[Closed] Your cycling confessions

I take Vape stops whilst out riding!

I can't even remember the last time I rode a singlespeed.

Triples are the sizzle & cycling on the hard shoulder of a motorway at the dead of night is actually quite safe.

I sometimes ride in normal clothes without a helmet and I don’t care how much my bike weighs.

I cant remember the last time I finished a ride sober. Even roadie ones 🍻

I quite enjoy a Boris bike now and again.

I actually prefer riding a road bike now :-/

I once had 4 mountain bikes , I now have 1 that has been used once in 2 years. I now have 3 road bikes that get used all the time. I shave my legs. I'm a roadie. I'm not ashamed.

I make a point to say hello to all other cyclists just to be annoying, I'm really not a miserable git, I just look like it.

Up until A few weeks ago, i hadnt been on a night ride for over a year. Haven't rode the lakes, my favourite bike place, for over 2. 😞

Bicycle, what’s one of them?

I keep a unicycle in my office and ride it up and down the corridor at work when I am bored

I built up a new bike in october. I still haven't ridden it.

or any other bike for that matter....

I pay someone else to wrap my bar tape.

I very much doubt I’ll buy another MTB.

I have no idea how to replace the pads on my disc brakes.

I’ve given up night rides and abandoned my riding mate in the process in favour of going to the gym... a gym that’s verging on CrossFit... I really dislike being cold and wet. Either is fine, but both...

I’ll be back when it’s less shit out.

I'm an unfit, semi-alcoholic, fag smoking, 56 year old, crap rider....But I do enjoy it!

I shave my legs cos I like it.

I bought a Joystick in the black Friday deals, but not ridden in the dark since.

Not ridden my mountain bike for 6 months.

Last year I bought a new pair of SPD shoes.

Next purchase was a new frame to match the shoes.

Why do people shave their legs? ****ing weird. I always thought that was a joke but people actually do it? Like with a razor. Why tf would you do that?
Coz once you've done it once you'll have to keep doing it.

Why do people shave their legs? **** weird. I always thought that was a joke but people actually do it? Like with a razor. Why tf would you do that?
Coz once you’ve done it once you’ll have to keep doing it.

As above, no, idea why, but I’ve kind of always done it so it’s now just normal.
Saying that, tanned and toned shaved legs do look good, irreverent if you’re male or female.
Maybe that’s the reason right there?

I have more bikes than my spare riding time can justify and really all I want or need is a moderately tough hardtail trail bike for mtb and maybe a cheap hybrid.

I could really do with ditching the entire fleet but the FS is non boost, the hardtail is 26" and the road bike was cheap 15 years ago. Where do you sell and who buys this stuff?

I'm not that fast, or stripey.

British by birth but I really dont like riding in the wet and just dont understand why other riders seem to think its something all Brits love to do?

I also shave my legs, but I do so because I returned to road riding quite some time ago and haven’t looked back. That’s not really a confession though.

What is a confession is the fact that I was once in a criterium race in which I was getting utterly left behind and destroyed. My solution was to have a bit of a temper tantrum in which I broke of a shifter. I was able to pull out of the race due to a ‘mechanical’, and thus save face.

I sometimes ride through red lights

My favourite bike was a pink 20 inch wheel shopper.

I own a bike with a derailleur...

Having got my wife into cycling over the years we’ve been together I actually resent having my ‘me’ time invaded when she asks if she can come out with me when I wanted to ride alone. Not all of the time, but some of the time, especially off road as she’s got knackered knees so ends up being easy/short rides.  Then I get “oh, I’ll make my way back home/to the car, you carry on”... in that wife type voice that clearly means “you’d better not abandon me, or I’ll sulk for days”...

I'm building up a 26er.

Anyone seen my coat?

I don't really get gravel biking, but even worse is I think it might be what I call mountain biking ☺

I also thought I would once cheekily squeeze through the gap between two buses, but I didn't....

The change in standard wheel sizes peed me off so badly I’ve been practically a roadie since.

I can understand the point of a dropper, but really can’t be arsed with one, even if it’s on the bike that I’m riding.

I'm always clipped in even though anyone else I'm ever out with on a mountain bike are just on flat things, my xt pedals have not been serviced/oiled adjusted in 25 years and still spin like new, but I will admit I've twice had stitches on my left knee due to falls not so good. Never shaved my legs but is it to do with Elastoplast removal?

