Well, I've got it, a nice, shiny, dark blue Streetmachine GT. And I _/love/_ it.
I took delivery on Saturday afternoon, a very cold and blustery day, and got my first surprise. In
my Rover (an old, old, 216) with the rear seats folded, the bike fits quite neatly - I'd even be
able to take a passenger. Which was nice. I had visions of having to remove bits from my car.
Minor advert. I cannot praise Kinetics, or to be precise Ben Cooper who is Kinetics, enough. He set
up the bike methodically and precisely, fitted it for me, adjusted the chain to length, gave me
tips on how to do things for myself, with great politeness and cheer (and given that Kinetics was
shut in the morning due to bereavement, this was service over and above the call of duty). I
thought that the front tyres (20" high pressure) might be a bit hard to source so I thought I'd
better buy one before I left - Glasgow being a bit far away - Ben got one out, and when I proffered
payment, he just grinned and said "Don't be silly" and stuffed the tyre and a gaggle of spare tubes
in a bag for me.
I drove back towards Edinburgh, and on the outskirts I stopped on a quiet lane I know, to practice.
Getting the hang of a recumbent is weird. I read a review in a mag, and the tester said "This is
wrong, I /know/ how to ride a bike" - and I know what he means. The initial 10 minutes are
unnerving. Thoughts like "I've just dropped a huge sum of money on this, and I won't be able to ride
it..." float through your head. A few minutes later you realise you're still worrying away, but the
bike is gliding underneath you like you've been riding it all your life.
Well, nearly. The hardest thing to do, I found, was to relax my arms and shoulders enough. If you
don't, and you move your torso, the bike shimmies quite alarmingly, which led to another revelation
- the bike is amazingly stable. I shimmied on some ice - Friday night/Saturday being very cold and
snowy - and was bracing myself for a painful exit from the bike, but it just gathered itself
together and carried on - I presume this must be the low center of gravity. Starting on a hill is an
exercise in faith at the moment, and hills in general are definitely more of a challenge, but
practice and miles will sort that. The weather closed in at this point, so I called it a day.
Sunday dawned bright and clear, and so I fitted my spare SPDs - the brief trial I had had on
Saturday had convinced me that it wouldn't be too much of a risk, and set off for my first ride of
any significant length - about 12 miles to and from Cramond on the Waverly path, for any locals. I
won't bore you any more than I already have, but it was enormous fun - I was on off-road path
mainly, but afterwards, I risked Princes' Street. The bike attracts some considerable attention, and
I had a crisis of confidence after a ned tried to jump on my luggage rack, and so I pushed the bike
to quieter streets, but this morning, I cycled into work - admittedly I waited till after 9 to set
off to allow the traffic to get quieter. No problems, just some puzzled glances. I'm going to have
to exercise some new muscles - my neck is possibly a little stiff today, and I've got some
tenderness on the left hand area of my lumbar region - I need to adjust my cleats and sitting
position to dial this out, but it's not a major issue.
I'm not pensioning off my faithful Hardrock - we've done 13,000+ miles together over the last 3
years, and there are a lot of things that I can do with it which I can't do with the Streetmachine -
cycle the tracks over the local hills for example - particularly marvellous on summer evenings, but
I'm really looking forward to cruising round the countryside in the armchair comfort that the
Streetmachine provides.
All the best,
Eddie Dubourg