MAJs gay bikes [she’s in her fitness era]

now the mania of new years resolutions have passed i have finally sat down and thought of some cycling things i'd like to do this year

1) accepting i cannot ride in the same way i used too

i talk about it in this thread a lot that i have quite a severe chronic heart condition which impacts my cardiac ability greatly, but over the last 2 years i have felt this worsen. I went to my cardiologist recently for a bunch of tests and was like "hit me with it doc, i'm dying right!?!?!" and she was like "maj.... there is no change in your cardiac preformance, 02 levels or blood pressure"

i was shocked, surely she was wrong - i've gone from being able to hold onto friends cycling to having to force them to go slower, i just cannot get up the same hills i used too - even post covid fitenss drive - she then pointed out i'd been on HRT for approaching 2 years, and proposed that what i was experiencing was a loss of muscle - that when combined with my dependancy on offsetting poor cardiac ability with freakish muscle edurance (painting to excercise test results in which i was above average preformance expected, with far,far below average cardiac readings) i just did not have that in me anymore - pointing to that the one thing that has changed is my weight and body make up, drastically

i was pretty shocked, relieved but shocked - i mean, i'm well aware HRT inhibits sports preformance, but with all due respect, i had none to begin with, i thought i was safe. but after consulting my endo they were quite insistant that from the data they'd seen and patients they had HRT knocks a flat 20% off the top - which anecdotally matches the sort of loss i'd been experiencing compared to old rough data i had.

with this in mind i spent the winter just letting myself rest - after a summer of maybe over doing it, cycling everywhere, never touching public transport, i have put on my blundestones and baggy trousers and spent my time catching the tube, the bus, the train! but never the bike

this year i'd like to spend the energy i do have for cycling now doing more of the riding i like, taking the train to epping or cycling locations, than junk miles round the city in the hope to get back to where i was. hopefully this will get me cycling enough to keep my general good heart health as it is, while also not leaving me exhausted and worn out, loathing riding the bikes

2) would like to build a more gay bike

terrible news to some on this thread, but great to others, i put normal handlebars on my homer and cotic this winter and they ride a lot better for it. it pains me to admit. i also put drops on my xcheck earlier this year; skinny tyres (35's) turning it into a sort of road bike for city dwelling and lanes. I have no willingness to do either of these things however, in line with resolution 1, it's also too bling to leave outside. i think it's likely i take it all to bits and start again or i sell it to someone to enjoy as is.

just have a scratch for a bike which looks a bit "gayer" , this is my 2023 bike vibe "gay bikes", "queer bikes", "[redacted bikes]" an aesthetic and functional urge to have a bike which reflects me. i've spoken to a few fellow gay bike friends and they resonate with this and we've been trying to drill down on what a gay bike is

1. i don't think boutique parts are gay, but i do think like, having
   something that feels like it came from a weird trinket store parts
   bin is v gay bike
   
2. i think swept bars are obviously the most gay, the homer was defo more gay when i had the obscene clunkers, likewise sloped top tubes are gay, horizontal TT's are objectively, not gay
   
3. also think lots of carrying capcity is v gay, as are things designed
   for comfort, ie saddle covers, racks, bar end mitts, big bells
   
4. I feel like absurd spacer stacks are pretty gay
   
   

i'd like to hear about other lgbt members thoughts on this metaphysical feeling

i think the grant rivs are close to being gay but they're more metrosexual than gay, kind of like retro mtb basket bikes. veeerrryy metrosexual, not gay. they do not have a sense of mania, a sense of like, panic, sure they're often made from an existential dread, but it's like a dread of not living up to your parents expectations of you, not a dread of like "holy shit i could go another 30 years surviving the gay police and i still would not have felt like i had my belated flirty 20's"

mood boards to come on this - i'm still working it out

3) i'd like to go back to the new forrest again

the new forest was ace last year, perfect riding, perfect amount of outdoors. for those who read the write up it did have its downsides but i think this year we can avoid those parts.

I'd like to see more of the forest, do maybe some cooking or coffee outside, go back to the great sandwhich place, get another witch magnet. I'd also like to go with friends this year, i've met so many fantastic bike people on here and out in the real world, it would be good to get some people together for a weekend or weekday to just chill, talk bike, ride bike, and sit around.

my favourite bit of riding last year has been going to riding days and meeting the people who are openly like "i enjoy riding bikes, i hate going on bike rides" and riding far shorter distances with them, much slower, taking the time to talk and chat, be it about life or bikes, than ride as far as we could before going home.

hopefully i will have more to offer if anyone was interested in this sort of thing, later in the year

4) helping friends with bikes and accepting i like bikes, not cycling

I really enjoy bikes, they're great. a genuinely good human invention. love building them (not in the moment, but after), love seeing how others build theirs, love helping others build theirs, love just rolling it around and admiring the work once its done.

don't much like "cycling tho"

last year i helped a few people fix or get started fixing their bikes, got my boyfriend into bikes and taught them to fix em themselves. i found it quite rewarding when compared to my day job of sending emails. i'd like to do more of that this year where i can.

i think that's all i have for now, but yes, excited to get back into cycling and uploading pictures of it again, interested to hear if anyone else has been thinking about their cycling commitments for the year