Well said, Sanesh. For years, I've been saying (and heard it said by others) that there's a difference between how many of us feel about current incarnation bikes vs the steel hardtails of the past. What I try to work out in my mind is how much of this is about the bike, and how much of it is dictated by my age + experience, ability to swap bikes out more easily than it was to swap out a fork when I was young with very little money...or is there something about metal bikes that all kind of sucked for what we expected of them (talking about late 90s / early 00s) vs. plastic ones that all kind of rule.
Are those imperfections we learned to live with part of what we loved, or did we just not know any better and grow content? Does keeping a bike longer and slowly upgrading it lead to loving it more? (that's a pretty obvious 'yes' to me). Is this a different form of 'the journey is sweeter than reaching the destination'? Likely.
Oct. 6, 2022, 10:55 a.m. - Pete Roggeman
Well said, Sanesh. For years, I've been saying (and heard it said by others) that there's a difference between how many of us feel about current incarnation bikes vs the steel hardtails of the past. What I try to work out in my mind is how much of this is about the bike, and how much of it is dictated by my age + experience, ability to swap bikes out more easily than it was to swap out a fork when I was young with very little money...or is there something about metal bikes that all kind of sucked for what we expected of them (talking about late 90s / early 00s) vs. plastic ones that all kind of rule. Are those imperfections we learned to live with part of what we loved, or did we just not know any better and grow content? Does keeping a bike longer and slowly upgrading it lead to loving it more? (that's a pretty obvious 'yes' to me). Is this a different form of 'the journey is sweeter than reaching the destination'? Likely.