Balance - a life, one bicycle at a time

Hi all

For the last couple of years I have been writing a blog post for every bike I have owned, from age 7 to 53. Along the way I have had a good few steel racing bikes, very early MTBs, shit bikes for being a student on, more shit bikes for being a commuter on before finally getting into Long Distance riding about ten years ago and buying proper bikes again, like a Tripster ATR and a Genesis Datum. 25 bikes in total. Over the years I've been a racer, a cycle courier, an early MTBer, had some scary moment with motorists, ridden London-Edinburgh-London and ridden many many miles commuting and pottering around for my mental health's sake. I start in NZ and end up resident in the UK via Australia.

There are also interludes - on topics from the power of wheels to drugs, performance and depression and the head/heart battle of carbon versus steel. The posts people like the most are On Suffering and The Passion - the two parts of why we bother.

Anyway, thought this might provide you all with some light reading over the xmas and new years break. It is, as you might guess from the title, as much about being a very average rider going through thick as it is about the bikes themselves

http://bikeby.bike/

Happy xmas.