I only road ride to commute, because I hate road riding. But when I do it, I always wear MTB shoes, baggy shorts, a helmet with a peak, carry a backpack and listen to music via headphones.
<Elvis>Always have. Always will<Elvis>

I frequently ride with:
Enduro specific baggies*.
Roadie top
bibshorts/tights
Road helmet
Road/commute jacket
Backpack

All together off road. I have no intention of changing. On road I just take the baggies and backpack off.

*Well, Specialized Enduro ones, they say Enduro on them so as far as I'm concerned, they're enduro specific.

I didn't use carbon paste with my dropper and didn't remove it for 2 years.

£300 lesson learned.

I have no idea and no willingness to care about suspension set up. Its roughly the right pressure for my weight and that'll do.

I didn’t use carbon paste with my dropper and didn’t remove it for 2 years.

£300 lesson learned.

It's a basic law of cycling that everyone has to experience this once in their career. Mine was buying a used bike without checking that the seatpost actually moved before I took it away...

I don’t really get gravel biking, but even worse is I think it might be what I call mountain biking ☺

A friend who does a bit of gravel biking tells me his friends always ask why he bothered telling them it was a gravel ride when they're just riding the MTB trails on a different bike.

I think that's kind of the point!

Question for the leg shavers.

If you are a hairy man, where do you stop? Is it at the top by the bum crease? What about your gouch? Do you shave that? Ball bag?

Anyway, unless you are pro and getting a massage everyday, then the only reason anyone does it is vanity.

daern

Member
I didn’t use carbon paste with my dropper and didn’t remove it for 2 years.

£300 lesson learned.

It’s a basic law of cycling that everyone has to experience this once in their career. Mine was buying a used bike without checking that the seatpost actually moved before I took it away…

All hail the Seatpost man, could have been a £3K lesson

 

Ok, I'll bite - yep, vanity is the main reason I shave my legs, but after a big sliding crash last summer, the shaved bits healed much quicker than the hairy bits.

Plus I look an idiot at weekends with hair poking through my fishnets

If you are a hairy man, where do you stop? Is it at the top by the bum crease? What about your gouch? Do you shave that? Ball bag?

I'm not that hairy and stop at the top of the thigh. That combined with a touch of "manscaping" means it all looks vaguely respectable!
And yes, vanity definitely plays a part, though a nice side benefit is that I get less chafing when I run too.

I pay someone else to wrap my bar tape.

Me too.

I keep a unicycle in my office and ride it up and down the corridor at work when I am bored

Me too but with my Brompton when I work late and everyone else has gone. I work in a very corporate Law office in London.

Since October last year I have splashed £7K on new bikes. 1 mtb, 1 gravel and a Brompton. My Brompton is my favourite bike to ride due to the crap weather, I actually really enjoy it. THe gravel bike seems lovely but it's only had a few outings because of the weather. The mtb has had one outing on tarmac for coffee.

I actually drink more coffee than tea.

I wear my socks under my bib tights in winter ! Oh the shame !

Member
I wear my socks under my bib tights in winter ! Oh the shame !

Is that not normal then?

#askingforafriend

I only own one mountain bike. I bought it over 7 years ago, second hand. I have no idea how old it actually is. It has 26" wheels and 27 gears. It also has cable brakes because I don't don't how to fettle or fix hydraulics.

In the intervening years I have bought four road bikes.

I don't know what a gouch is.

Also, I quite enjoyed riding in the sleet yesterday.............

The 'best' bike thing I've ever bought is full length mudguards for my commuter. Those get me riding much more than any fancy dropper post or fancy full carbon FSer.

On a couple of bike trips I've been lumped in with the beginner / intermediate group and am too polite to say, the whole reason I'm on this trip is to ride the difficult stuff & big days and I'm more than capable of doing it.

If you are a hairy man, where do you stop? Is it at the top by the bum crease? What about your gouch? Do you shave that? Ball bag?

Never shaved legs myself, but I'm informed that "hairy hot pants" is a good look.

gouch

Isn't that someone who played cricket for Essex?

I don't think I've been "mountain biking" since SSUK........

I have just as much fun on my CX bike because I can ride it locally.

I justify riding the road bike because it will make me fitter, which will improve my Sailing and Mountainbiking. I've neither sailed or mountainbiked in months.

I'm considering getting Zwift............

I'm more likely to buy a bike if I like the colour rather than if it has the latest must have geometry.

Is that not normal then?

I think so, but its a burning issue in road cycling circles right now.

I think so, but its a burning issue in road cycling circles right now.

This one is getting me too - where else would they go? Over the top?

