We are cyclists, the rest of the world merely rides a bike. What defines us as cyclists? Can a recumbent rider be a cyclist, a unicyclist, a fat recumbent rider with hairy legs and a YJA on? I think yes but am I snob for even asking?
Years ago, I was helping a woman at another research institution set up some scientific equipment. Evidently we kept our small talk very small because it never came up that she was the wife of a cyclist friend, Paul. I had ridden with this guy many times, he used to race a lot, and he always put in his miles. Eventually, he and I put it together that I had been working with his wife.
“She didn’t think you were cyclist, as you didn’t have shaved legs.”
Boom, lightening struck, really, that’s the requisite? I had dabbled in racing fleetingly and shave up for it but unless one was somewhere in the spectrum between racer and ex-racer, I thought it was almost false advertising to shave the legs. I rode nearly as much as Paul, I was probably more obsessed with professional european cycling than he was. Actually, I had to have been a lot more obsessed than him, he had a PhD and could not spend his lunch break cloistered in his office reading Cycling News online, every day, could he? Was I not a cyclist too?
In the 1970s at a big college where I knew no one, I became best friends with a fellow misfit, Mark. He had raced on the boards through his high school years, racing at the outdoor velodrome in Northbrook, Illinois. The Chicago area must have been a hot bed of American cycling back then. High school youth with too much energy could channel it into track racing on bikes when it was warm and track racing on speed-skates when it was cold. We bonded over Jimi, not Eddy but he had a huge poster of Eddy Merckx in his dorm room. I had never seen that before. I dare say he worshiped Eddy. He agonized over still referring to himself as a track racer, though he had not raced in two years. I didn’t understand at the time how important a question this was to him. It was his identity. Let’s see, you haven’t raced in a long time, and you have a bong in your hand, you might not be a bike racer anymore, I thought, but I didn’t get it. He was still a cyclist.
It was his unbridled enthusiasm for bikes and cycling that opened my eyes. He understood a whole universe I was unaware of and even though we were the same age, he became my sensi.
We both dropped out of school that year and the sensi began his work. His Campagnolo-ed up Frejus road bike was always spotless. He taught me by example only, everything about looking fantastic on the bike. He was the one who insisted we take apart my brand new, as yet unridden Peugeot PX-10 down to the ball bearings and rebuild it properly. He was a Velominati long before there were Velominati. As a sad endnote to this, Mark died in his sleep in his early twenties; some cruel syndrome that kills young healthy men for no known reason. One of his track jerseys has always hung deep in my closet. It remains, as the idea of discarding it is still impossible.
So what makes us cyclists instead of just bike riders? Is it love? Does loving to ride any wheeled (I’m not unicyclist phobic) machine do it? Is it the need to ride where we cross the line? If riding defines us and we are good with that, then we are cyclists.
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The difference between a cyclist and a bike rider to me is that a cyclist spends time on his bike for no reason - he's not commuting, not off to the shops, not even trying to stick to a new years resolution - he's just riding. In short, the difference is love.
Excellent,
I reckon we are cyclists if the passion is consuming.
I get a little angry if havent ridden at least twice a week. Juggling that to keep sane with a very busy family is often difficult. Night riding has enabled the endorphins to come out to play when all else has failed.
Road cycling is my drug of choice, no matter when or how, I need the fix to keep the addiction fed.
Riding my bike is my therapy. It is all consuming, and I think about it non stop, day and night. I get nervous and sleepless the day before a big ride/race, kinda like a kid on Christmas Eve. I have no idea why I took so long to accept this addiction of mine, I have truly wasted a lifetime of undue stress to my body, that I could have otherwise been releasing through two clipless pedals. (there might be some that claim my obsession requires professional therapy - fuck them)
Pinning some numbers to my kit and racing my steed on weekends, is quite literally a legal drug. Riding alone, for hours on end, in our East TN rolling hill is nothing short of indescribable ecstasy. The psst, of an air pump, the clicking in of cleats, and the sound of rubber rolling across the tarmac. There is no better addiction.
