Forgotten Cycling slang

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SuperHans123

Formerly known as snertos999
One person on our estate always had his handlebars way forward. His surname was Humble and whenever we saw someone with their bars quite forward (BMX), we would all shout Humble Humble!
 

yello

Guest
Broad slides, or broadies, were what we did as kids; get up a head of steam, slam on the brakes and slide the rear end around without, hopefully, losing it. Worked best and most spectacularly in gravel, particularly if you did lose it!

I think the term's probably borrowed from speedway, but it's known as broadside there.
 
Location
Shropshire
A photo from the early 1980's a group of my friends and I did this mad thing we equipped or bikes with nicad packs to make up 12 volts and mounted a mobile aerial to the frame (DV27 in my case)and then rode around chatting to each other on the CB ( illegal AM CB radio that was !)

BIKE.JPG
 
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lazybloke

Considering a new username
Location
Leafy Surrey
Broad slides, or broadies, were what we did as kids; get up a head of steam, slam on the brakes and slide the rear end around without, hopefully, losing it. Worked best and most spectacularly in gravel, particularly if you did lose it!

I think the term's probably borrowed from speedway, but it's known as broadside there.
Oh yes! I occasionally demonstrate that to my kids.
 
Benelux! I recall having to borrow a bike to get to school - must have been 1966 as I had to get to an "O-level" exam, and it had a Benelux 3 speed derailleur. They depended on a sort of clock-spring. Needless to say, the clock-spring broke and shot the entire mech into the rear wheel. Messy. I made it to the exam, but I don't remember how.

I suspect this was the start of my long-held belief that there are two sorts of cycling gear: stuff that breaks and Campagnolo.
 

Paulus

Started young, and still going.
Location
Barnet,
Or cyclists with their trousers tucked into tier socks to stop their right leg being dragged into the chain wheel,

I still do this, saves on old school trouser clips^_^
 

Ming the Merciless

There is no mercy
Location
Inside my skull
We used to call bikes that had been stripped down to the bare minimum for mucking about in the fields" Dirt Trackers". Some kids would fit motorcycle scrambler bars and later Cow Horn bars to their bikes. There was also a few lucky kids who managed to get hold of some special knobbly tyres which had small round projections. I think they came from an Avon Rubber dump and weren't for the home market. It was a shame as all us kids thought they looked great.

Knobblies were around for tracker bikes in the mid to late 70's. Don't know about before that. Somewhere in a family album will be a pic of me on my tracker bike with a frame recovered from the dump by my dad, and restored by a pre teenage me. Painted the frame gold from memory.
 
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