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 So Marti (@irishgirl31) and I have been talking for a long time about buying her a bike. We finally got serious about it a few weeks ago and me, being the “expert” asked her a few questions and proudly determined that she needed a cruiser or hybrid bike. So we headed to a few LBSs to get a feel for sizing and pricing.
So we leave the LBS to go run a few other errands and while driving my AWESOME GF says something like… “you know I think I’d rather mountain bike.” About a million things went through my head – not a single one negative mind you – I was stunned. Mainly I got this image of her and I in the woods all wet and muddy… but I digress! So we talked about mountain biking and basically I summed up road and mountain biking like this: Road Biking = “you will fall a lot less often but when you do it will hurt bad. Falling at 15 – 50 MPH and hitting pavement while wearing spandex and you are going to get hurt.” Mountain Biking = “you will fall a lot more often. Roots will jump out and bite you. But more than likely you will be going 7 – 20 MPH and you will more often than not land in mud, grass or a bush (just hope its not a blackberry bush!). You may get scratched up but you’ll more often than not pop up and go on with the ride” YES there are exceptions. YES you CAN get hurt mountain biking. I do know this… but we’re not going to be doing any extreme downhill (at least THIS summer!).  So we returned to the LBS with a new goal… to find a nice entry level mountain bike suitable of my @irishgirl31! She stood over and sat on a nice mid-level offering from Specialized. The size was 15” and it looked like it fit pretty well (I’m NO expert on sizing others. I know what I like but I don’t know how to help others.) but we wanted the entry level model – mostly because it came in an AWESOME color scheme, black and lavender!
So we ordered away and prayed to the Gods that it would come in before the weekend (this was a Tuesday night, I believe?). Finally on Friday afternoon after a few days of saying to each other “God I hope we get to mountain bike this weekend” I told her to just call the shop – they might be busy and forget to call her – she did and her bike was in! YES… so I picked her up after work and we headed up the shop. We walked in and they had The Specialized Myka HT all ready to go! This really is a GREAT little mountain bike… aluminum frame, V-Pull brakes, solid components and most importantly a super color-scheme! I had promised to buy Irish some accessories when we picked up her bike so we shopped around a bit and finally threw the new bike in the back of my truck for the ride home – of course as we’re backing out of the parking spot I realize I left the manual hanging from the handlebars so I hop out grab them and hand them to Irish. SIDE NOTE: Shouldn’t bicycle manuals really be called “don’t sue us books?” I mean really they contain ZERO useful information. All they say can be summed up as “Don’t ever ride this bike. If you do ride this bike and you fall off or even if it breaks because of our negligence you can’t sue us.” Back to the story. Well Irish kinda looks at me while holding her manual and says shyly “I wonder why this manual has a big 17" on it?” OH SHIT… they ordered the wrong size? There goes our weekend plans! DAMN! We pull over a few block away from the shop and I have her stand over the bike… well it looks okay, really but I’m NO expert! Hmmm… we decided to head back to the shop. Luckily when we arrive the owner of the shop is inside (I’ve purchased a few bikes from this location and know the employees fairly well.) and we tell him our dilemma. He is AWESOME… he comes outside and watches Irish on the 17” (Yeah that’s a hard job – watching a HOTTIE ride a bike around the parking lot!) he then brings out a 15” (same model, wrong price-point, same geometry) and we both agree that she actually looks better on the bigger bike! This is where the customer service of a LBS comes into play… he promises us that if she rides it for the weekend and she doesn’t like it that she can bring it back and he’ll order her the 15” size no problem! Wow… that is awesome! The peace of mind knowing that we were free to try this bike out and NOT ruin our weekend plans and still be able to change our minds was awesome! Stay Tuned for Part Two tomorrow… our first few rides!
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