There's no shortage of reasons why people are taking up cycling. Some folks are having a hard time keeping up with the rising cost of gasoline and maintenance bills, so they choose to ride a bike. Others choose it because riding a bike is better for the environment than travelling in a car or using public transportation.
Still others simply ride bicycles for fun. Whatever your reason for going cycle shopping there are some definite criteria that you need to think about before you make your choice. There is more to choosing the right cycling bicycle than the colors used to paint it! This article gives you some tips and pointers to help you pick the bicycle that will be perfect for you.
One of the major parts of choosing the right cycling bicycle for you is making sure that the bicycle is the right size. The measurement of your inseam is needed for this. Your inseam is the amount of inches from the bottom of your foot, up the inside of your leg to your groin. You should be able to sit on your bike while keeping both feet flat on the ground. This is for saftey reasons and will allow you to stop the bike if your brakes fail, avoiding any injury.
For road bikes take away 9 inches from the total of your inseam. This is to account for the size of tires you will use on a road bike. Designed for cycling around the city road bike tires are thin. For a mountain bike you will need to take 12" away from your total inseam. Again this is to account for the size of tires. You will find them to be much bigger and designed to handle rocky terrain. You can of course use a mountain bike for road cycling but this isn't supposed to be their primary use.
Ask yourself the number of gears necessary for your bike. Make your choice by knowing that if you ride in mountainous areas you’ll need more gears than when riding in a flat area. You can’t evaluate the bike only by the number of gears it has. You may never even get around to using all the available gears. Don’t spend money on something you won’t use. Find out where you’ll ride your bike, especially if this is your main vehicle, and make sure you have you could look here enough gears to handle the areas through which you will travel. There are a lot of criteria to use when deciding which cycling bicycle is right for you. Are you going to be riding your bicycle every day or riding it only when you feel the urge to? What height makes you feel the most comfortable? Do you feel more at ease with your feet just above the ground as you sit on the seat, or would you rather that your feet sit flat when you are at rest? You will need to consider each of these things when choosing your bicycle..