Riding out the other day (one of the first rides on the road after a knee replacement), I was passed by a group of four old guys pootling along, chatting to each other as they rode their bikes. The final guy to pass me was riding an old steel-frame, specialised bike with gear levers on the down tube, an extraordinary, ancient thing that made me smile like a classic car.
The guys dropped in, and I dropped in behind them, and then I ended up cycling beside this guy just for a little while and commenting on how much I loved his bike. He was laughing with me; the other three guys had brand-new carbon monocoque bikes - thousands of pounds worth of kit - beautiful in their modernity. He said to me they keep hassling him to buy a bike like that, and he has the money, but he loves the bike he has. He said he rode Land's End to John o' Groats on that bike.
I looked down at my bike, thousands of pounds and hours of work to get, been to places with it that are amazing. I've never done Land's End to John o' Groats, and there was a guy beside me in his 60s, smiling away on his ramshackle old specialised bike, who's ridden from Land's End to John o' Groats.
Do you get it?
Blog Post Number - 4209