Air and oil and a good fit = happy cycling

The key to enjoyable and fun (and fast!) cycling is bike fit.

Your bike should fit you like a glove. It should be an invisible extension of your body. It should not get in the way.

Once you achieve bike fit, how do you keep track of it if, say, your friend borrows your bike, you get a new bike, or you are away from home and using someone else's bike (no!).

Park tools has a good checklist/form for writing down all the bike fit details. Here's the link (click here).

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Park Tools also has bike repair information.

Bike repair knowledge can be very useful.

You should know how to put air in your tires, oil the chain, adjust your brakes, adjust your seat height, and fix a flat tire by patching or replacing a tube. There are some basic tools required to do most of these things. A bike will provide loyal service for transportation and fun for a very long time with very minor maintenance.

Can we have that advice easier and simpler please?

1. put air in your tires
2. oil your chain

You can get oil and a hand pump at your local bike store.

As we ride along, we often check out the equipment of the cyclists we pass.

We notice tires, and notice that very many of you are riding on soft or almost flat tires.

Once in a while we suggest that the cycling will be easier and therefore more fun when one isn't riding with flat tires. A surprising number of people reply that they know that their tires are flat, but they didn't put air in yet. Do it! Nothing makes the bike riding better than inflated tires. Although, oiling the chain is good too.

Actually we stopped telling people that their tire was flat, because this provoked in a few riders too much shock, some would stop right away! Whoa, take it easy. Now we say you really need to put some air in that tire.