Simplicity.
A trail:
A bike:
A gear, or maybe two:
What more do you need?*
*[In my case you also need like eight other bikes, but I’m going to keep acting all self-righteous about my phony commitment to simplicity anyway.]
Well, it turns out you need a lot. I recently joked about “needing a dropper post for your dropper post’s dropper post,” but little did I know how close we were, for a reader has alerted me to the existence of this:
It’s called the SwitchGrade, and it will “unlock the full potential of your dropper seatpost:”
How does it do this? By letting you change your saddle angle depending on the terrain. Here’s a rider in abject misery because he could not angle his saddle down before the big climb:
See how the nose of his saddle goes right up his ass as a result?
Ouch!
Now here’s a rider who could optimize his saddle angle thanks to the miracle of SwitchGrade:
It still goes up his ass, but instead of violating him roughly it gently massages his prostate:
Ahhh, that’s better.
Just ask Josh Harris, mountain biker and doctor of proctology:
Hey, I’m not anti-tech or anti-capitalism. Quite the opposite–we are very fortunate to live in a society in which people have the luxury of purchasing a $255 seatpost head:
Indeed, whether it’s bike parts, or prostate massagers, or pretty much any luxury item you can think of, the array of what’s available to us today at the push of a virtual button is truly dazzling, and a reminder that we’re far better off than any humans who have come before us.
[Intern: insert affiliate link for prostate massager above, no pun intended.]
Nevertheless, philosophically speaking, I must question what it is exactly we’re doing here. How much of the bike has to move, exactly? At what point do you stop adapting the bike to suit the terrain and simply accept it for what it is? And at what point does this contraptions cease to be a bike? First the bike was too rigid, and we made it so the front wheel could go up and down. Then that made us realize that the back wheel didn’t go up and down too, so we solved that too. Next came the seat, which we set up so it could telescope. (Yes, I’m willfully omitting the Hite Rite here.) But what good is that if you can’t also change your saddle angle? This in turn will only make it necessary to invent a device that allows on-the-fly handlebar angle adjustment, and width adjustment, and eventually you’ll even be able to change your tire pressure while you’re riding. (Oh wait, that’s already a thing.) And that’s not even addressing motors! I nightmares about the sorts of battery-powered articulating monstrosities our descendants will one day be riding.
I believe that, as a species, humanity should never resign itself to its fate. We should continue to evolve and to innovate. Indeed, our innate urge to push and to explore and to transcend is the very essence of what it means to be human, and we should always strive to defy our limitations.
However, I also believe that as cyclists we should do the exact opposite. For chrissakes, just suck it up! Sometimes the trail’s too bumpy. Sometimes the climb’s too hard. Sometimes your saddle position isn’t entirely optimal. How utterly free from any sort of challenge or adversity or minor inconvenience does your goddamn ride have to be?!?
Or fine, just get the seatpost thingy, whatever works for you.