Your cycling gap years

[mjr]

I remember trying that! I also remember breaking the mudguards. And the gears.

Blooming heck, my Grifter led a charmed life then. I only remember a bit of surface rust in the usual places that suffered stonechips from questionable riding on dodgy surface dressing.

 

[w00hoo_kent]

The Grifter weighed a ton and the mudguard broke too easily.

I recall every time it came to an incline knowing just how heavy the Grifter was compared to all my mates bikes. I think mine came with tiny mudguards at best, I vaguely remember us pop riveting a bit of rubber to the end to make it work which flopped about and caught in the tyres but wasn't stiff enough to make interesting noises. A year or so after mine came out they added a black one with red detailing and full mudguards, etc which I remember lusting after but (probably fortunately) not being bought. I seem to recall at some point mine got a gold spray job, or possibly it was painted from an old can with a stick. I have honestly no idea what happened to it. I presume at some point it hadn't been ridden for a while and needing the space after a move it was unceremoniously taken to the tip.

Like the mini chopper/chipper/thing my overwhelming memories of the Grifter are poor. Having some chavs steal it off of us in the woods that we weren't supposed to have ridden to (but fortunately bring it back after a bit). Out on a ride with my dad (no idea what he was on, he wasn't a bicycle rider at all) and the front wheel locking up and sliding me through gravel. He is positive I panic braked again, I'm positive the stupid huge square speedo thing from Halfords that measured speed using a bent bit of metal jammed in the spokes of the front wheel malfunctioned and jammed through the spokes. Classic 70's, he flagged down a random car and the stranger drove me home while he 'rode' both bikes back the three of four miles.

 

[andyfraser]

Blooming heck, my Grifter led a charmed life then. I only remember a bit of surface rust in the usual places that suffered stonechips from questionable riding on dodgy surface dressing.

Nothing else went wrong with it. The rest of the bike was pretty solid for years.

 

[Smithbat]

I rode a bike as child as all do, then by the time I was 15 I was too cool to ride it, late teens early twenties, too busy with boys and alcohol. Late twenties to April this year, I felt I was too big to be on a bike and that my bum would swallow the saddle. Finally on Easter Saturday this year, I gave in to nagging from my daughter, got on her bike and felt like I was flying.

Bought my new bike on Easter Monday and I now ride to work most days as well as at the weekends. Not huge distances, I am hoping to crack 10 miles in one go this weekend. I love it.l

 

[taximan]

I gave up cycling when I married in 1964 and spent the next 40 something years getting fat & lazy. When I retired in 2010 I had a senior moment and bought a BSO and the first time I took it out my legs were like jelly. However I persevered and never looked back I no longer have the miles in my legs that I once had but I regularly ride 20 - 30 miles around the North York Moors and go further afield for the occasional camping trip and now feel as if I wasted over 40 years of my life.

 

[ACS]

Always had a bike as a kid progressing to a fixed wheel, gas pipe special with rod brakes I used to grind back and forward to town where I worked as an apprentice butcher. Left home and joined the RAF where running was the preferred method of getting around during duty time and staggering at most other times.

Got into running in a big way until the constant pavement pounding took its inevitable toll. Warned that unless I moderated my weekly mileage I would be taking part in wheelchair racing I took up Triathlon for about 6 years before drifting into time trailing. Had a specular RTC which forced me to stop training so I went and got an education which took about 15 years to achieve.

Left the RAF after 29 years and established myself in a second career. In Apr 09 my granddaughter (then aged 4 years) asked when the baby was due and I realised that perhaps a change in lifestyle was worth considering. Got my 531 road bike out, tried a 5 mile circuit around the local roads and it nearly killed me but I also realised that I missed exercising. Purchased a second hand hybrid off Fleabay and started to commute the 11.5 miles to work and back.

30,000 miles later, I'm 4 stone lighter, the second worst climber in the entire world and have fallen love with riding again.

 

[dee.jay]

I had a black single speed bike when I was very small then when I was about 9-10 I had a Lew-ways Trackstar in white and green. It had "oversized" emblazoned down the top tube and my word it weighed a ton.

I rode that everywhere (it was a 12 speed so wasn't very cool compared to any bike with 18 or more - apparently more gears the better) until I were about 14 then stopped due it being a bit small and me doing different things.

Fast forward to last year, 31 years old, school, college, a degree, several certifications in Microsoft and Cisco, 11 years into an IT career later... I'm quite the lard arse and decided that buying a bike might be a good idea given all the cycle paths that I live nearby now (moved here in 2009) and I set about my quest by buying a cheap Apollo in Halfords aaaaand then subsequently returning it within a week.

It was pretty craptastic but what did I expect for 129.99 retail? Nevertheless - I managed to cut my teeth again and start riding. The first day I rode I don't think I went more than a mile away, had to come home and go to bed feeling ill... But I had done it. That was September '14. On October 3rd - I was commuting the 6 miles to work on the Claud Butler hybrid I'd bought to replace the Halfords special.

