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911

as a rule, i tend not to involve myself in the parallel universe that is the e-bike market, for similar reasons as to why i have done likewise with mountain bikes: i own neither. though my early years in the hebrides were conducted aboard a hardtail mtb, it was but a matter of time before that gave way to road biking, purely because i seemed to spend more time on the road getting to scrabbly bits of offroad, than i spent actually getting muddy. and those kilometres of travel were accomplished on two-inch knobbly rubber, a method demonstrably slower than riding 25mm of treadless.

and though i was sent a very fine turbo vado by specialized for review, by the time the review was written, i had come to terms with the fact that i was definitely not the target market for an e-bike. with uk legal e-bikes capped at 25kph, ending motor support when exceeding that speed, i became a passenger, riding pretty much everywhere at 25kph, watching the battery indicator like a hawk to ensure sufficient juice for the return trip.

but there are many for whom the e-bike has arisen as a gift from above, and strangely not only for those categorised as elderly or infirm. a matter of two years past saw the emergence of an e-bike hire business on the island, and over the course of last summer, we met several of their customers, all younger than the ageing sunday peloton, riding as if the highway code didn't exist and as if they were the only ones on the road (much to the annoyance of several truck drivers and a bus). every one of them could likely have accomplished the same journey on a regular analogue bicycle. batteries not included.

so while the e-bike market might be experiencing a meteoric and satisfying rise in sales, from an ecological point of view, it is using what, in my opinion, is unnecessary amounts of electricity. though e-bikes create no emissions at the point of use, that electricity has to be generated somewhere, and for the moment, that's more likely to be coal-fired, gas powered or nuclear than renewable. such matters may change, but it seems still a valid point to make that many e-bike owners could manage just as well on analogue bikes, it's just that they haven't read rule #5.

however, when you consider that the the power source for the e-bike market shares a great deal with the path being taken by the car market, it should probably come as no real surprise that the financial might of the car market is slowly but surely, making inroads into the velocipedinal realm.

though the electric car is also in some sort of an enforced rise to power (pardon the pun), it is predictable that those making headlines are the frighteningly fast, aerodynamically-shaped two-seaters with an electric motor on each wheel, expressly designed to go as fast as possible. legislation prevents that particular situation infecting the e-bike market (for now at least), but that hasn't stopped the likes of porsche selling their own beautifully designed and crafted, full-suspension carbon fibre e-bikes, currently outfitted with shimano motors.

constructed by germany's rotwild, a porsche e-bike can be yours, as long as you have between £10,000 and £12,000 to spend. however, one does have to question their grasp of the bicycle market when their website states, 'The 'PORSCHE' logo on the top tube immediately reveals the roots of the eBike.' the porsche logo actually appears on the headtube, while the word 'porsche' is emblazoned on the downtube.

it's possible, however, that japan might soon be given the bum's rush, following the german car manufacturer acquiring a 20% share in e-bike drive-systems manufacturer, fazua, with an option to purchase further shares in the future. and were that not sufficient to signal its interest in the e-bike market, porsche has also established a partnership with ponooc investment to focus on "...technological solutions in the micromobility market."

with the relaxation and in some cases, total disappearance of covid restrictions, car use has returned to pre-pandemic levels all across the world, while the bicycle slowly creeps back to the relative obscurity it once enjoyed. however, though we can commiserate with each other on reality, it appears that the singularity might be headed in a hitherto unforeseen direction. while the luddites amongst us bemoan the marginalisation of the caliper brake, maybe we should be looking at the bigger picture and prepare ourselves for the encroaching rarity of analogue bicycles.

still, i've been wrong before.

monday 14 february 2022