Tired of the Bike Abuse

Come on Marcel, you are a professional (and only the most recent to act out childishly against your bike), you should, you can, do better than that. Maybe someone should start a campaign to save the bikes from the pros who abuse them. Bike abuse is a terrible thing. Alright, maybe not as terrible as some other forms of abuse, but it is still pretty bad.

Seriously though. You know how much those things cost? You know how much those things cost! I have seen enough pros get angry and abuse their bikes in a similar way, enough times that I have reached a point of disgust. I have owned some pretty decent bikes over the years, race worthy bikes, but I would be happy to own a pro-calibre bike once in a lifetime, twice if I were lucky. By pro-calibre I mean top of the line everything. Expensive everything. Perhaps if pros, or maybe I should just say some pros, had to pay for their rides they might treat them in a little less cavalier fashion.

I have come to grief through the actions of others, I have had bikes suffer frustrating mechanicals, but never once have I thought to lift one up over my head and smash it to the ground. Heck, back in the day, I never even considered doing that to a tennis racquet, and they are much more affordable.

There are people who treasure their fifty-dollar bikes with rust holes in the tubes, components secured with zip ties, bare bars, and tires that have exceeded their life expectancy by some thousand miles, or more. I have to think they might be more deserving of the mega-dollar bike than some pros. The method is irrelevant; whether they smash it to the ground, throw it into a ditch beside the road, or hurl it over the edge of a cliff, the message says one thing - ingratitude. Respect the tools of your trade. Respect your fellow pros. Respect the many non-pros who would love to own a bike like that. Just once on their lives.