wipekitty

I started riding primarily for transportation (and most of my transportation is still by bike). Eventually, I discovered that it was fun to go explore other roads when I didn't have to be anywhere, that other people were doing the same thing, and that I could go fast, maybe draft off people, and get a killer workout doing it. Hence...road cycling.

Like many others, I have multiple bikes. I ride a geared CF road bike for speed, and a steel single speed for working on various skills or when I need to lock up somewhere. I have two other bikes that run on gravel roads, lightly iced roads, and roads covered with thick ice/snowpack. Different surfaces can be fun.

My variety is limited because nearly all rides start and end at my house. Since I still identify bikes as a way to go places (as well as sport/exercise equipment), the idea of regularly driving a bike someplace to go ride is weird. I'll happily make a ride longer by riding to and from a group ride or event on unfamiliar roads, but it's got to be a pretty epic event or route to get the bike in a vehicle.

This obviously limits variety. Specifically, it's deterred my interest in MTB (which often requires driving to a trail or park) and road racing (though I promised my SO I wouldn't race, so there's that.)

notgr

At the risk of being pointlessly contrary, I'm not sure valuing variety isn't just a sneaky way of avoiding the hard labor of mastery. I say this as a jack of few trades, a master of none, a generally poor physical specimen, and someone so mentally noncommittal as to resort to lazy contrarianism. But there's something beautiful about the idea of the kind of absolute knowledge of a bike, and even a single route, that would emerge from weeks and months and years of unyielding repetition. I imagine that after a long period of soul-testing boredom, you'd break through something, learn about variety at a micro level, perhaps experience ultimate spiritual enlightenment. You could make a religion out of that. (No, don't.)

But, I mean, if we're listing the different kinds of bikes we have, I have road bikes from 6 to 11 speeds, TT bikes, a track bike, a tracklocross bike, a cross bike for gravel, a touring bike built as a SS gravel bike, weird novelty builds, and a BMX (flatland) bike. So, obviously, I have yet to experience ultimate spiritual enlightenment. Maybe mastery is a crock, though. Maybe it's better to just play, to work towards nothing, to become perfectly lost following a string of whims. Maybe it's more meaningful to learn how move forward without knowing what's ahead.

Maybe it doesn't matter. What am I even talking about?

Rides4Beer

Simple stable for now, a road bike and a gravel bike, they allow me to do everything I want to do at the moment. Will add a TT bike eventually, as I really enjoyed TTing this year on a road bike with clip-ons.

Might add a MTB at some point, we'll see, going slow on trails doesn't interest me much, when I can just go run them. That's one thing I like about gravel, can still maintain some decent speed most of the time.

JanMM

I have some variety in my cycling stable: Three recumbent bikes - a long wheelbase, a short wheelbase, and a tandem.

Nachoman

I have variety, but honestly unless I'm out on the tandem with the wife, all I ever ride is my road bike.

Doctor Morbius

If by that you mean they are a bunch of humorless stiffs, I would say we are in agreement.

Doctor Morbius

Nice collection!

robnol

have u been eating special brownies again

Tony Marley

I, too, like to mix it up with different rides. I have a Bike Friday road bike and mountain bike; an upright tandem and a recumbent tandem; a trike; and an Easy Racer. I just sold our triplet three years ago when we moved to the UAE.

Milton Keynes

I'm afraid I've only got two bikes, a hybrid I use mainly as a road bike, and a mountain bike I use for tooling around town and for gravel. But between the both of them I have enough variety to go wherever I want to go on a bike.

Synack42

I personally have three 26ers in rotation: an older hardtail MTB with knobbies for singletrack (which doesn't get used nearly enough), another hardtail with more street friendly tread and less trail friendly fork (for suburban route exploring if that makes any sense) and a frame up rigid MTB build (skinnier tires, sort of a weird hybrid/gravel/exercise machine). I also have an older crazy 27 road bike that I converted to an upright/flat bar, but it might go back to drops because I can't make up my mind ;-).

Also built up a bike for the wife from parts and two kids bikes... Everything is stored neatly in the garage but I still get comments from family "man, you have enough bikes in there, heh heh..." I try not to take it the wrong way, but down 150+ lbs... I'd say they're serving their purpose quite well..

Hermes

2 Track bikes
Time trial bike
2 Road
Tandem