Anti Grant amirite
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HAHA TRUE. But I donāt think weāre anti-cyclists in any form unless they are being a turd to other humans (except cagers). We also donāt have the same bully pulpit as Grant, Prolls, or anyone else at that level (except @capn_FANCYpants) so our semi-private grumblings about what we think is dumb arenāt exactly the same, to begin with.
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Iām not saying theyāre irrelevant. Iām saying youāre creating a strawgrant, and if you went by Riv headquarters and said āHey Grant, I bought this B17 so I could commute to work in regular clothes, and even though itās 15 minutes Iām getting terrible saddle soreā, Evil Grant would laugh at you and say ātough luck buttercup, take the busā.
When you know what would actually happen is that youād spend two hours talking to Grant, get to ride every other Brooks in the Riv test fleet, and leave with a pair of free prototype wool underwear to test out plus a ziplock bag of Dr Bronners.
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Negative.
im buying a riv now
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yes, but then in next weekās blagh heād write about the guy who came in wearing bibs and clipless shoes, handlebars set far-too-racerly half an inch below the saddle, and fancy indexed gears, and about how Grant isnāt judging or thinking less of me for riding that bike, but he does blame the shop or person who put me on that bike (the person who put me on that bike is me)
On the way over, on the ferry, was a guy in spandex, with a fat-tire eBike with clipless pedals and $250 Sidi road shoes. Itās not my business how he gets his rig together, but one doesnāt come up with a combination like that without expert help. I didnāt snicker to myself or think low thoughts. I blamed the unidentified shop or person or persons who sold him that. No skin off my nose what he rode. I didnāt ask him how he liked it.
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Tarck has a whole thread devoted to mocking high handlebars
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as well as blaming R&E for selling people said setups
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sure, but weāre a bunch of openly-critical internet weirdos, not a guy who has preached for years that you should be able to ride a bike the way you want to ride it.
we shit talk both the rider and the shop and donāt try to pull a smug āI didnāt snicker to myself or think low thoughtsā at the same time.
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The Roadini isnāt (fvo āisnātā that were almost five years ago) bad. Not nearly as nice looking as the few non-mixte Rosco Bubbes were, but also not nearly as much of a bicycle of substance as they were.
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like iām not going to make a stink about āableismā or āgatekeepingā because as you point out, tarck often has (and still sometimes does) gleefully engaged in criticism of otherās bikes
Basically:
I get it, itās very hard to be āproā something without contrasting the stuff you like with the stuff you donāt like, and this has been Grantās schtick forever. But it feels like heās been focusing more on the anti side of things and also getting more tone-deaf over the years, to the point that you have to think about what heās said/written in the past and recontextualize the stuff he writes now through that lens.
And thatās the brouhaha over the IG post: unless you make the effort to put it through the Grant translation filter, the literal interpretation of that sentence and the direct implications is āYouāre riding bikes Wrong and riding Wrong is worse than riding at all, so you should ride bikes lessā. Thatās not what Grant thinks he means, but thatās what a lot of people are reading.
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Or the world is going to shit and this is leaking out when the company and the person are inseparable.
There are two aspects to Grantās schtick that I find interesting as a casual observer.
The first is the anti-racer aspect, which I think is inarguably at least some of his deal. I suppose this may, depending on the post and the reader, come across as āyou should not race/want to raceā or āa bunch of people will tell you to race, but you donāt have to listen to them.ā The first of these interpretations strikes me as rude and presumptuous - who would put that much effort into doing something they donāt enjoy? - the second as out of touch. Itās not the 90s any more - even race bikes clear 32s now and all the gravgrav hype means tons of bikes come with wide tires and zits for fenders and extra water bottles etc. This feels like a guy who still rails against jocks and their āsportsballā because he got teased for liking D&D when he was a teenager 30 years ago. Heās fighting ghosts.
People go into shops wanting some exercise and they come out with 23mm tires, low drop bars, an outfit that looks like a costume, shoes they can barely walk in, and thousands poorer.
Not even WorldTour teams ride 23s these days my dude. And I have a lot of trouble believing a random person just wanting some exercise gets sold a Tarmac SL7 against their wishes. The last time I was in a shop it was all gravgrav and MTBs - I donāt recall seeing a āpureā road bike at all. (And speaking of being āthousands poorerā, donāt Rivs cost significantly more than the average hybrid which would serve as a better solution for these hypothetical victims of Big Racer?)
The second aspect is one I find so confounding I have trouble even articulating what it is I think Iām seeing. I guess Iād describe it as the hyper-focus on casualness. Itās like, the complete and utter dedication of your entire life to being as basic and entry-level as possible. Donāt just ride your bike for fun for an hour a couple of times a week and then live the rest of your life - spend all of your time focused on that casual bike and those short rides. Donāt buy a $700 hybrid that will completely serve your basic needs flawlessly - put a lot more money into something that is arguably less suited to the task. Spend your time reading our blog about this thing we donāt want you to do very often! Buy our special underwear to do it! Not the clothes the bike shop will sell you, but different clothes that weāll sell you that are morally superior for some reason.
This is even more confusing when taken in context with the friction shifting discussion - so Iām not supposed to do this thing very often, but Iām supposed to be very highly skilled at it? When am I supposed to develop this skill? And why, if Iām supposed to be casual about this, do I not want indexed shifting which is easier to use?
To a certain extent this feels a bit like PLPās thing too, and Iāve seen this - whatever it is - in other places as well. For example, sometimes I watch video game streams and itās amazing to me how many people spending hours watching the same game being played over and over yet still donāt know even the most basic things about it. Itās like a complete refusal or inability to gain any expertise, I guess? Defining yourself by a thing you donāt really know much about or do very often? Being about the thing more than being the thing? 
I might be conflating a couple of different things - like I said, Iām still trying to figure out what exactly this is. So this is probably not the best explanation, but itās something thatās been floating around in my mind for a while.
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Grant if youāre reading this just make modern versions of the rb-1 and xo-1 with tire clearances for 700/650 and disc TA
Your fledgling bike company wonāt be
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This is the age-old debate of simplicity versus āprogressā, see Thoreauās āWaldenā
Also not a new idea, look at stuff like āShop Class as Soulcraftā or go back to āZen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenanceā.
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Bless his heart, Grant doesnāt know about Reddit guys.
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soā¦ crust?
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a) he doesnāt say this
b) he canāt compete in the $700 hybrid market
You guys think heās selling bikes in the context of the US retail bicycle market. Heās selling a mindset, and does it through bicycles.
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thatās a crust romanceur
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