I haven't owned a bike in years. I use to ride a 20" BMX when I was a teenager, then I bought a hardtail dirt jumper bike when I was in my early 20's but ended up selling it because I didn't ride it for probably 2 years due to knee pain whenever I would ride. Never really had a good mountain bike or roadbike either, so I didn't know what I was missing out on.
But after we moved back to Toronto, my brother in law had a roadbike sitting in the garage doing nothing for the last couple years, so I decided to take it out on a ride. Never had the chance to really ride a road bike before, so getting used to the narrow tires was weird, but I really enjoyed getting out and riding. A week or two after I started riding his bike, I was out on a run on garbage day and someone in the neighbourhood was throwing out an older TREK mountain bike (late 90's Trek Mountain Trek), so I ran home, grabbed the truck and picked it up. It was in good shape, just needed a bit of work on the derailers to get the full 21 speed and the grips replaced (the old ones were so old, the rubber was essentially melting). Since I grabbed that bike, I've probably put in over 150km in the last 3 weeks of just riding around the area I live. It's so much nicer to have a proper sized mountain bike that's set up correctly, vs having the pain caused by pedaling a smaller bike or standing all the time.
I'm now really considering buying a better bike in the next couple of months. Might look into a Dual Sport style bike so I can also enjoy it on the trails in the parks near by too.
