I’ve had my new road bike since the beginning of October and so far I’ve done 600 miles and had to spend a big fat zero on the bike (OK, I did change the saddle to a more comfy one). 600 miles on the Quantocks on a MTB at this time of year will cost at least one set of disc pads and the chain will be on the way out.

My road bike has been depressingly reliable too.

Where’s the incentive to ‘upgrade’ when the bloody thing just keeps working for mile after mile.

My road bike is reliable as well. It does get very dusty in the corner of the shed though 😳

Same here – don’t use mine all that much but it’s needed almost zero spending on it since I got it (after adding a few essentials like a Road Drive pump, Strada computer and saddle bag.)

Conversely my heavily used MTB wears out/breaks expensively all the time!

… it’s much more fun wearing out your mountain bike though

Single-speeding is almost as cheap 😉

had mine for 12 months now, cant fault it. Was as shock to have to spend cash on it last weekend on a pair of brake blocks. And lube. Its just ‘simple’, no bleeding, no suspension, wipe down and jobs a good’un. Was in two minds whether a carbon road bike was good idea for daily commute…..it was.

I still laugh at how light mine is – it’s not even a very good model (2010 Allez Elite) but it seems to weigh nothing!

My now (HT) expensive MTB has had £100s if not £1000s spent on it shedding about 1.5-2lbs in total yet is still a lot heavier.

Leaves more to spend on kit and carbon upgrades 🙂

In three years and maybe 10k miles, mine has needed:

Saddle I could live with (road bike fit is crucial)
Stem (as above)
New shifters (unclear if they died because of user error)
New rear mech – not strictly needed but the old one was a touch floppy
New BB bearings
3 sets of brake pads
4 sets of tyres
About 4 chains
A cassette
Two new sets of cleats for look pedals
New cables

My now (HT) expensive MTB has had £100s if not £1000s spent on it shedding about 1.5-2lbs in total yet is still a lot heavier.

Well duh – MTBs are a lot heavier than road bikes obviously!

ive got quite a few mates who would disagree! they spend thousands each year getting the colour/weight just right… 🙂

I practically went over to the darkside in the spring. What I’ve noticed is that it’s very cheap compared to mountain biking…. and very low maintainance, quick hose down and dry in the sun every month and that’s about it (barring the oil and GT85)

Yep, in 4 years and probably about 6,000 miles I’ve spent very little on mine. Replaced bars and saddle pretty soon to get the fit right and I’ve replaced brake pads a couple of times, gone through a few tyres and put a new chain and cassette on at the start of the summer. It just seems to keep on working and things just don’t wear out like they do on an MTB.

You can’t compare 600 miles on a road bike and 600 miles on a MTB the road bike will see much higher mileage for the same number of hours riding. The running cost will probably still be less but your comparison of 600 mile off road to 600 mile on road does not give a true representation of cost.

It’s noticeable that roadies seem to spend more onkit but I think it’secause they buy less of it. Things do just last longer. You measure the life of wearing components in years and not months. The initial coat always seems to be much higher though.

Don’t crash, then it get’s expensive. On a mtb you get your kit muddy and maybe the odd tear. I crashed on sunday (at a moderate speed) and managed to put a whole in everthing I was wearing other than my socks and shoes.

You can’t compare 600 miles on a road bike and 600 miles on a MTB the road bike will see much higher mileage for the same number of hours riding.

Well yes but a far bigger factor imo is the conditions of those miles. It’s grit and crud that do for MTB components.

My road bike has been depressingly reliable too.

Where’s the incentive to ‘upgrade’ when the bloody thing just keeps working for mile after mile.

