Here's some more information about different kinds of bicycle. If you're beginning to cycle and planning to make your first purchase, or looking to advance your riding, here we'll be looking into the different types of bicycles and what they're designed to do. This article looks into road racing bikes and mountain bikes. Discover more about bicycles in this short guide.
Road Racing Bicycles
Road bikes and road racing bikes are built for speed and are designed for use on the road. Because these bicycles are designed to gain maximum speed on the roads, these types of bike are very lightweight, with a slender frame made from materials such as carbon fibre. Other design inventions to helping gain maximum speed on a road bike include very narrow and smooth surface tyres, and dropped curved handlebars and tri-bars fitted to the centre, which all help make the cyclists position on the bike more aerodynamic whilst riding. The aerodynamic design of a road racing bike helps to enhance the speed of the bike, helping the rider go faster.
Road racing bikes also have a minimal amount of gears. A minimal amount of gears are designed to create a narrow gear ratio, and this narrow gear ratio makes cycling on the road more efficient. The idea behind a minimal amount of gears on road racing bikes is to allow the rider to crank the pedals at an efficient and constant pace on this type of smooth terrain, whilst being able to handle the road at different gradients encountered during the course, such as up and down hills.
Mountain Bikes
Mountain bikes are used over all kinds of different, and often bumpy, uneven terrain. Unlike racing cycles, mountain bikes have many gears to control and maintain an efficient and constant pace (or in other words, a cadence). These many gears help to maintain a good pedalling cadence for the rider throughout the rough, uneven terrain and contrasting degrees of gradient; from steep mountain, hill side terrain, to more rugged flat grassy land.
Mountain bikes are often more robustly built than road bikes. To manage a good efficient ride, these bikes are designed to handle the hefty stress and strain the cycle may go through to perform on these types of trails. Often mountain bikes are made from steel and aluminium, and the more performance based, racing cycles can be made from carbon-fibre and titanium materials to make them lighter and faster.
Two important features found on a mountain bike are that they often have suspension systems and disc brakes. Disc brakes fitted to the centre of the wheel help maintain an efficient braking system during riding through difficult muddy terrain for example, whereas its counterpart, the v-brakes (seated on the rim of the wheels) may easily get clogged up with mud, and become less efficient during the course of the ride.
Suspension on a bicycle helps the tyres to better manage the rough, bumpy terrain and aims to absorb the shock produced as the tyres better manage through the ground. Mountain bikes are commonly found to have front suspension, or full suspension (suspension at the front and rear of the tyres) and suspension too can be fitted to the saddle/saddle post to produce a more comfortable ride.