Confession-wise - I have too many bikes for the amount of riding I can actually do these days 🙁

My girlfriend said to my new bike: “I have competition”.

I said “there is no competition”.

She became the ex girlfriend.

This one is getting me too – where else would they go? Over the top?

Exactly, crazy, right?

https://cyclingmagazine.ca/sections/gear-reviews/should-you-wear-your-socks-over-or-under-your-leg-warmers/

I don't count Downhillers as proper cyclists.

I consider it the height of bad luck NOT to vocally greet every new set of animals I encounter on a ride.
All ducks are named Margaret. Everything else is just referred to as the regular noun, e.g. "Hello horses."

This one is getting me too – where else would they go? Over the top?

There's another way to do this? For me: socks under bib tights, which are then pulled down over the neck of my winter boots so that rain (in theory) runs down over the boots rather than being channelled down into the neck. Unless you're running spatz or similar, I can't see another way to do this without getting wet feet, but it does depend on what other layers you are running.

Surely you just layer the socks with everything else?

Socks on first, then leggings, then shoes, then overshoes.

Socks longer than overshoes would look daft.

Leggings without overshoes, why? Or winter boots the leggings go inside them anyway?

I still have a collection of 26" tyres in the garage that are perfectly rideable (Super Moto, Crazy Bob, Landcruiser, Big Apple iirc), even though I discovered a terminal seat tube crack on my Saracen Pylon 8 (which is still sat in garage without original fork re-fitted) back in 2014(?) and my better half's Saracen Zena 2 was nicked within seconds of me entering Sainsbury's back in 2015(?).

I've half-heartedly tried to inflate the 26*2.35" Super Motos on my Wazoo fatbike's ~70mm(?) internal rims, in the hope of some fast rolling road tyres... I got scared at the size of the inflating tube and how far the beads were from the rim hooks! 😆

There's some unused 700*25(?) Schwalbe Blizzard tyres down there too.

Until the weekend just gone, when I moved 40mm of spacers under the stem, I think the bars were lower on my fatbike than my road bike. 😮

My fatbike turned 4 years old on 7th Feb and it's spent ~3+ years of that on and off being a 29er hybrid with massive tyre clearance and barely any off-road time.

I've had nice road bikes dating back to ~1997 (Principia RSL, Felt F5C from 2007, Cube Attain GTC Pro Disc from 2017) and more basic but rideable road bikes since ~1985, but having lived in Southampton since Oct '92, I only discovered Upham/Durley and beyond into the South Downs hills in June 2017... I have no idea if my old uni mates with bikes back then were secretly heading up there without telling me!

Prefer my cheap hardtail to my relatively expensive full suss.

Fallen out of love of riding. Seems a lot of effort to get muddy and wet. Roll on spring.

Leggings without overshoes, why? Or winter boots the leggings go inside them anyway?

For me at least, with tights + winter boots, I'd always pull the bottom of the tights down over the top of the neoprene neck of the boots as it always seems a much better seal against weather than tucking them into the boots. Never really considered it that much - just something I've always done.

Who'd have ever thought that sock-layering was such a contentious issue? Surely someone has done scientific testing of this critical area of cycling...

last time I rode my MTB was Hit the North (I think) and the next race will be it's next outing ! I think daily commuting winter and summer round is blunting my enjoyment of bikes

I don’t know what a gouch is.

A portmanteau? ie

(Cases jump and slips forward onto t-t):

‘Ouch, me gooch!’

I haven’t serviced my forks since 2003

I have no idea and no willingness to care about suspension set up. Its roughly the right pressure for my weight and that’ll do.

Amen brother.

If you ever saw me lift my arse off the saddle on a flat section, it was almost certainly to release a fart.

I don't wear a helmet, I ride on pavements, my only bike (bafang cove hummer ebike) has a throttle, I haven't had a rear brake for well over a year (leaky something or other, can't be ****ed to fix it)

I don't ride during the winter months. I mean, it's cold AND wet. Why would you do it?

Hold on everyone! "Tom Boonen once went for a ride with his socks over his leg warmers. "

Thats good enough for me.

I do enjoy getting cold and wet (as long as it's for a reasonably short period with a warm house after) once I'm out, it genuinely makes me smile and enriches my life.

An open, non-judgemental place to confess your cycling sins.

Woo hoo!

I ride on the pavement and run red lights when the mood takes me

I don’t know what a gouch is.

A colloquial name for the area of a man's anatomy between genitals and anus. Also known, I believe, by sciencey types as the perineum. Also spelt "gooch" sometimes.