I want to sell my road bike as it’s basically relegated to trainer duties. I’d much rather focus on gravel instead of trusting northern Virginia drivers not to maim/kill me.
I don’t do crits or road races but do maybe one or two organized centuries a year. Figure I could swap tires in the rare event of a road ride.
Is there anything I’m overlooking, a reason to keep dedicated road and gravel bikes?
I don’t understand the question…
I’d keep both if you can manage it. Even if you’re mostly riding one of them, it can be super handy to have a spare around for when something goes wrong with your A bike or someone visits etc.
Ooooh…got it.
Skittles…definitely Skittles.
Having only one bike is a bummer if it needs to be serviced since you don’t have anything to ride while you wait. Since I MTB and groad I have two bikes. If I was only a single discipline rider I would still want two bikes for this reason.
I downsized to 1 bike, went from CX & road to just a CX with 2 wheelsets (road/offroad)
Then I wanted to go faster again, and now ive got an aero road bike, and the CX. I last a couple years with 1 bike
For me personally, taking a bike on/off the trainer is also a hassle. I can just jump on a ride, dont have to think about which bike is where
My biggest regret with owning one bike is that I don’t have enough money to buy another one.
On a more serious note, I imagine it would be specific to your discipline(s) and performance goals.
I thought about selling my road bike when I got my cx/gravel bike with multiple wheelsets, but considering I’d probably get less than $900 for it and it’s already set up on the trainer… Easier to just leave it there and not waste a few minutes every time I want to do a training ride. Plus I can pull it off if I’m doing a real deal road ride where I want the higher gearing options, since my gravel bike is 1x and more climbing oriented.
If push came to shove, I could definitely drop down to having only the CX bike and a FS mountain bike to cover 90% of my riding. Fortunately, I have the luxury of being an n+1 kind of person so I’m usually adding, not subtracting.
I could do one bike and one trainer bike. By trainer bike I mean a bike that never leaves the trainer. Limited work is done on that bike and you can always get a work out in.
My first bike, aluminum, lives on the trainer. I’m way too lazy to drag a bike up and down to the basement. If you don’t mind that, then I think you can get by with just gravel/cx style bike. My outdoor bike is a nice cx bike: racked up a few thousand miles last year on the road before converting for cross in the fall. The 1x isn’t that much of an inconvenience - I’ve done several centuries on it with a 40t chainring. I keep thinking about bike 3, but the cx bike gets the job done and is actually a pleasure to ride.
Good point and something I hadn’t previously considered.
Having a zero bikes due to a maintenance issue would certainly not help with training consistency.
Also if you have an ERG trainer and dont shift, the chains last FOREVER
Not really your question…but where in N VA are you? If you are in the thick of it then there are still some incredible road riding opportunities within a 30 min drive that may be worth keeping the road bike for even if you only do those 1+ times/month.
Keep the road bike. I was considering selling mine too when I got the gravel bike but - like everyone is saying, you won’t get much for it, it’s nice having a spare when you need one, it’s very convenient leaving it on the trainer (more plan compliance!). And like @mwglow15 says you may decided to plan a fun/safe road route once in awhile. Road bike is still a bit faster and a bit more fun on dedicated road loops.
Even if you do shift, the absence of dirt and road dust means no abrasives get onto the drivetrain, and everything just lasts forever. I do one drivetrain job per year on my trainer bike, and it’s way enough.
Yes. The horrible feeling of deep, deep regret.
Just curious…but where are there gravel options in N. Va? It has been 30 years since I lived there (McLean / Tysons Corner) but there really wasn’t any gravel options then (outside of the C&O Canal, I guess).
Road riding in McLean and out into Great Falls was pretty good then…but I imagine riding on Old Dominion out to Great Falls these days is tantamount to a death wish.
Sell the road bike and get a TT bike then you’ve got a road bike that goes really fast.
I grew up in Centreville, right near the border of Fairfax and Loudon counties. So there are a decent amount of gravel options if you drive out to the Middleburg/The Plains/Marshall area. But 30 years ago Centreville was most certainly the very edge of what might have been considered N VA and is still much much more suburban than the Tysons area. So compared to Tysons, I imagine Centreville is like a cyclist’s paradise