Good Morning and happy Father's day to all.

I have a semi-rhetorical thought/question. When we talk about bike riding we most often talk about the bikes themselves and not how to properly use and ride them. It seems as if there is an implied idea that a good bike will make a good rider. At the same time we all (I hope) intellectually understand that the bike doesn't make the rider. Yet we seem to focus on the bike at the exclusion of the rider.

I'm sure there must be a good number of reasons for this. First off, gear is fun and there is the tempting thought that the right fit and enough bar drop will make us the next LeMond. It's too easy to look at the bike as being the limiting factor when in most cases it's just not so. We've all been on the group ride or race where some old guy with a beat to shit crooked Colnago with 36 spoke wheels crushes all comers with their carbon stems and ti spindled pedals. So we KNOW that it's not the bike but for the most part we talk about the bike.

I suppose it's easy to talk about the bike as opposed to the rider as it's pretty clear cut. A bike is light or it isn't. A bike has a steep seat angle or it doesn't..........clean. So that said how do we talk about how to ride the bike instead of the bike? Or do "we" even want that? I suspect some might not as it will ruin the "next LeMond" fantasy.

A few weeks ago I took a high performance driving and autocross school. We all drove our our cars and had an instructor with us most every moment of the day. In the 8 hours I took part in this not once did any of the instructors talk about the car. It was all about how to use the car. Timing, intensity, duration, looking ahead, picking of lines, etc. was the focus. I learned a lot. I wish the bike thing was more pragmatic like this.

There is a lot of shit given to folks that have their bars at the same elevation as their saddles and with short top tubes and long seat tubes and a handful of spacers. The whole fred look deal. It seems to me that many of the bikes that look like this are a result of the fact that the rider hasn't been shown how to properly use a bike. If they had then the position they ended up with might not make as much sense and they would evolve into a position that is more "traditional". Certainly some folks need non-Raul Alcala positions to be comfortable and that is just the way it is. But I suspect many would benefit from a lower, longer position IF they had the riding skills that rewarded that. A chicken and egg deal of sorts.

So how does one use the internet and it's forums to help in this way? It's certainly not by ridiculing the guy with the high bars. I think that has proven over time to be less than effective. At best it gives the guy a bike that looks right but isn't ridden right.

Am I alone in feeling this way? Am I over thinking this?

dave