explain to me this terminology..

[HaYWiRe]

What the f*** is a hybrid?

Now I hope this is going to be a healthy question and discussion, and not another rant, but help me out here...

Now I understand a mountain bike, fatter tyres (sometimes REALLY fat) stronger frame, built for a few bumps
Road bikes have skinny slicks and aerodynamics, built for asphalt and speed

But this third category gets me....one minute its a road bike with suspension...or an MTB with slicks, or a retro city commuter, or what basically is a CX bike for hipsters, it goes on, is this really just a,marketing term for "miscellaneous"?

And do these bikes seem like they're not very good at anything? Wouldn't this middle ground be better suited to GG or CX bikes? sometimes looking at the list of bike categories leaves me overwhelmed by the diversity, is it necessary to have all these names to make sense of it?

I know where I stand when I look at a road bike, or a triathlon bike. Even cross country and downhill bikes are clear cut (but don't get me started on 'enduro')
Yet simply googling any of the following:
Touring, adventure, hybrid, gravel, city, allroad, and even cyclocross on occasion leaves the bikes I see no more narrowed down??

Maybe I've been sucked into the sales pitch, or or too old school to understand the new trends, but I just cant get my head around it?


What ever happened to buying either a road bike (for roads) or mountain bike (for...uhh...mountains?), and riding it.

[Single Speed George]

hybrids are just thoes like commuter bikes or cycling round lanes kinda bikes though i suppose a cx bike wit flat bars would be a hybrid as it wouldnt meet regulations of most cx races .... damn this is deep ....

ps enduro is like down hill but for middle aged people ...

[benp1]

It used to apply to bikes very well, but is increasingly harder to apply with the need to further differentiation for marketing purposes

I it used to be MTB style upright comfy position with thinner, bigger road wheels. The name doesn't really work so well as a category, apart from hybrid literally meaning a bit of 2 different styles

[ScotRoutes]

It used to apply to bikes very well, but is increasingly harder to apply with the need to further differentiation for marketing purposes

I it used to be MTB style upright comfy position with thinner, bigger road wheels

That's a good description of the hybrids that we hire out.

[HaYWiRe]

So flat bar road bikes, that makes sense but honestly I wonder why they're not simply called that?

I've never questioned why different bikes exist, its just the amount of fancy marketing used is mind boggling, or when companies come up with different terms fir the same product

What ever happened to AUDAX bikes? Roadies with more relaxed geometry and slightly fatter rubber. Or do "adventure road bikes" sell better?

And what "category" does our typical rigid 29ers fit into? Being the bikepacking iron horse of choice

[Single Speed George]

Ridged 29 is just an xc mountain bike, tbh myn is pretty much do it all geometry single speed, that does everything from bike packing, xc races and gets top 10s on strava down trail centres, so ye single speed ridged xc bikes are the most versatile haha

[Bearbonesnorm]

Hybrids have been around for a long time, it's nothing new. In my mind it's a good term as it describes a cross between a mountain bike and a road bike ... quite where that cross-over happens is down to each manufacturer.

I really wouldn't give it anymore thought, it doesn't matter what you / we / them call it, it's just a bike and if you like it and it makes you smile, that's good enough

[benp1]

N+1

[ScotRoutes]

Just to really confuse things, the continentals use "Hybrid" as a name for E-bikes

This is a Cube Stereo Hybrid 140...

[jameso]

What ever happened to buying either a road bike (for roads) or mountain bike (for...uhh...mountains?), and riding it.

A lot of people just want 'a bike'. They don't wear lycra, use strava or care about what sort of bike/gear they have - and good on them. There's also a lot of people that are really into bikes who think MTBs and road bikes are both fairly hopeless options for them and I'd say they're right.
Hybrids at first were 700c MTBs, the first flat-bar CX, or light 29ers, whatever term that you want to call them as a keen rider that makes no sense to a new rider. Raleigh Pioneers, Diamondback Overdrive, that sort of thing. Now, people new to bikes understand MTB and Road bikes via the general media etc and something inbetween seems a go-to option. For most of them a CX bike wouldn't be ideal but a 700x35-45c, flat bar, upright, MTB gearing? Spot on. It's not from marketing, just a term that's settled because people get it. Spilt it down into more sub-categories if you like, you'll just get blank looks from some people, or accusations of being a marketeer : )

Edit to add, there's a lot of BS around all-road, adventure, adventure road, B-road, gravel, etc - that's down to individual brands trying to one-up each other in thinking of the best name for another sort of generally drop-bar Hybrid that gets used for Road, Off-road, Roughstuff and Touring .. easy : )

[HaYWiRe]

@jameso

I think that's probably the best way to look at it, atleast without sounding patronising to those kind of people.

One thing I do hate to see is people riding things completely unsuitable for them, now I understand budget, and the second hand market and have no qualms there, but when I whiteness someone being clearly mis sold something by a salesman.....that gets me.

Like seeing an older woman wobbling because she clearly doesn't feel safe on drop bars and 21c, or a FS 650b being sold for shopping duties on tarmac,

Now don't get me wrong, I'm no bike snob, I'm just happy to see people riding, whatever that is, but get frustrated when certain shops cash in on the people that don't know better

[Bearbonesnorm]

One thing I do hate to see is people riding things completely unsuitable for them, now I understand budget, and the second hand market and have no qualms there, but when I whiteness someone being clearly mis sold something by a salesman.....that gets me.

Give over ... 2/3 of the UK's mountain bikers are riding something unsuitable for the terrain they're on / speed they're actually going

[Cheeky Monkey]

One thing I do hate to see is people riding things completely unsuitable for them, now I understand budget, and the second hand market and have no qualms there, but when I whiteness someone being clearly mis sold something by a salesman.....that gets me.