Good piece. Good question. I think we are cyclists because we define ourselves that way. In the same way there be runners and people who jog, surfers and also people who surf. We don't just jump on a bicycle. We take an interest in the sport - what it teaches us, its history and techniques. We respect the tools, take it seriously, and expect to suffer for it. We foster a professional attitude (mostly) without the $s.
I need a Frank for the words ...
Love it, great writing @Gianni. It is not defined by others, as has already been said, this begs the question....are we a religion...are we a culture...are we actually an entirely separate race? (Pardon the pun)
A neighbor rides a late 80's Hard Rock to work and to run errands, visit her sister etc. 5200 miles a year. She's a cyclist.
An employee commutes 6 miles each day when the weather permits, on a '68 Schwinn.
I struggle to get 3-4000 miles a year on some expensive hardware.
We are all cyclists. If you throw a leg over and pedal it, you're a cyclist. I'm stymied to think of the words to describe the arrogance of the phrase "serious cyclist".
Cyclist: [sahy-klist] n. "bicyclist," 1882; see bicycle + -ist. Saxonists preferred wheelman.
1: One who travels by bicycle.
2: One for whom the desire to ride a human-powered vehicle is overwhelming, compulsive, innate, and engaged in without regard for pain, suffering, or other vicissitudes inherent in endurance sports. Failure to observe Rule 4, Rule 5, and Rule 9 is antithetical to this definition. This definition is inclusive of all persons so afflicted, and is not affected by:
As for myself, I follow the fucking rules**, but we're all brothers and sisters on the road.
**Well, except for Rule 34, Rule 62, and Rule 29 for self-supported brevets over 300k. See Rule 5 and STFU in the last case.
@VeloSix
Yes, yes, yes, yes, and hell yes. All of that. I agree, fuck them to the tenth power. Idiots.
Tennessee can be a cycling paradise. Wish I was able to ride in East TN more - I'm in NashVegas.
Gianni, great piece! Save for the dropping out of school bit and the decade involved, my induction into the faith mirrors yours quite closely. My sensi taught me the rules entirely by example and sadly as well died young (of myeloma). I haven't a memento though, save for awesome memories.
Tangent: riding the "Flatest Century" last year my riding buddy was asked by a teammate's wife if he was a poser (because he shaves but does not race). "I'm a cyclist...of course I shave," was a great answer.
It is not the miles you put or the times in a week you ride. Being a cyclist does not have to do with actually cycling imho. You can be a cyclist even if you don't ride your bike.
I have a 2 year old boy and a 2 month old baby, a wife and a job. I have not ridden outside the last 8 months. I dont have the time.
Three times a week I put my Colnago Super on my trainer and I do my training programme for 1-2 hours. I love sweating and aching while pushing the pedals, even if I see the boring apartment opposite of ours. In my agony I smile when i see that gorgeous Sarronni red of the paintscheme or the club on the steel fork. I am not moving a single meter, the view is urban but in my eyes I am in the high mountains of the audax I am trying to keep fit for in 9 weeks. I can see the trees and the river that starts after 30 kilometeres from the start and will keep us company for 12 kilometers.
When the bike is stored in the balcony I can see its rear as I watch TV. That gorgeous view of the saddle up there going down to the italian carbon seatpost and meeting the frame to that fine thin steel seatstays with the wheel among them is so damn sexy some time that I am carried away and stop watching the movie and watch the bike for a minute.
Some people choose their proffession to define them. Cyclists are defined by a bicycle. You can be still in your living room and yet in your mind you could be climbing a mountain. You are watching the Vuelta and your heart for some seconds beats faster because you are part of the peloton and you can actually sense Froome and Contador a few meters away .
We are cyclist because a bicycle can make our heart beat faster even for a few seconds without being on it.