There you have view of the Citizen Alloy, 6 speed, 20 inch silver frame assembled and folded into its carrying case. Pretty neat both ways. It is a bit bulkier than I'd hoped. Great for travel, as when I have to go to Arizona and speak later this year, but how it will work taking it around town remains to be seen. First, for the maiden ride:So it took me awhile to get comfortable, not being used to straight across handle bars, (mine curve back toward me)and needing to get the seat and handle bar heights set up. All in all it took about 4 minutes. But my first ride lasted only a block before I realized the brakes were situated below the bar and I couldn't reach them (small hands.) I'm too much of a novice to know whether some people like them there, but I had to retreat into the house to find an Allen wrench and re-position them. Then out again, this time feeling very comfortable and very happy with the performance of the bike. I took it around the street for awhile near my home and then headed up to the Schuykill path just to see how it would go. Around town it seems like it may be great; on the path it was a chore. Not because it doesn't ride beautifully and handle perfectly, but mostly I think because of the 20" wheels. It's just a lot more work to get a lot less distance. I only took it to the Museum (the path was closed there for the moment as they were doing some tree work but that's as far as I'd planned to go.Annie and I had already done our 12.5 mile loop earlier.) It took the fairly steep hill by the Museum better than I expected, but it was a workout. So now we know the bike works great. How practical it will be for my in-town needs remains to be seen when I go back to work with it next week.
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2 comments:
...on the path it was a chore.....because of the 20" wheels. It's just a lot more work to get a lot less distance.
That is correct. For a given gear ratio, larger wheels will move you further with one turn of the pedals than smaller wheels. Look at it as a way to hit your target rate faster.
I'm impressed you adjusted your brake levers--a lot of new cyclists are nervous about doing something like that. For this year, I built my own bike, taking parts off a frame that was a bit too large for me and putting them onto a smaller frame. That frame fits me a lot better; I tried to do the Seagull Century on it this year. I only did ~62 miles, but it was the constant wind from the nor'easter blowing thru that killed me, not the rain and cool conditions.
hi Rabbi Stone, welcome to cycle world! after long years of little exercise, i got into biking in 1998. I got a recumbent road bike, which I found to be much easier to handle for long rides. Biking is a great hobby and a great way to stay in shape.
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