11 things I HATE about cycling

In this video, I talk about some of the things that get my goat about cycling. How many of these do you hate too? Anything I’ve missed?

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Hello. I’ve ridden a bike almost every day for the last 25 years. A lot of it has been in the UK, but probably all over the world on the bike. But we thought it would be funny to list off 10 things or 12 things. 10 to 12 things that I hate about cycling. Number one, the elitism and the superficiality of the modernday cyclist. [Music] What I mean about the elitism of cycling is like cycling when I first got into this sport was all about like how hard you could put on the pedals, how fast you could descend and just there was a sense of camaraderie uh with the people that you rode bikes with. And perhaps that there’s still an element of that, but it seems to be a lot more about the stuff. But I guess this is a male-dominated sport and we are all magpies. We like shiny. Historically, it was a a workingclass sport. And I I think somebody once wrote, and I think it might have been by radar, said, “We need to take the golf out of cycling.” And, you know, I I I agree with that. Right. Next on my list, and it it was going to have to be on my list, is bad bike fitting. [Music] There are a lot of people that seem to think that uh getting into bike fitting is just an easy way of making a quick buck. Um, I’m telling you, having done it for 15 years that it’s hard work. I’ve got people who have come through here who have had bike fits, professional bike fits. I’ve had to lower their saddle height by like 4 cm or take half a ton of plastic out of this inside of their shoes. Stuff like that um really gets on my goat because, you know, you you end up hurting people. If you were a physiotherapist and you injured somebody because of negligence, you’d be struck off. But in the bike fitting world, because of its attachment to the cycling industry, it’s kind of yeah, just acceptable to set somebody’s saddle 40 mil too high and the reach 50 mil too long because of your own ideals. Wow, this is turning into a rant, isn’t it? I always knew it was I’m going to I’m going to upset some people here. Bad bike fitting. Bite fitting that has, you know, technology or ethos from the arcane. people that assume that everybody wants to be in a really aggressive racing position or people that assume that people want to be in a bolt upright position or a comfort orientated position. People that just assume makes an ass out of me and you, you and me. Next on my list of things that I hate, I absolutely loathe to covers. [Music] They have no place in this world whatsoever. They do nothing. They don’t make your feet warmer. They shred inevitably within days, maybe maybe weeks, but usually days, possibly even hours. They’re they’re useless. They also they look the death of the rim brake. The demise of the rim brake has resulted in bicycles becoming more expensive and as a result, it makes the sport less accessible. There are some outliers. I mean, you know, the likes of is it Triband make a rim brake bikes. A lot of brands and manufacturers make rim brake bikes, but the problem that we’re seeing is a demise in the products and the equipment that you can fit to these bikes. So, for instance, I I’ve been um having a bike designed for me for my commuting bike. I’ve been talking to Stalebell and I I wanted to put rim brakes on it because for winter riding, rim brakes are actually better for commuting because they don’t um they don’t salt up. They don’t get they don’t corrode, which disc brakes do if you use them day in day out on the roads in the UK. I wanted a set of 57 mm deep drop calipers. And the ones that I currently use, which I’ve had to rebuild three times now because they’re 15 years old, you can’t buy them anymore. So, we’re seeing this decline in rim brake equipment. And as a result, the bikes out there on the roads that, you know, rely on this equipment are going to be running completely obsolete. The only saving grace here is Campanolo. They still make a reasonable rim brake uh group set. I mean, I’ve I’ve got a Campanola Chorus 12speed rim brake group set on one of my bikes and it’s fantastic. And also, I mean, having descended coals in the pissing rain with carbon rims and rim brakes. I mean, I’ve never had a problem. Personally, I’m not a fan of the demise of the rim brake. Definitely not anti-disc, but I I think there should be I think there is a place in the world for both. In a similar light, mechanical group sets. I feel like this is somewhat dictated by frame design with the constant will and need to put the cables inside a bike to make it more aesthetically pleasing or to make it more aerodynamic and to to be completely transparent. When you do put a mechanical group set, especially a modern mechanical group set through inside a carbon frame, it doesn’t work. You know, all of these mechanical groupets are designed with uh the intention of the cables being outside the frame because as soon as you put them inside of a frame, they don’t work quite as well. There is something slightly absurd about having to charge one’s bicycle. The humble beon. [Music] Going back to my elitism thing, this is not an elitist comment or or an elitist point of view. These are a they always leak. Um, and if you leave them open and invert them or invert the bike, they drip everywhere. I’m a big fan of the of camel back bottles, the the the jet valve, because you don’t have to around with this and, you know, trying to bite it or