There was no need for Rule #74 until the cyclometer showed up on our handlebars. According to the late Sheldon Brown, the cyclometer has been around since the early 1900s.
“Star-wheel cyclometers, such as the Lucas unit, suffered two serious problems. They made an annoying “tink-tink-tink” noise. At high speeds, the star wheel would sometimes turn too far when hit by the fast-moving striker, then, the next time around the striker would hit the tip of one of the star points, sometimes knocking the unit out of position.”
My thought is, these things have been annoying us for much too long. As a youth no one had any measuring device on their bike. There are no old black and white photos of racers staring down at their front hubs to the Lucas meters. Eddy had retired before the Avocet made its debut. He would have caused his to go to failure or he would have removed it because it was extra weight and rubbish.
I bought an Avocet digital cyclometer as soon as I could. It had two slightly inset buttons to better hold water to seep inside. It read speed and elapsed time. That was something to get excited about. Going from no data to data was big, this was going to improve cycling.
Thirty years and many cyclometers later I’m not convinced. My most recent model was a Cateye wireless cyclometer with heart rate and it demanded a new battery every two months…enough! I needed anything else, which made me ask an obvious question- why? Do I care how fast I’m going? I know it’s not very fast and no I don’t really care.
It’s more a question of how hard am I going? Hard or not so hard and again, I’m not trying to quantify this anymore. I’m no quant. I’m beyond quant. It’s not being too old as much as I’ve been riding for so damn long the numbers no longer interest me. Even if I was training for a specific event I have moved past the desire to have data. I did encourage my wife into upgrading to a Garmin 500 as she is into data. I encouraged her because I wanted to know the grades of some of our climbs. I should have kept quiet and emulated a friend who actually went out with a tape measure and long level and quantified the grades to the island’s most “interesting” climbs, bless his heart.
It’s been gratifying to look around on the Sunday group ride I’ve fallen into and notice that some of my cycling friends also have no cyclometers on their bikes. I’m not even sure it’s an interesting point of discussion amongst us. The people who are training with data don’t show up on this ride often because we spend the first 40 km gossiping, riding two abreast, riding a route too curvy, hilly and breath-taking for staring at a watt meter. The second part, I’ve heard*, turns sporty as the big guns get fired leaving bodies scattered along the route home. Training with data requires control of effort. Luckily my people have little interest in that. This Sunday ride is more pleasure than pain and I don’t need a meter to tell me a serious workout was logged.
I was visiting friends who worked and lived in Monaco and was told about the eighty year old owner of the building they rented in. Most every Sunday morning he and his buddies would kit up and go for a ride either east into Italy or west into France. I assume this had been the routine for decades. Eventually they would stop for a nice long Sunday lunch then they ride to the nearest train platform, roll their bikes on the train and return home via rail. Damn, I want to be one of those guys if I get close to eighty. And damn I wish I had a bike and kit when I was there, it would have been a riot to ride with them. I bet those old dudes have V-meters on their bikes.
*either I have turned back before the official turn around or I’m shelled out so early that all I hear are the distant reports. At some point the return always becomes a death slog and as such, a good training ride.
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I've been riding with a clean stem/bars for the past year and it's great. I like Strava too, so I stick a Garmin 200 in my jersey pocket. No data during the ride. Then I get to re-live the ride later when I upload.
nice one!
i like having data, but can't stand the cyclometers. i'm using strava with my phone, which i'm keeping in my pocket so i don't get distracted from the pleasure of the ride.
So many people using Strava...er I have to confess, that I like data and ride every ride I can with a Garmin. However I don't look at it at all during the ride, I am not sure why I would want to. But I do enjoy loading the data on to the PC at the end whilst I am cooling down and just looking at where I have been, and in particular the gradients of some of the climbs.
I'm not that keen on Strava, the social/competitive nature of it does not appeal to me. I use ridewithgps and cross match with garmin training center...but I also manually enter in to a spreadsheet...call me paranoid, but I really want a record of all my rides, I put in comments like wind, weather, how the ride felt. This is not to get any better, it is really just like keeping a diary, if my Garmin broke tomorrow, I really would not care, but I would still log my spreadsheet just for the memories.....
@mcsqueak I'm a big fan of Strava as well. I like that I can just turn it on and put it in my pocket and then just ride on sensations. I have a Cateye Strada Wireless with mounts on Bikes #1 and #2, but none on my other two bikes. Lately I've found I enjoy riding without the immediate data feedback more, but I do like knowing its all being recorded for viewing later at home. I may just ditch the Cateye - the bikes look much better without it anyway.
@Nate
I've been thinking of doing that as well. No reason not to that I can think of. Plus since I switched out my 100mm stem for a 90mm stem, the Garmin looks a little stupid on there as it's basically takes up the whole "neck" of the stem.
Strava and Garmin, I'm loving it but still use the Sunnto for the odd ride and indoor work outs, just to keep the Stravaneski guessing.
I roll with a Garmin, the nice thing about it is that it allows me to limit what it displays to me. I roll with speed, HR, temperature, and distance. I like a bit of data, but not too much. I do have every computer I've ever owned since 1993 though. I find it really interesting that I used to operate comfortably at 185BPM for 30-40 minutes, now that's pretty much my max.
@Nate
I like this plan a lot! Hmm, maybe I should see if my wireless Cateye computers will record from my jersey pocket...I'd love clean bars.
scaler - Do you there is such a thing as a sex addict? I know how I've reacted to sports stars and such claiming as much. And, just read an interesting discussion on the topic.
And now things get totally wacky...
@TBONE I hear you there. My max is definitely around 185 these days. I guess age has inevitable effects on our on the bike abilities.
My biggest enemy on rides in my mind; about 95% of my rides are solo, leaving me to ride against myself. When with another cyclist, not drafting, I can push myself immensely further and harder, for the same amount of time & suffering as solo.
To counter this, I've been slipping my wireless cycling computer into my jersey after I turn it on. I can tell when my cadence needs to be adjusted using my legs, and I don't need numbers flashing at me constantly, telling me what I should be able to feel with my body. I only keep it in my jersey pocket because I like to record distances on exploratory rides.
Hiding my computer is as much Rule #6 as it is Rule #74. It's easy to get caught up in data. But numbers only tell limits. Free yourself from numbers and you'll free yourself from those preconceived limits.