I even did a 29 mile ride at the end of October with two colleagues from work so progress was being made. I managed to commute pretty much throughout the whole winter - I had a broken spoke in November though and that was the beginning of the end. I had most of January off commuting by bike as I was preparing for the CCIE exam in February. I passed the exam and soon got back to work - within a week another spoke broke and that was that - it was time to buy a proper decent bike. Hence my latest bike - which I clocked up nearly 200 miles in 4 weeks on - my Cotic Roadrat. I love cycling. I did a 31.3 mile ride on it within a week of owning it and am looking forward to many more longer rides this year.

 

[Moe]

I never had a bike as a youngster (very sad and almost criminal I know!!) I didn't even learn to ride a bike until I was around 10 or 11, it was my best friends bike I learnt on! I remember it very clearly, it was a gold/yellow coloured chopper type! I bought my own second hand bike around the age of 12 and rode it the first day ALL DAY and suffered for the next few days terribly! (Ouch!!) Then, boys came into play who had motorbikes and that was that for the next 30 years! I then bought myself a cheap mountain bike which was torture to ride but came off it on black ice after only a few months and never got back on it again for over two years. Then the Tour De France came through my home town and I got hooked... I dug out my bike and off I went again. Bought a better mountain bike through the cycle to work scheme but very quickly wanted a road bike, so I saved hard and got one!! I am doing my first sportive at the end of June so I am working hard on getting my stamina and distance up!

 

[nickyboy]

Like everyone, rode a bike everywhere as a child. Last memory of riding a bike until recently was cycling to Wednesday night rugby training when I was about 19. It always seemed to be dark and raining and was really hard getting home after an hour of shuttle runs.
Can't remember riding a bike after that for more than 20 years other than the odd bike hire on holiday. Decided about 6 years ago to try to lose some weight and get fitter so bought a Halfords hybrid. Rode that in the Peak District until it fell apart. Stopped riding for about a year after that. My Dad had always been a keen cyclist (hill climb comps and CX races) and he'd just bought a Raleigh road bike. He passed away on a ride with his mates so I inherited the bike so I decided to get back into it more in his memory than anything else. Really enjoyed it but after a couple of years I'd ridden that bike into the ground too. Bought a fancy carbon, campagnolo thing a couple of years ago and haven't looked back

 

[vernon]

How do you explain your gap years, if you had any, and what brought you back to the fold?

Sex and drugs and rock and roll lured me away.

A tentative diagnosis of heart failure brought me back.

 

[summerdays]

Sex and drugs and rock and roll lured me away.

A tentative diagnosis of heart failure brought me back.

How long ago was that?

 

[vernon]

How long ago was that?

Twelve years ago. Extensive investigations failed to get to the root of what was going on at the time and the medical investigations were extended when it was inadvertently discovered that I had different blood pressures on the left and right side of my body. It was a scary time and finding out that all my organs were behaving as they should or better than they should was not reassuring.

It was eventually signed off as a post viral malady - I'd had full blown flu three months earlier.

 

[Fnaar]

Having spent most of my childhood on a bike I carried this into adulthood, but cycled mainly for transport, with only the odd leisure ride (in jeans and t-shirt etc). Had bike nicked just before leaving uni, and bought a fab Raleigh tourer; moved abroad for a couple of years, and the bike was forgotten about, and I believe eventually given away (pity, it was a great bike, and I could have made more of it). Didn't cycle then for 6 years or so, and eventually bought a bog-standard MTB, which again, I used for transport and the odd venture out into the countryside (I was in my 30s by this time, had 3 kids, and leisure time was limited).
Following redundancy, I got a new job in Newcastle, moved to Northumberland, saw the countryside, and just HAD to get a bike. Bought a £30 second hand MTB from a colleague (I still have it, it still gets used), then graduated to a roadie (nowt special, but I've had in for 9 years, and it's changed my life!!!!) Now have a tourer too, and basically plan my life around cycling!

 

[hatler]

Only two true gaps in my cycling, though I wasn't really a cyclist until the current job.

Gap 1 Birth to when I got my first bike.
Gap 2 1990 - 1994 Had always had a bike but in 1990 I returned from a summer holiday (cycle to Blois for a friend's wedding, then train with bike to Geneva and cycled from there to Martigny) to start a new job. I hung my bike on the wall in my room and there it stayed as the job was as a regional engineer sizing and running construction jobs all over my patch. No way a bike could have done that. Lost that job in '94 and had just had an ACL re-construction so got the bike off the wall and used it for my physio. No further gaps since then. Though things got silly when I started cyclo-commuting in 2004, ten miles each way, five days a week, all year.

 

[User16625]

I got off a bike sometime in 1983 and didn't get on again until 1996. It was a 1972 Pontiac Lemans that seduced me away, then a move to a new country and an urge to explore it under my own steam that brought me back. (I was so impatient to get going that within a month of buying my hybrid I rode it from London to Fort William just so I could hike up Ben Nevis and shout Hallelujah! I'm born again! closer to the heavens. Or something like that.)

How do you explain your gap years, if you had any, and what brought you back to the fold?

Crikey your one fit ****er! I rode a bike round Scotland and also hiked up Ben Nevis. My bike had a 1250cc engine in it tho. My legs werent in a condition for any more work for several days after that. Also that A82 through Glen Coe, show me a nicer road in the UK and I will show you a live dodo.