Girl Bike

I bought a girl bike last weekend. At least that’s what we used to call them back in the last century. When we were kids. In the days of banana seats. And chopper handlebars on our 3-speed bikes. When we built jump ramps out of scrap wood from the barn.

And no one wore a helmet.

Girl bikes are bikes without a top tube. (I almost typed “tube top” in that previous sentence. That took me back a few years as well). Anyway, history tells us that girl bikes were designed differently than boy bikes to accommodate certain social norms about women and bicycles.

[Sidebar}. There is, in fact, a lot of interesting history written about women and bicycling. Just do a quick Google search. One of my most favorite organizations operating in the world today, World Bicycle Relief, is moving the needle in overcoming extreme poverty by equipping folks with bicycles. Especially girls. Check out their mission. Or just wait for a future blog post from me.

Here’s a depiction of a bike frame. Girl bikes don’t have the top tube.

Image: Century Cycles

I feel like I’m belaboring this point about the top tube. We all know what a girl bike is. Can we please get on with this….?

Yes. Let’s. We have a girl in our house (Aubrey – she rocks). But I didn’t buy the girl bike for her. I bought it for me. Bought myself a girl bike.

In one of an increasing number of concessions I’m making to growing older, my body doesn’t always feel like tossing my leg up and over a top tube to jump on a bike. So I bought a girl bike. Which we’ll call a “step thru” from now on. Cause that’s somehow more masculine sounding.

It’s been a little emotional giving up my old Trek. We’ve been good friends for well over 25,000 miles. But everything has a season.

Technical details. The bike is a Momentum Vida. Momentum frames are built by Giant (as are the vast majority of all bicycle frames in the world today (source: Mike at Mike’s Bikes). Cost: $760. If you check out the website you’ll see this is definitely a girl bike.

But there’s this. Vida is a Spanish/Portuguese word that means “life.” I like that. Cause bikes have given me a lot of life over the years. And I want to keep on riding. Right off into the sunset if that’s how God arranges it. Pretty sure there will be bikes in heaven.

So that’s it. Nothing profound or deeply philosophical about this. Just steppin’ thru to the next phase. I just want to keep riding.

Here’s to another 25,000 miles.

And at least I didn’t buy an e-bike. Yet.

P.S. – also thought about getting a recumbent bike. Just not really my thing.