Bad ride yesterday - We all have them!
Comments
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styxd wrote:Brakeless wrote:styxd wrote:Slowbike wrote:Amazing how sanctimonious you guys can sound ... "oo why would you need a GPS you can ride without one" ... well of course you can ride without one and you can ride without mapping - but ask yourself this ... why SHOULDN'T you ride with one? It adds another dimension to your ride should you want one, it can add a degree of record keeping that allows you to see how well you are improving (or not) and it can sometimes help with navigation - leaving you more time to enjoy the ride...
Mine is on every ride - I don't need the stats whilst riding and (most of the time) I know where I'm going - but it records the ride for me and it can be quite interesting to compare how you rode segments against a previous ride.
Alternatively I can use it to target certain elements of riding - so I could try to ride to a heart rate or beat a personal record - or if I ride on unfamiliar roads I can switch to the mapping element to help me understand where I could go to take the flatest/quickest/hardest/longest ride.
Having a GPS on my bike gives me the choice - I can choose to use it or ignore it - at any point in the ride ... you might not want one, but just because you don't doesn't mean everyone else should go without too ...
Cycling should be about freedom, daring, adventure, bravery, challenge etc.
Its not about the Garmin, or the bike, or the Strava segments.
I think the real cycling heroes/pioneers would agree.
Having to "log on" before riding your bike seems to undermine everything cycling is about.
What a load of bollerxx
Can you expand?
This weekend I rode 40 miles on Saturday and 50 miles on Sunday, it wasn't daring, adventerous or brave. It was just a bike ride.0 -
styxd wrote:TheSmithers wrote:styxd wrote:Cycling should be about freedom, daring, adventure, bravery, challenge etc.
How does having a GPS bike computer detract from any of that really?
It doesn't control me or my ride. It supplements my ride. I don't ride along with my eyes glued to the figures. I still get a feeling of freedom, daring and all the other stuff you mention. It's what I love about cycling. Are you saying I'm less brave for having a GPS cycle computer, or that it's less of a challenge? What rubbish! You sound to me like a more traditional cyclist, and there's nothing wrong with that at all and I respect you for it, but you should also respect my choice for wanting to use hi-tech gadgetry to enhance and supplement my rides.
FYI, I don't normally program routes into my Garmin for it to navigate me round. I only did for this one particular course because it was intricate and much of it in unfamiliar territory. Without it, I would never have got as far as I did.
All I'm saying is, if a Garmin computer ruined a bike ride then I wouldn't use one. Get rid of it. It might happen next time you go out. How many ruined rides will it take?
Ride on feel.
It wasn't solely the bike computer yesterday. It was a combination of things, i.e. failing daylight, lack of proper nutrition, and yes the navigation failing me a couple of times. I've been out on at least 10 rides with it now, and I can safely say it's been a valuable tool which I've benefited, and will continue to benefit from as my fitness increases.
I take it you don't have one?!
Do you feel the same about hi-tech materials (carbon fiber etc) and electronic shifting? I bet you hate that?! Electronic shifting?! Heroes of old didn't need that!
Like everything though, cycling evolves.0 -
With or without is your choice. My 500 is only used to record and download to strava. I tend to ride familiar courses all the time or do out and backs ... But that's just me being a wimp0
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How about a combination of 'feel' and tech?
I use the 500, and can happily explore new roads in my area knowing that with the compass feature I'll never get lost.
It's one of the most useful things on the 500 IMO, and nice and accurate. It will always get you home, unless you really mess up. It's also useful for judging your speed/effort against wind direction.
So no need for the big old chunky 800 for me, the 500's fine, but I can see the need for an 800 if you're off to strange new places - like France for example!0 -
styxd wrote:Slowbike wrote:Don't let a malfunctioning gadget ruin your ride ...
I imagine once you become "gadget dependant" then this would prove difficult to avoid.
Just how many gadgets do you have on your bike?
