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Here's the background. I want a new road bike, there is no real justification for it, I just do. I can afford it, I have agreement from my wife to do so and I know roughly what I want. Yet I still can't click buy on what I think is the best bike for me.
I've come to the conclusion that it is a heart and head clash. The decision to buy a bike is a heart decision, irrational, frivolous, not in any way logical. Yet I have set about the buying process with my head, looking for value, for sensible options, for the bargains.
Frankly, this is a pointless post, maybe someone else feels this way, but I just wanted to tell someone, anyone who might have a vague idea as to how I feel.
Isn't that how most of us make important decisions though? You need to have an emotional yearning for something whether it be a partner, house, car, bike... Then the sensible part of the brain needs to take over to rationalise things i.e. not to shack up with the gorgeous bunny boiler or buy the 10 year old Alfa. I think that is totally normal - especially when you have a certain budget to work to.
FWIW, I think it's hard to really want a bike you've not swung a leg over - I recall from your other posts that your were looking at Sensa bikes.
Edit: There's a joke somewhere in there but I'm not going there...
I know [i]exactly[/i] how you feel*.
*new bike hopefully arriving end of next week or the week after. 🙂
If you only ever made your purchases based on "need" then you probably would not have a bike in the first place.
Get it bought you big Jessie. 🙂
slowpuncheur, you are correct about me looking at the Sensa bikes, they are the sensible option that I am drawn to but not enough to click buy. However, I've also spent a lot of time over the last month in various bike shops, sitting, touching and generally being around bikes. Yet, I haven't bought any of them either.
I've also spent a lot of time
And? For me at least, there's a certain pleasure in shopping for a new bike, comparing options in flesh and online, working out what's a good deal etc. I get pleasure from buying bikes, owning bikes, upgrading bikes, maintaining bikes, riding bikes, talking about bikes.... etc.
I like bikes.
Do you like bikes?
Do you need more reason than that?
If you can afford to, spending your money doing things you like is a good use of it IMO.
IA, don't get me wrong, it's been a pleasurable process looking, comparing and spending time around new bikes, it's just interesting that I've still not bought one!
I too have been pondering. I even put a deposit on a giant defy advanced pro 1 then cancelling it over my worry id like di2. This is after only going to the shop to look at a cannondale synapse disc.
Then looking at rose bikes hydro with di2 great value even has thru axles and 2016 brake mounts but then i worried well come next year id want the flat mount calipers not the ones supplied and am i sure 15mm front is the way its goin as i thought it was 12mm so would i be limiting myself
Then the wife points out i prefer cx to road so what on earth am i doing
So at the min who knows. Rose dx di2 (i prefer the alloy to steel for some reason). A giant advanced pro something. Or left field a shand rohloff or indeed as will probably happen the more i mither nothing at all this year
Doh....
Oh yeah, I was in the same boat. I basically hummed and hawed for ages till my partner/everyone got sick of banging on about it and told me to buy a bike to shut up going on about it 😀
What's on the shortlist, then everyone can post other options based on what they own 😆
I guarantee you'd feel better if you bought [b]me[/b] a new road bike
benji, the shortlist is ever changing. The requirements are are short and vague:
Good, stiff frame with racey geometry. Carbon was the material of choice Hora's Ritchey has made me question through though.
Ultegra Di2, though mechanica Dura-Ace has been debated
Carbon wheels. I know I could get lighter with alu wheels but I want carbon ones. This is one of the few things I know I want.
Err, that's it. Useless I know.
Could be worse I have a realist versus fantasist arguing in my head, I commute by bike, pretty much all year and in any weather. I'm 'interested' in a new bike, something with gears as I'm starting to get pain in my right knee and this could be to do with just pedal mashing a single speed.
So one side of the brain says:
It's new a shiny, go on, you could get disc brakes and a lighter bike out of it, plus those lovely gears you think you need on windy days.
Other more logical side says:
It won't be that different to the current bike, I rarely have to brake as I'm on a cycleway for all of my commute. I won't clean or maintain the gears so there is no point in having them. The commute is flat so gears aren't that useful anyway. If you lose some weight the knee problem will likely go away anyway.
This has been going on for well over a year now!
I'm sort of in the same boat, I was dying to get down to the Alps this summer, I didn't go last year because we had a Baby in June, I didn't go the year before, because I was made redundant and we got married so this year - nothing was going to stop me - My Wife quite rightly objected to being left with the kids, me spending money when really we need to move house and the general sense of loss of being apart from such sheer awesomeness - there were arguments, there was crossed words, there was compromise and finally there was agreement.
But ultimately I've decided not to go - we DO need to move house, I probably left it a bit too late and frankly my Mates are wishy washy as hell - why is it that the people who argument the most vocally that they MUST go on a certain date and we MUST go to a certain place and we MUST travel a certain way are always the ones who say "actually, I can't go" at the 11th hour.
Anyway, BPW is as good as PDS is it not?
FML.