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Flat pedals are better than clipless pedals
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Gravel bikes are better with flat bars instead of drop bars
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I see a lot of talk about “gravel” bikes and trends being an unnecessary industry creation to get more money from followers. I’d say its the opposite where 95% of road riders have been needlessly spending for the optimizations that make sense in a pro peloton, and modern gravel bikes are the evolution that should have happened if the industry wasn’t milking consumers off the idea their bike is almost exactly what they see in the TdF.
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I don’t know why these aren’t sold more.
I have cut the chamois out of every pair of tights I’ve bought in the last twenty years.
They’re warmer without the chamois if you layer with bib shorts. Then your bits stay much warmer and you don’t get double-chamois. You also can wear them a few days in a row, if you combine with bib shorts, which cuts down on washing and the amount of tights you need.
It’s also much harder to get tights to fit right vs shorts. Removing the chamois means the chamois can’t be in the wrong place.
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At this point, why not buy running tights?
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Saying that gravel bikes are just 90s mountain bikes, like you have defeated the entire industry and all its consumers, is annoying…and wrong.
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I have in the past… But many of them aren’t as warm and I still prefer having straps.
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Not even that inconvenient if you want to race on a grad student budget!
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RH 35s with latex tubes have been the Goldilocks setup for me. Snagged a bunch of new KOMs on them too 
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The two rules of climbing:
- Climb fast
- Don’t climb slow.
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Here will be my unpopular pro cycling doping opinion.
Mapei was the biggest doped team ever that was never caught red handed though some riders have admitted to it years later (without any ramifications).
If you don’t know it, the current incarnation of the Mapei team is Quickstep run by Patrick Lefevere. He was there in 1996 when they took all the podium spots at Paris-Roubaix. He’s never had to pay any price for running the most successful doped team of all time.
And people still love Mapei jerseys, frames, and paraphernalia. Do people not realize that this level of dominance was fueled by EPO or blood bags just before it commonplace in the peloton?
I have no love for Armstrong but it’s kind of annoying that some in the sport are vilified while others are glorified. And they did exactly the same thing. Well, except LA was a big arseh***.
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Rim brake tire clearance issues are purely a caliper design problem and people were riding gravel bikes with the same tire sizes we use today well before discs were a thing.
The benefits I see from discs are different wheel sizes and wet conditions. The rest is marketing.
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Gravel biking isn’t offroad unless you are under biking. (It is off pavement though)
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If you think sugar gives you a bit of a performance boost, you’re gonna LOVE cocaine! And crystal meth is even better!!
Seriously. Many riders have lost the plot.
Why do you ride? I ride because: I have an absolute blast, feel like the fastest person alive, make great memories, and feel like a million bucks during and for days after. But also HUGELY because of the dramatic increases in my quality of life, both short term and long, that come from the fantastic physical muscular / skeletal condition & overall health that cycling puts me in.
I sleep amazing, feel like an Olympic athlete all day every day, have energy for hours, never blood sugar crash, even after hours and hours without food, have tons of stamina for activities [ ; ) ], have the strength and power to do things like ski hard all day for 6 days straight, hike HARD all day, do 7 day portage trips like a 25 year old, etc.
Riding is only part of what gives me that.
Flushing all the benefits you get from riding down the turlet by completely trashing your body chemistry, totally destroying your insulin sensitivity, and setting life-long, difficult-to-impossible-to-break dietary dependencies and patterns is absolute insanity. The super pros do it because every fraction of a second counts to get that next sponsorship, title, etc. You’re not a super pro. We are turds on bikes! And now you’re not even having any fun anymore! You’re playing with how much sugar you can cram through your grimaced lips down your gullet without getting cramps or ishing your pants. How do you even wish someone well on that!? “Good luck chugging grossness, I hope you don’t ish your pants!” ???
Have fun! Smile, laugh, go fast. Try to go faster than everyone else, and sure, eliminate all reasonable obstacles toward that goal! But eat great, healthy food, and take care of yourself. Live well. Make cycling part of what is causing you to live your best life, not part of what is making you feel like crap, and slowly killing you.
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So good you only need 1 year warranty
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It’s more important to protect your knees with knee warmers in moderate temps than it is to protect your forearms with long sleeves. (Posting this here so you can bash me since I tried to cut off the discussion in the Jokes thread. I like that thread to just be jokes and memes)
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Haha, it was only a matter of time. I’m just a weenie and don’t like the cold, so I wear long sleeves.
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This is probably the most outrageous opinion posted in this thread. I can accept hairy legs, Lance-Armstrong-is-a-nice-guy, heck, I can even accept baggy shorts on a road bike. But underwear and cycling bibs takes it too far. Far too far. Unthinkable. I can’t even process this in my head.
I love this thread 
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Add Gewiss Bianchi a few years before that victory at Roubaix. And LaVieClaire, System U, etc. Yes, Lance was THE best of his time, but has a shitty character, so people wanted to take him down with a passion. Had he displayed a minimum of bonhomie a la Lemond or any other non-sociopath human, he’d still be riding Treks, running marathons, and winning Ironmans. Or Ironmen. Whichever, you know what I mean.
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