It’s still easy to spunk cash upgrading road kit;

end of 2008 – 2010 spend

Another Road bike to try tt’ing on
Tri bars for tt’ing on road bike
Planet X 80/101 wheels for tt’ing on road bike
wheel bags for new wheels
skinsuit for tt’ing
pointy helmet for tt’ing
Time trial frame
groupset, bars, etc for time trial frame – can’t use the kit on the afore mentioned road bike as that’s now my training bike
better quality carbon tri bars to take the bar end gear levers
aero bottle and cage for tt frame
new front wheel as deep Planet x a bit twitchy in cross wind.
rear disc wheel
spare cassette for disc wheel
Club skinsuit
Wheel covers for 101 rear wheel to use it as a spare disc wheel as it is not being used much now
Chuck in various race tyres and tubs, carbon brake pads, etc etc

Next year – new tt frame, better aero helmet

molgrips – I second that….. 3500 miles on the road between January and now and all I’ve done to my roadbike is change the tyres once, not even changed the brake pads yet..

Ignoring upgrades (decent wheels, a compact chainset for long hilly days out), the decent road bike is relatively inexpensive.

The commuter/winter trainer is more costly, but that’s mainly because it does c 10,000 miles a year. Tyres, brakes, rims, chains, cassettes, chainrings….

But let’s be honest anyone riding a road bike in Lycra looks a total ****.

It’s because road cycling is BORING

It’s cheap until you decide it’d be nice to have some lighter wheels, faster tyres, had better get the right shoes too….

Suddenly mountain bike gear looks cheap by comparison but roadie stuff and road bikes are much prettier!

The running cost will probably still be less but your comparison of 600 mile off road to 600 mile on road does not give a true representation of cost.

True to some extent as I was told many years ago that 1 mile offroad = 2 miles onroad, but that’s my point if I did the same distance offroad it would cost a lot more (even if I did half the distance offroad it would still cost more).

3500 miles and nothing needed???

In that time I’d have gone through 3 chains, at least one cassette, a pair of tyres, a couple of sets of brake pads.

Hey Timbur,

Want to sell that dusty bike then?

Well yes but a far bigger factor imo is the conditions of those miles. It’s grit and crud that do for MTB components.

For this comparison the mechanism of wear (although I would agree that it is the higher level of grim that cause the increased wear rate) is unimportant but that they receive the same amount of use for the comparison to be valid hence the hour use vs mileage.

I’ve read the newspaper today so am a bit wound up about improper metric usage. I may go write to badscience about this one.

One odd thing – road bikes stay much cleaner apart from on the chains – they get REALLY black and grimy.

I found the ride section of the tri I did extremely exciting actually. And you can go as fast as you want downhill with much less chance of crashing.

Still prefer MTBing but road riding is definitely fun too.

hence the hour use vs mileage

Using hours to record the length of MTB rides (especially group rides) is next to useless, because, in my experience, up to 50% of the time can be wasted standing around.

I think road biking can be very cheep.

After the initial outlay. i.e. bike, shoes, clothing etc.
It will run for many many miles, could be years with limited expense and a little self maintenance.

But like many sports the upgrade / hobby / keep up with the jones type of thing will emerge.
The working absolutely fine bike will be relegated to a winter bike and a spangly new carbon version will be its replacement and this cycle will be repeated over and over again.

It can be cheep .. and it can be very expensive.

Or even cheAp.

3500 miles and nothing needed???

In that time I’d have gone through 3 chains, at least one cassette, a pair of tyres, a couple of sets of brake pads.

yup, not thing at all…. and only 1 puncture 🙂

Suddenly mountain bike gear looks cheap by comparison

I disagree the cost of roadbike components and MTB components is completely comparable.. Except a descent set of road forks cost £200 or so instead of £500+

I’ve just had a look on CRC and there’s very little difference in price between XTR and Dura-Ace, where does the idea that road stuff is expensive come from? Maybe roadies tend to be “tight-wads” and moan about the prices more 😆

If you really want to chew road kit up, do a season of cyclocross races!

My Langster wins the crown of ‘lowest running cost bike’. Only bought one set of pads for each end in 500 miles of use.

I’m more and more tempted by a singlespeed MTB now….