On Tuesday, February 24, 2015 at 4:57:32 PM UTC-8, Jim Bronson wrote: > > Why? Why, over and over again? Because the racing philosophy has the > mainstream and the LBS. And it's not what serves most causal riders best, > and I applaud Grant for calling them out for it. > We all have seen at the LBS the times when some racerish young LBS > employee is trying to fit an older person onto a racerish bike, that will > not be well served by said bike. Why is this what's in the mainstream? >
I just got off the phone with three representative LBS's. I asked them all the same thing: I'm going to send my 58-year-old neighbor in to see you. He has average fitness, not bad, hikes on the weekend, hasn't ridden a bike since college. He wants to start riding on weekends, maybe work up riding more regularly. What kind of bike do you think he should look at first? The shops were Black Mountain Bicycles, a large Specialized dealer, the Performance near my house, and the Trek Super Store nearest to my house. All three gave me the same answer: a flat bar road hybrid. None said, well, duh, a racing bicycle, of course, with drop bars three inches below the saddle! Then I asked about what tires would come with the bikes. Both the Trek and Specialized stores said, somewhere between 32 and 38. The guy at Performance said, 28 at the narrowest, but more likely 32 or 35. Two of the three asked if I knew whether my friend had back or neck pain, and both suggested my friend should start off with something pretty upright. The guy at Performance said, well, I'd really have to talk to him to find out what he wants to do with the bike. So, are those answers OK with you, Jim? How big a sample do I need to persuade you that stereotyping the industry, LBS's, and a group of cyclists, has the same value as other stereotypes? By the way, do you know what bike shops make the most money on, the largest margins? Rubber and softgoods. If LBS's are as stupid and singleminded as you and, apparently, Grant think they are, and if they are pushing bikes that will make people uncomfortable, tell me, do you think their customers will come back and buy rubber and softgoods? Will their customers be excited about riding, and bring their friends in to buy bikes? Do I think the racerish sale has ever happened? Of course I know that it has. There are poor salespeople, making inappropriate sales, in every industry. However, tarring the bicycle industry, and a significant group of its members, all with the same brush, is not productive, and does not reflect well on the speaker. The whole nonsense of making an entire group of people wrong so that you can feel superior just needs to stop. And I gotta tell you, I've never heard any of the racer-y people I know say, those people on lugged steel bikes with alba bars sure are stupid and brainwashed. I refer again to Norma's last paragraph. Clearly, she has gotten an impression about Grant and about his positions, and it's not a positive impression. I'm betting that she is in fact a nice person, and not a stupid one. And, she's a cyclist! However she arrived at her impression of Grant ... well, you draw your own conclusions. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
