Originally Posted by
Longfemur
Much as I love the look of the bikes, when I'm out riding, for whatever purpose, I always end up preferring a sportier bike than what a randonneuse represents - even if my primary intent is not to go fast. Maybe it's because I'm a child of the 60's and 70's, and to me, a bike is still a 10-speed, albeit a more refined one with more speeds.
Ah, that's my era, too, but somehow most bikes have ended up be 3-speeds for me from those days (as an adult) of working on and riding Raleigh 3-speeds. I find that on most of my rides, no matter how many gears I have, I usually use only 3. Now, if I were riding mountain passes or any sort of hillier terrain or were at the end of a long day, I'd want the lower gears, but that's not the kind of riding I've been doing for the last couple of years. I should also add that my primary bike for several years was a Columbia middle-weight single speed w/ a coaster brake. I took it everywhere and passed many a roadie going up hills (and was subsequently passed on the descent).
Neal