Greatest cycling invention of the last 25 years?

[Dogtrousers]

When was the hybrid bike invented, that's the best cycle marketing invention!

When I was a teenager there were two kinds of bike (in my world, at least): Racers, which had derailleurs and drop bars, and ordinary bikes, which to my memory didn't have a name, which had flat bars, chain guards and 3 speed hubs. Apart from those differences they were pretty much the same thing. All the bits seemed to be compatible. They were pretty much all made by Raleigh.

Anyway, in about 1977 I cobbled a derailleur and a wheel with a 5 speed block onto an old flat bar bike I bought from someone at school. It worked kind of OK.

I invented the hybrid.

 

[Sharky]

ordinary bikes

Penny farthing bikes are called "ordinary" bikes.

Penny-farthing - Wikipedia https://share.google/55MM7LbPu5GYRWirc

 

[dan_bo]

Strava

 

[Dogtrousers]

Penny farthing bikes are called "ordinary" bikes.

Penny-farthing - Wikipedia https://share.google/55MM7LbPu5GYRWirc

There were no penny farthings when I was growing up. I'm not that old. Ordinary bikes were bikes that were ... ordinary.

 

[Ming the Merciless]

There were no penny farthings when I was growing up. I'm not that old. Ordinary bikes were bikes that were ... ordinary.

Did you not have tracker bikes round your way?

 

[HLaB]

For who.🤷🏼‍♂️

The clue is in the post, the best 'marketing' invention.

 

[Webbo2]

The clue is in the post, the best 'marketing' invention.

👍

 

[matticus]

How could they [rim-brake wheels] be [lighter overall], when they have to have a large "sidewall" for a braking surface.

It's a pretty irrelevant issue, as you would always change other parts of the bike to fit a disc-only-brake wheel; post this question over on the hugely informative and jolly disc-brake thread, and we can discuss in detail!

 

[Alex321]

It's a pretty irrelevant issue, as you would always change other parts of the bike to fit a disc-only-brake wheel; post this question over on the hugely informative and jolly disc-brake thread, and we can discuss in detail!

Not completely irrelevant, because AIUI rotating weight matters more than static weight. Disc brake bikes tend to be about half a kilo more than rim brake bikes overall, but that extra weight is mostly in the stromger forks, the mount and calipers, with lighter rims.

 

[Ian H]

There were no penny farthings when I was growing up. I'm not that old. Ordinary bikes were bikes that were ... ordinary.

"Roadsters"

 

[Dogtrousers]

"Roadsters"

Maybe so but it was not a word used in my neck of the woods at the time.

The only way information was spread in those days was schoolboy word of mouth plus Richard's Bicycle Book. None of us really had a clue what we were doing.