Roadie Rage

Road riding is boring; this is a fact and plainly obvious to anyone with a brain evolved enough to tune their suspension rebound. Why would I want to do that?

“Trail Tale” a simple statement. The holy trail and the ensuing tale, it works so well that the alphabet even saw fit to make it rhyme. We’ve all been there and we know what it’s about—rider, machine, dirt, imagination and some tall stories. The brotherhood of mountain bikers united in an unspoken acknowledgement of solidarity. The secret handshake of the brotherhood is gritty and calloused, encased in a smelly, stained, full-fingered glove. That’s us, that’s me. When relatives and acquaintances find out that I’m a ‘cyclist’ the initial conversation always misses the mark. ‘Do you know Cadel Evans?’ ‘Would you like to do the Tour de France?’ ‘Do you wear those funny fluro tights?’ ‘Do you shave your legs?’ ‘Do you take drugs?’ ‘You’re not one of those terrible idiots that I see riding on the road in the morning are you?’ ‘Do you know Cadel Evans?’ And on it goes… you know this story as well as I do. Listen up granny/ cousin/random spouse of workmate/bogan in the pub; it ain’t like that! I’m not one of those cyclists, I’m not a roadie—ewweh!

 

 "Road riding is boring; this is a fact and plainly obvious to anyone with a brain evolved enough to tune their suspension rebound. Why would I want to do that?"

 

Your assassination of my character disgusts me! Keep talking crazy like that and you’ll hear from my defamation lawyer.  I don’t have time to hang out at the café and drink 20 skinny soy decaf lattes and eat biodynamic tofu wraps. I don’t have time to worry about whether my socks, knicks, jersey and wind breaker all match. I don’t have time to shave my legs; heck, I don’t have time to shave, period! I bet roadies even clean their teeth. If I spent all my time being really good looking and hygienic, I wouldn’t expect anyone to talk to me. It’s no wonder no one likes them…

 

Brandishing an attitude such as this, something was sure to go wrong. Times change and a new job the first chink in my armour. My previous job was 10 minutes ride from home—I quite often walked. It really was that close by. Times were good. I was a young and bright eyed Jedi. Back then my dually took up residence in the lounge room. I would grab it on the way out and hit some parks on the way to work for fun and to satisfy the urge to ride until I got some real off-road indulgence on the weekend.

 

A new job, a new routine—I should have seen it coming a mile away. No matter how strong The Force is within you, suck you in the dark side it will, and Yoda won’t be around to save your dirty ass! When your commute steps up from 10 minutes of footpath to 90 minutes of urban motorway, there is a period of adjustment. There’s the physical side of course, but over time there’s also a mental adjustment. My smelly full-fingered Yoda gloves informed me that 300km a week of road commuting would be a grand idea on my trail bike. No problem they said! They were right, it works—of this there is no doubt. Riding a mountain bike on the road is okay, riding a MTB off-road on the weekend is great. Riding the same bike on the road five days a week, riding it off-road at night, and then riding it on Saturday and Sunday is far from ideal—my poor bike! My favourite race tyres were chewed up, my chain squeaked like an army of mice in a cheese factory and my cables needed bypass surgery more urgently than Jabba The Hut. I needed another bike real bad.

 

I consulted my smelly gloves, asking them for their bacteria laden thoughts. The answer was blindingly obvious… you need a single speed mountain bike. Why hadn’t I thought of that? No cables and derailleurs to worry about, no suspension pivots and seals to stress about, and as a bonus I could ride it off-road too. A steel single speed it was— surely no bike screams ‘mountain biker’ louder than that? What an ideal choice for 300km a week of road riding. Jolly good! This lasted seven months. Thousands of kilometres of boring motorway, spinning like a lunatic in a 32/13 gear finally did my head in! One day I’d simply had enough, the mental torture of three hours a day on a single speed snapped my mountain biker’s resolve. My gloves, although smelly, were clearly not smelly enough. Their hallucinogenic properties could no longer fool my brain. The boring, souless prospect of a road bike could be no worse than this slow and painful daily pilgrimage. Broken by the dark side I was. I’d heard mates describe their road bikes as ‘pain machines’, and they looked about as comfortable as a Hawaiian shirt at a cocktail party. Roadies from our local club often fronted to our XC races, and on cue proceeded to fall off and encounter all kinds of difficulties. What the heck was I getting in to?

 

Here I am a few years on writing about road riding in a mountain bike magazine, irony gleefully slapping me in the face. Riding the road bike, all five that I’ve since owned, has been the single biggest improvement that I’ve made to my mountain biking. If I don’t have time to travel to the trails, I now roll out my door and sneak a ride on the road bike whereas before I’d have sat and dreamt of riding. As a result I’m now riding faster and further than ever before, and when I do hit the dirt, I always get the most out of it. I’ve supersized my off-road meal and value added dessert along the way! And the riding itself? It ain’t so bad! The best part of mountain biking is fast flowing singletrack. Speed, direction and weight changes, pulling what feels like a few Gs through a corner. You needn’t head bush to find big corners and speed though, they run past the front of your house and all around your neighbourhood. They’re called roads. That black hard stuff you drive your car on is firm and grippy, and riding a light, stiff bike on the hot mix as quickly as you can is something else! My most ‘core’ bike moments have definitely been super fast road descents. Thirty kms per hour feels like flying when you’re surrounded by trees, but 90 on the road really gets your attention. So, can I hold myself as qualified to word an article entitled ‘Trail Tale’, or have I unwittingly become some slimy, well groomed impostor? I’ll admit that I love riding my road bike, but I stress it’s unreservedly on my terms. Do I rock out with monkey-like hairy legs? Don’t you know it! Long fingered smelly gloves? You bet! Skinny decaf latte? No thanks!

 

The absolute best part of riding a road bike? Dropping some prissy roadie with matching socks, knicks, gloves, arm warmers, skull cap and sunglasses whilst aboard my filthy bike, wearing stinky full finger gloves, black socks and a beer jersey. Take that princess! Chalk another one up to the brotherhood of the dirt.