How Many Bikes Should You Have?

Back in the old days when you went to buy a mountain bike you simply bought a mountain bike and enjoyed your 40 pound, 21 speed, v-brake equipped mountain bike with no suspension out on the trails. Nowadays there are so many types of bikes to choose from with so many categories of riding it's hard to figure out how many bikes you need to make sure you are covered. Are you going to be hitting bike parks for downhill runs? Taking on 50 mile cross country rides? Gearing up for an enduro race? How about a gravel bike that you can ride on the road and the dirt?

Sure you can have one bike and attempt to do everything with it but you won’t get the same results as if you had a bike that was made for that type of riding or particular types of trails. And sure you can combine a couple types of riding with only one type of bike and probably be ok but it depends on how serious you are about getting the most out of riding. But if you want to get the best results and have the most fun (and best Strava times) it's better to have a bike made for the specific kind of riding. Sure you can take an XC bike to the bike park and probably live but it sure won't be any fun!

If you are just a casual Sunday rider then having one bike is most likely going to be fine but if you like to mix up your riding styles then it's great to be able to have a bike that aligns with that riding style... money permitted of course. Now if your riding styles are XC and all mountain then you can most likely have one bike for both but if you want to do an enduro race on one weekend and 100 mile XC race on the next then you definitely need a bike for each type of ride. It makes quite the difference when you have the appropriate bike. Even if money is an issue you are probably still better off having 2 less expensive bikes than one expensive bike that you try and use for everything.

The things that require you to have multiple bikes are things like how much suspension travel you need, the bike’s geometry, wheel size, gearing, handlebar and stem sizes, braking power, weight and so on. All these items factor in to how the bike will perform on specific trails and how hard you can push it and how easy it will be to climb and cover distance etc.

So if you find yourself struggling when doing things such as climbing or going downhill over rocks and so on and you know it's not related to your skill level or endurance then it might be time to look into getting a more appropriate bike for the task at hand. And it's always good to look into used bikes because you can save a lot of money and avoid going broke while figuring out what type of bike you need to get.

Posted by Jim Bernstein