Utility

Bicycles are the greatest invention of humankind.

OK, medicine, agriculture, and the written word have all been great too, but the bicycle brings an unmatched joy to our lives.

There’s a freedom you get when you ride a bike. Others have written innumerable words about the joy of riding, but it is worth talking about because it is inspiring. You get to be free, go where you like, go faster than you knew possible, see different places, and go on adventures. All of this happens under your own steam and is facilitated by the utility of your bike.

Utility is a strange concept. Utilitarian things are not always considered beautiful. There’s an argument that function and form must meet and be matched for something to be truly beautiful. I don’t know that that is true, but I do know that bicycles provide an astonishing level of utility whilst also being incredibly beautiful.

That utility is often defined by a label (gravel, road, CX, MTB, enduro, track, triathlon, etc.) and the wider industry would have you believe that each of these bikes does a slightly different thing and shouldn’t be used for any of the other activities because it simply won’t perform. I’d love to be able to tell you that this is true and that you need to order a fleet of bikes from me, but the reality is, that some of the most fun is had by stretching the utility of your bike and taking it places it should not go. Just look at the Rough Stuff Fellowship, 19c tyres and carrying up mountains and across muddy fields. There’s a whole world of adventure out there if you stretch the utility of your bike.

Lots of these blogs will be about how great bicycles are in a myriad of different ways, but I suspect I will be returning to utility in more detail over the next few weeks and months.

If you've got a challenge in mind and you need a bike for it. Send me a message or give me a call.