Give over ... 2/3 of the UK's mountain bikers are riding something unsuitable for the terrain they're on / speed they're actually going

(realises he falls in that bracket but )

TBH I think this sort of navel gazing would probably get the juices flowing here:

http://singletrackworld.com/

[HaYWiRe]

Oh no I'm not falling Into that pit

I've read through whole threads arguing over the huge difference between 12x100 and 15x100 axles.... Or that all QR wheels should be destroyed!
Do they forget what people have been riding for the last 50 years...

Still not as funny as seeing a rigid bike on MTBR.... Anything less than 120mm travel shouldn't be taken off-road apparently...i think most of you guys have proven that wrong

[Single Speed George]

as i say enduro DH for middle aged people with to much money , spend my life overtaking them on trail centers on a full ridged single speed haha i mean i over took some guy on a nomad the other day when i had all my bike packing stuff on down the track in to clappham near inglebourough pretty technical rididng that that bike should have spanked me on, did have a DH bike till a few months ago but keped breaking my self but that only go used for dh haha.
650b hard core trail and enduro bikes are all over trail centers most of which can be ridden on a hard tail much faster due to the flowy terrain , etc on most red runs. ... though when i worked in bike retail it was always pretty easy to up sell to these people so kind of my fault too kind of being a bike snob i know but it is sad to see bikes that should be flying down some alpine run or off some lake district bridleway with rocks flying everywhere not tottering down some red run hahaha anyway rant over :D


hybrid bike riding ^

[Cheeky Monkey]

STW here we come

[Bearbonesnorm]

When you say unsuitable, how do you mean?



This was a few years ago at the Brecon Beast. In reality it's much steeper than it looks in the pic, gully with loose rocks dropping down into a small stream. Rigid, 26" wheels, some shockingly bad £12 cable disc brakes and just out of shot 3 150mm bikes being wheeled down I'd also ridden 80 miles to the start too, which obviously makes me double dead good.



Please note lucky Welsh socks.

[Single Speed George]

haha epic

[HaYWiRe]

I ride trail centres alot, there's one 20 miles from my house and my partner loves the technical aggro stuff.
The place is flooded with high end trail bikes and I'm pretty sure I'm one of the only hard tails there. Yet its funny watching them bob on their suspension at 4mph on the climbs then mine fully locked can power up, but I guess that's just what XC bikes are for.

I do suck at the downs, but that's not the bike, its me, but I'm getting better...still new to MTB after all


However everyone I speak to thinks I'm crazy/ludicrous/in need of a car,ect. When I tell them I rode some 25 miles to get to the trailhead...i mean is that really that far for these people? Maybe its my inner roadie but I can quite happily plow out a 70 mile day, yet it seems far fetched to the trail guys I speak to sitting on 5k of 200mm travel...

[FLV]

Wow.

Cant people just ride what they want / enjoy riding, regardless of whether or not they are faster / slower than anybody else?

The industry will keep on changing things because they are here to make money. This is a good thing overall (some of the terminology might not be so great)

*leaves*

[whitestone]

As far as I'm concerned the biggest failing about my bike is the lump of lard sat on top of it I doubt I'd be any faster on a technical downhill on a FS bike than I am on my HT though possibly less shaken up.

If someone wants to spend 5K on a bike then it's their money (or monthly payments) and if they get out and are happy then that's fine.

[HaYWiRe]

They can just as easily criticise us for how much we spend on tent pegs and a sheet of fancy tarp

[whitestone]

They can just as easily criticise us for how much we spend on tent pegs and a sheet of fancy tarp

Easy to justify any spending to yourself and puzzle over someone else doing it on what they like doing. Sometimes you do wonder about your own spending though! A friend and his wife have a camper home (RV for the stateside crowd) and like it but calculated that the cost has been more than stopping in decent hotels.

Mention the cost of a typical bike such as the Genesis Longitude to someone who doesn't cycle and you'll get the response that you can get a bike for £80 in Argos/Lidl/Asda.

[Bearbonesnorm]

still new to MTB after all

Don't take this the wrong way but I think that might be the reason you're looking for a reason behind everything. As Dave says, the only reasoning is that there's an industry driving cycling and as with all industry, they need to make money, whether it be a bike manufacturer, a suspension importer, a magazine or your local bike shop.

When I started riding (same as many on here), you had 'A Bike' which was likely a 26" wheeled, rigid steel bike with dubious brakes and you rode it everywhere. You didn't pick and choose where to ride in case the bike wasn't suitable, you just rode it from your door or on occasion you'd visit another part of the country, not a trail centre but the actual countryside itself ... things were simpler and they still are if you want them to be.

[Zippy]

When I started riding (same as many on here), you had 'A Bike' which was....

Actually an a-bike is a hilarious bike with bugger all structural rigidity, tiny wheels, a penchant to wheelie and actually more useless than walking. That said, I still bought one, pedalled it a bit and then sold it a couple of years later for a profit!


"A-bike stand alone" by The Uploader - Own work. Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Commons - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File ... _alone.jpg

Back on topic. I ride what most would classify a "hybrid". It's a Kinesis Crosslight Pro6, with flat bars and running 1x9 with gearing erring towards more roadie. It's perfect for the job it does - but you can call it whatever genre of bike you like...
(I've also worked out that since I built it in 2012 it's on it's 4th drivetrain, 6th chain and 2nd set of wheels...! I dread to think how many sets of tyres and brakepads I've got through.)

Here it is in bikepacking (or should that be touring, so I guess it's a touring bike..) guise:
Crosslight Touring by Chris Reeves, on Flickr