Now you might be thinking that I am going to go into a deeply philosophical but somewhat esoteric rant about how “steel is real” and all that guff. Wrong my furry friends. After riding the stuff for 25 years, I am starting to get the shits up with steel a bit.
Now before any of you rich gits who have brought a custom made, chrome lugged beauty cough up your double shot latte’s, I feel I have to give a bit of context. Steel is fine for a beater bike. It is makes a really good training bike and it is still what you should be touring on. What gives me the shits about steel is the way people have gone all misty eyed and romantic about it.
Let’s start getting some perspective here. My steel “race” bike would have been a pretty good thing back in the day. It has nice angles and it rides comfortably. On a windy downhill, it feels as good as any bike I have ridden. So I should love steel right? Wrong. It always feels like the tyres are a bit flat even when I have 130psi in em. It is molto heavy and if I don’t keep spraying a gallon of fish oil into every orifice every couple of months it starts rusting. My favorite real race bike was made out of Columbus Airplane Alloy tubing. Man did it have some zing. It was a bucking bronco of a bike that always felt like it was ready to go. Climbing or sprinting it wanted me to smash the pedals. You felt everything that was happening, every little ripple in the road. It was here for a good time not a long time, and true to form was always a chance to bust behind the bottom bracket one day without notice.
My steel frame feels like it wants to take a little snooze when I am riding it. It has feel but it has no zing. I can almost fall asleep while I ponce along, as it just sort of glides majestically over the road. It never looks like it is going to break, but it aint gunna break free either.
And that the thing, aluminum frames are yesterdays news now. I suppose it makes sense. I broke about 5 frames when I was racing. I used to ride them to the point where I though they were going to break soon and then offload them, but sometimes I went a little too long… Now steel is kinda back in, sold to “purists”, who want to be able to justifying spending as much money on a frame as a cheap car by saying that it has “character” and that it will last a lifetime blah blah blah.
Each to his own I suppose, but for my money, your best bet if you want to get a buzz out of cycling is to keep an eye out for an older high end alloy frame. It will rattle your fillings out and you will have a very sore arse after 100k, but man will it have a bit of pep when the going gets hot. A steel frame will allow you to seem cool, and a carbon fiber frame is what you are meant to buy as a good consumer, but a good aluminum frame will make you feel like Cippolini in the sprints and Pantani on the climbs. Give one a try if you get the chance.
Pics are steel vs how it should be done.
