, I will cultivate my own garden.