Brakes, Levers, derailleurs, pumps, tyre levers, multi-tools, lights, pedals & clips?
they're all gadgets and you depend on those ...
and it depends on your definition of "ruined" ... it seems the OPs ruined ride was that he didn't achieve the route that he set out to do. I've had rides where the GPS has played up - it doesn't "ruin my ride" though ... even if I take a "wrong" turning - it just changes the game plan ...
Last time I really used the GPS for Nav was in France - we could plan a route and ride it on completely unknown roads to us with the certainty that we could find where we left the car a good few hours earlier - the routes didn't always work, but you could always see where you started from and get back there.
In your book we should've ridden by feel ... but with the instrumentation available we could push ourselves further than we would've done without - so we actually had better rides ...
and on a couple of occasions I could test my (lack of) hill climbing ability and compare it to others on the same segment by using strava ... now that's a good challenge ...0 -
styxd wrote:Brakeless wrote:This weekend I rode 40 miles on Saturday and 50 miles on Sunday, it wasn't daring, adventerous or brave. It was just a bike ride.
I guess that depends where you've come from and what you've been through.
Well I've come from nowhere and been through very little so therefore my bike ride like most bike rides wasn't daring, brave or adventerous. It was just a bike ride.0 -
Funny you should say that ...bernithebiker wrote:So no need for the big old chunky 800 for me, the 500's fine, but I can see the need for an 800 if you're off to strange new places - like France for example!
I've come from sailing where charts (maps for the layman) are the norm but mostly unused in local waters- so it feels quite natural to have mapping facility that sits there unused for the most part.0 -
My problem is that I am quite superstitious, which I think comes from years of playing footy (the 'must have' lucky socks, boots on left then right, etc.). Always do prep things in a certain order/way or it just does not feel quite right. I once did a ride but could not find the right AC/DC track to listen to on the way to the start...ride never felt right and I punctured after about 10 miles and had to fix it in the pouring rain. Hasn't helped with my OCD!
Ref the stuff about getting lost, quite easy to do on audaxes as routecards are pretty much a list of "turn right at T", "next left", etc., so having come a cropper once or twice (as in having a decent map but not having a clue where I was) I now try and clock the villages as I go through them. I have been amazed on some rides though where folks have turned up without a routecard or map and seem to have planned to be solely reliant on following someone else who knows the way (I know someone who followed a wheel for 20 miles only to then find himself at the leader's front door, as in the rider in front was just out for spin and was nothing to do with the audax).
My one disastrous day was last summer. Day started badly when I got up bang on time but had to wait for 2 hours for the rain to stop before leaving the caravan (family holiday), then the rain started again and got heavier and heavier. Ended up like some biblical movie and up on top of Dartmoor I came a cropper and went over the front. Lost big chunks of teeth, big cuts to legs, hands and face, punctured and sat in about 3 inches of water not knowing what to do. A good samaritan stopped and gave me a lift to A&E...although she got lost on the way and we ended up driving for 3 hours when apparently it should have been a 30 min drive. In the evening (having been patched up) I went to get my bike back and took my daughter to help but nearly ran out of diesel in a remote part, managed to freewheel to a garage. Then the car nearly got caught in the floods on top of the moor and I had to get my daughter to walk through some flooded sections to gauge the depth (up to her knees), no phone signal, feeling crap, daughter scared sh*tless as the car warning lights keep coming on/off whilst we were surrounded by blackness and rushing water. Managed to get back ok (having abandoned the pickup attempt) but needed a large volume of alcohol before I could relax. It was certainly an adventure. I waited for 2 days, picked up my bike and then did the whole planned route. Lovely ride 0 -
bernithebiker wrote:How about a combination of 'feel' and tech?
I use the 500, and can happily explore new roads in my area knowing that with the compass feature I'll never get lost.
It's one of the most useful things on the 500 IMO, and nice and accurate. It will always get you home, unless you really mess up. It's also useful for judging your speed/effort against wind direction.
So no need for the big old chunky 800 for me, the 500's fine, but I can see the need for an 800 if you're off to strange new places - like France for example!
Can you explain the compass feature? I have a 500 and don't think I've seen this or I know it as something else. I've used the 'breadcrumb' route tracking but this had points along it so would point to the next point, not home.0
