aholic justifies many
Non classé - 1 juin 2013FORT KENT, Maine It’s time to face facts, and I’m telling you all right now, it’s not pretty.
I have an addictive personality. There is no one but myself to blame not my parents, not society, not even all those anvil falling, coyote exploding cartoons I watched as a kid.
The roots of my addiction can be traced back to that first Schwinn one speed with the balloon tires which got me from point A to point B throughout my pre teen years. My high school years ushered in a series of 10 speed road bikes also Schwins that saw me through my university life.
After that, wholesale nfl jerseys from china cycling sort of rolled to the back burner, though the idea of it was always there, just waiting to be re inflated and rolled back out.
And roll out it did in the late 90s with the purchase of a new mountain bike. Soon after I found myself in training for my first Trek Across Maine 180 miles in three days to benefit the Maine Lung Association.
I won’t lie, not only did 180 miles on a mountain bike damn near kill me, it gave me the only excuse I needed to go shopping for a pavement friendly road bike.
Two weeks after completing the Trek, a new blue Fuji 21 speed road bike was keeping the mountain bike company in the garage.
It made perfect sense, at least in my head. One bike for exploring the dirt roads and rocky trails around the farm, and the other to tour the miles of northern Maine’s paved highways and byways.
But soon, two bikes were not satisfying my habit. The mountain bike was old school, lacking a front suspension, but how to justify a third bike?
That justification came after having a somewhat serious accident with that old bike which I quickly replaced with a new one after the sprains healed and bruises faded.
Since I did keep the damaged bike, the count was up to three certainly far from excessive, and they took up hardly any room at all in the garage.
I blame the fourth bike on this very newspaper.
In 2001, I wrote a story on the now defunct Aegis Bicycle company which produced the first full carbon monocoque frames used in cycling from its factory in Van Buren.
So impressed was I with the technology and looks of those bikes, I went out and bought one the next year.
This, I told myself, was the last bike I would EVER need purchase.
And I was right until last year when I decided it was time to replace it given the thousands and thousands of miles worth of wear and tear on it.
The count was at five bikes, but did not stay that way for long when last fall a rusty but super cool looking old Columbia 10 speed came home in the back of my truck.
This, my cycling friend Alan told me, is going to make a great single speed, or “SS” as we sufferers of bikeaholics call it.
Basically, a single speed is just that it has one speed which is pretty much as fast as you can pedal, which makes it a perfect training bike.
In this case, to achieve this, Alan will strip the Columbia down to it’s core and build it back up with new parts minus the gearing and cables needed for shifting.
Since that fall, http://www.big49erssanfrancisco.com things have really spiraled out of control with another single speed, a re built 1970s era 10 speed and a dizzying array of parts and bike components arriving on a disturbingly frequent basis via UPS to feed this habit.
Oh, and did I mention the accoutrements that go along with bike aholism?
Specialized shorts, jerseys, gloves, shoes, socks and hats for every conceivable weather and terrain condition. Tools, water bottles, GPS sensors and all manner of energy enhancing snacks, treats and beverages to fuel the rides.
Because yes, these bikes do get ridden. They get ridden a lot.
But, in the end, can a person really have too many bikes?
Not according to my fellow cyclists.
“You need a bike for every purpose,” according to my elite athlete friend Kale Poland, who logs more miles on his bike over a year than most people do in cars. “A training bike, a crappy weather bike that you spent maybe 50 bucks on and don’t care if it gets annihilated by a plow, a racing bike, a mountain bike, a cyclocross bike, a singlespeed, a commuter and a coffee shop cruiser.”
