Bicycle commute rationale

I broke a spoke on the rear wheel of my Trek FX-3 hybrid bike, so I decided to switch back to my 28 year old Raleigh Tarantula mountain bike I’ve owned since 1996 for my commute to work today.

Sally has the same model in the same colour in her size so we would have matching bikes. This is the bike I left locked up at Union Station when I worked downtown Toronto in 2012, and it would be faithfully waiting for me every morning I stepped off the train. It’s the bike I used to tow my son in a bicycle trailer when he was little. It’s also been on many camping adventures with us, including riding the famous Track and Tower at Algonquin Park. There’s a lot of history in this mountain bike, and that is the reason why I maintain it. That, and it’s a great steel frame mountain bike from the 90’s with classic powerful cantilever brakes that you just don’t see on bicycles anymore.

Every time I ride my bike to work, I save roughly $8 in fuel. But that is not the reason why.

I also save wear and tear on my truck, making it last longer and extending the maintenance intervals, but I don’t do it for that either.

I also get the benefit of two hours of cardio on the days that I ride, split into two one hour blocks, which is good for my heart health, but that’s also not the reason.

It’s the exhilaration and the feeling of freedom that comes from the bike ride that makes me feel great. All of the challenges to overcome, like climbing a hill, and the rewards from overcoming those challenges, like coasting down that hill. Feeling myself get stronger every time, and I get to do this while commuting to and from work so that I still have time for other things in my day. Everything else is just a very delicious layer of icing on the bicycle cake. The cherry on top is it makes my arthritis pain go away for a while, so it makes me feel great both mentally and physically, and that is the reason why.