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The guys I was with there this week were in t-shirts, and blowing out their arses at the top of Feed the Pony, despite being on e-bikes. They just got to ride it twice, whereas I only got to ride it once.
TooTallTim-
Fair enough. I guess it was just the mode or whatever that these people I saw were on.
When I get over taken by an ebike at a trail centre I don’t really have a “that person is cheating” feeling bit I do feel like I would feel that using one for an ‘out in the hills’ ride might feel a bit like that.
I’m really a bit of a retro grouch with cycling (as in sure many on here are). It’s only in the last year that I’ve had a bike with modern geometry and suspension and only in the last few months that I’ve owned a derailleur that wasn’t made 30 years ago so I think it might just be that the complexity of an e-bike puts me off more than any concerns about effort/cheating etc.
M_V
Probably I’ll get shot down in flames given the thread so maybe I should pre-empt this post with saying that I’m not anti ebike at all but, I’ve heard this “I get as good a workout, I just ride further” argument but I noticed at Glentress at the weekend, all the e-bikers are wrapped right up, jackets, trousers, gloves, buffs under helmets whereas I, riding a non e bike, was in shorts and short sleeves, dripping sweat on the climbs, that has to be indicative of something right?
I also got stuck behind an old dude at one point who was pulling away, but not by much, on climbs, on flat I was catching him back up and on descents I was right up his arse. Made me wonder if the rise of e-bikes is getting inexperienced riders out into territory and terrain where they otherwise wouldn’t find themselves?
I reckon some of the diversion stuff at Glentress has been put together by someone who has thought “everyone’s on an ebike so this’ll be fine” which kind of bugs me but otherwise I’m very much ‘you do you and I’ll do me’ about them. I do realise that the popularity of them is making places like Glentress busier and that that means there’s more money to get reinvested in trail building and upkeep which benefits e-bikers and non e-bikers alike so I’m (generally) happy to share the trail with them.