whatever. Um, and they never leak and you just literally squeeze it and job’s good. Whereas these, they’re just cheap plastic pieces of crap. bottom bracket standard. [Music] There is no bottom bracket standard. Uh I I mean this is probably on everybody’s list of things they hate about cycling. Uh and we are starting to see a trend go away from the press fit bottom bracket or the multiple different bottom bracket standards in favor of things like T47 which is an oversized um threaded standard. The fact in the industry that we even have the word standards to describe bottom bracket standards, it’s not standard if there are 30 different standards. The fact that they’re all different is wildly irritating. And even it to somebody in the industry who has built bikes in the past, I’ve built wheels in the past. Even I don’t know how the hell what what bottom bracket is supposed to go in what frame sometimes. So, how is a consumer supposed to know? No, we haven’t got any fixed cleats. Do you know why we haven’t got any fixed cleats? Cuz they’re devil. There was an epidemic back in the uh late 80s early 90s in patellofhemeral injury in professional cycling and it was wasn’t realized until some years later that it directly coincided with the introduction of the look black cleat. There are lots of people out there that are going to say I like my fixed cleat. Yeah, but the thing is you like your fixed cleat because you’re using them to mask a feeling. And that feeling is usually the washing around of the foot or cle or shoe in the cleat. That ain’t your cleat. It’s not your float. It’s the fact that your shoes don’t fit. Your cleat’s too far forward. You got no washport. Your feet are too close together. Your cranks are too long. Basically, your bike fit sucks. What that actually is is instability of the foot, which is driven by, as I’ve just mentioned, a million one factors. Fixed cleat suck. End of story. Any viewers who are who don’t have overbearing views on this, just take my word for it and you you won’t get any knee pain anymore. Women’s bikes, [Music] women don’t need different bikes. Women don’t need different saddles. They don’t need Maybe they do need different shorts, but they definitely don’t need different saddles. They definitely don’t need different bikes. They do need more choice. It’s gotten a lot lot better. When I first started in this game, I remember Tre did a a 1.2 or maybe it was a Trek 1000 actually. So, it was before the 1.2 that they did a they did a token women’s bike and it was basically exactly the same as the men’s, but it was black with pink flowers on it and it the geometrically was identical. It had the same 42 cm bar and it was laughably bad. Had a WSD saddle on it which was the same as the men’s but was pink. We need more sizes below a certain size range. We need more tire options for smaller wheel sizes, namely 650b. Uh, we need more options for crank lengths below a certain size, below 160 millimeters. Shimano Stram, I’m looking at you. You need to make 155, 150. You probably need to stop at about there, though, cuz below that, you’re starting to get a little bit kooky. But we need more options for not just women, but smaller people as well. The buy first, fit later mentality. [Music] I’ve come up with this. I I came up with it. It’s just a thing I’ve said for years is fit first, buy later. And the general premise of the bicycle industry is that you buy a bike and then you go and get it fitted. And the the problem with this is that it assumes the bike is right in the first place. It’s almost the way that it’s always been. And I had a conversation with Lee Prescott who’s um a bike fitter up in Warick and we were talking about how the history of buying a bike used to be more or less what we’re trying to achieve a bicycle where you would go and have some measurements taken and you would have a bicycle made. And with the advent of um mass production, you’ve got these big bike retailers that are just selling bikes to people whether they’re right or not. You know, stack it higher, watch it fly. Does it fit? who gives a and I just do not believe in that at all. I used to sell bikes to people blindly and go, “Oh, you know, 54 cm, you’d be fine.” And it wasn’t. It was probably too big. Um, I was wrong. And I I realized I was wrong. And I say I was wrong because I learned that there is an there is another way. There is a better way of doing it. And that is understanding the needs and limitations of a rider first and then fitting them. There is an epidemic level of uh people riding ill-fitting bikes. And you know, if you’re serious about the sport, go and get a bike fit. Obviously, if you watch this channel, you know what I’m all about. You’ll end up in enhancing your enjoyment of the sport. This is a potentially unpopular opinion, but hey, it’s it’s my list, not yours. Um, energy gels. I’ve done like triple aense of vonto, for instance, on nothing other than cheese and ham croissants. Maybe I’m a bit malignant and bit of a commodin, but like energy food in general, it’s overloaded with sugar. It tastes like the gels are like taking a I can’t say that on here, can I? I massively prefer like normal food, real food. I’ll put either a flapjack or something in my back pocket if I’m going to go for a bike ride or just not eat at all. Thank you very much for listening to me moan on about all the things that I hate about cycling. What are the things that you hate about cycling? You put it in the comments section below. Please don’t forget to like and subscribe. Thanks for watching. See you later. [Music]