E-Bike riders are not bike riders (and never will be)!
E-bikes are an example of everything that is weak and soft about people in the modern world.
Fact:
- A bike is a ‘pedal powered’ 2-wheel vehicle.
- Cycling is the act of riding a bike. It encompasses the use of human-power for recreation or transport.
- An E-Bike is a motorized bicycle with an integrated electric motor used to assist propulsion. NOT A BIKE.
Fun facts:
- People who ride real bikes don’t like you and never will.
- You can do everything on a real bike you can do on an E-bike. You just have to try, have some dignity, and give it a go for a little longer to achieve.
- Bike shops that sell them make more money from them as they are more profitable.
- You will get more hurt! Cycling is the most dangerous activity out of any sport. When you combine speed, with a lack of experience and skill, you will crash one day and far worse than if you were going slower on a real bike. Speed kills.
- Lighting will strike you at a higher percentage than normal bikes because you are a conducting rod! Scientifically this is false, but that is not how God works.
Analysis/opinion overall:
Despite clever marketing – E-Bikes are not bikes! They mimic the shape and look of a traditional bike – but they are just a slow motor bike.
You don’t get any of the true benefits you receive from riding a bike. It will only increase your overall weakness and contribute to a weaker mental state.
E-bike owners will never be given respect by cyclists. E-bikers are for people who can’t ride a real bike and people who look for short cuts and easy options.
Riding an E-bike is cheating, done by people looking for an easy answer. E-bikers deserve to be forever shunned as people found wanting, people who can’t ride a real bike and people who look for short cuts and easy options
An analogy:
You can get a sword, get the outfit and do a samurai course, but you are not a samurai. Without the culture to grow the samurai from the ground up, with the values, the mystique, the comradery, and respect that comes with the life and honour of a samurai.
My history:
I have been riding bikes since I used one as transport and freedom to get to primary school.
After a major knee operation 35 years ago and once able to ride again, I included in my rehab, riding my mountain bike. I developed the skills and fitness needed to spend hours in the saddle conquering challenging trails, hills, and descents.
I have had 14 reconstructive operations; I have a false knee and a false hip. I am 55 years old and have limited time and many life pressures. Yet, I still have the self-respect to pedal my bike without a motor.
At 55, I am still riding as much as I can and as often as I can on hard trails, up hills and even dabbling at the random endurance race. The soul is in the effort, the achievement and being outside working under your own steam.
My trigger:
I started to get passed on uphill black diamond trails that I have spent years conquering by people on motorised bikes! A recent phenomenon that is increasingly more prevalent on mountain bike trails all over the world. Being passed by someone who doesn’t deserve to be even be there grates at you, especially when they ruin your line and act like they are passing you, as if you are in their way, when, they should have the respect enough to be patient.
Riding in general:
E-bikes and E-bikers in races is only possible due to the ‘sell-out’ of bike manufacturers to the E-bike scam. If you have purchased a very expensive and overpriced E-bike you have been conned.
E-bike riders do not deserve to be on the same trials as mountain bikers. They chew up the tracks and do constant damage.
They try to overtake you on steep hills, ruining your line and momentum, they block up technical trails with their lack of skill and clog up down hills trails with their, ‘look at me’, I can go fast downhill attitude.
I have spent years developing the skills to get up a black diamond trails which are always one pedal stroke away from failure. Potentially ruining my goal of making it to the top without clicking out! These trails require concentration, balance, and repetition. Then an E-bike comes up behind you and wants to pass. Someone who would never have been capable of attempting the trail on a mountain bike! Someone who has never earnt the right to be there and they want to go past you, upsetting your line and momentum.
When a faster mountain bike rider comes up to pass, you let them because you respect them, and they have earnt it. Respect comes from effort! E-bikers rarely are people looking for achievement without effort.
Mountain bike riding takes time to develop the skill and fitness required to develop from green to blue to black trails. This development time is critical. Pride develops confidence, confidence is great for mental strength.
Fitness takes stages and riding is amazing for your health and fitness (when you don’t crash).
Everything about an E-bike is like trying to achieve all of this, with an app, or a pill, a short cut that gets you none of the true reasons you ride a bike and love it.
The most disgusting development I believe is the inclusion of an E-bike category in mountain bike races giving fictious credibility.
Debunking myths and some truth about E-Bikes:
There is a place for E-bikes in mountain bike riding. Yes, or course there is! If you are over 75 or have a serious physical disability that gives you no choice.
E-bikes are good for your fitness and develop your aerobic base. If you are someone that gets tired walking to the letter box, maybe. Aerobic fitness is development by a constant pace and a set heart rate over a period of time. E-Bikes do not do this, they engage a motor when you peddle! You can build your aerobic fitness riding a real bike, as you have to sit at a steady pace and keep your heart rate a certain level by pedalling! An engine will not help you do that, it will only reduce your consistency and requirement for effort.
I can get more runs in because I only use the E for uphill and getting more runs. Yes, you can. Or you could even take the shuttle (which is equally as weak but good for small children, people without legs and grandmothers who are time poor). However, you didn’t earn a single run, you got no sense of achievement from riding anywhere. You drove to the Mountain Bike Park, unpacked your motorised bike then used it to up and down the water slide, drove home and in 3 hours, didn’t ride anywhere.
It is great transport, gets me to work and is ecofriendly compared to driving, parking and everything that goes along with that. An E-bike uses a battery, it uses electricity to charge, it uses far more carbon to build and operate than a real bike.
If you want to be a climate activist, ride a bike, and stop comparing your E-bike use to using a car.
I get to ride with my kids and go out where I wouldn’t ever get to go. Yes, this might be the case, but what about setting an example! If you have an E-bike and your kids don’t (so you can keep up) – that is something to be ashamed about.
If your kids have an E-Bike, then you as a parent need to look at yourself! Indulging your kids with an obvious expensive is not teaching them about value and worth.
Conclusion:
E-bikes are evil and pointless. You are being conned by big manufacturers that riding them is good for the environment (not if compared to real bikes, or walking, but compared to trucks, yes).
If you want to get fit, it takes effort and it takes a real bike and a bit of time and consistency.
If you only walked on escalators, you would never be able to walk, so they are not a step towards fitness. They are a step backwards for your health and mental resilience.
They teach you to take the easy way, that you don’t need effort, only money!
Sell your E-bike now and save your life. Join me in lobbying the government to ban E-Bikes from all mountain bike parks and bike trails. Vote for having an E-Bike requires registration and payment of registration fees like other mortised vehicles. They are slow motor bikes not fast push bikes!
Thank you for reading!
Now go riding.
