5 ms·

One of the craziest thing I have noticed is bikes have been sold out everywhere. You can't find a $1500 entry level road bike. My friends are telling me the che

One of the craziest thing I have noticed is bikes have been sold out everywhere. You can't find a $1500 entry level road bike. My friends are telling me the cheapest they are seeing are starting to be $2-3k. If you have an old bike that you want to sell, the premiums are almost 20-50% more. Some people are selling 3 year old bikes for MSRP. It's crazy right now.

spanhandler 6y ago
The other day I looked into rowing machines (ergs). The one that seemed like the no-brainer best choice according to basically everyone is sold out everywhere. Heavily used ones are going for like 20% over retail on Craigslist. So much for that. I've been meaning to DIY a squat rack in the garage but I need a bar, and I haven't even bothered to check that. I assume they're hard to find and selling for over-normal-price used, same as everything else.
- asdff 6y ago
  I've been squatting with elastic resistance bands. Works great and I don't need to shove a rack somewhere.
  - spanhandler 6y ago
    Oooooh I have a couple sets of those kicking around, if I double them up, that might work. I wanna start doing some other big compound lifts, too, but that'd be better than nothing.
socalnate1 6y ago
Can confirm; I've been trying to find a sub $1k mountain bike in Southern California for a week without luck.
- asdff 6y ago
  Why not just go used? I picked up a road bike for a great deal in LA recently. I just checked LA craigslist, and there are over 400 results for "mountain bike" and > $1000.
  - socalnate1 6y ago
    Once you filter out pieces of junk, bikes that don't fit my specific height and aren't within an hour drive, that list unfortunately gets a lot smaller. I expect that filtering to become more relaxed as time goes on though. :)
asdff 6y ago
It depends on what kind of biker you are. If you are one to don spandex and drop a grip on a bike, then yeah it's tough to get a 2020 Trek right now. However, if you lower your standards a little, humble yourself and realize that you aren't Lance Armstrong, that you won't notice the difference between a 2020 ultegra groupset and a 2010 ultegra groupset, then there are plenty of bikes. Even my local bike shops look pretty stocked which is odd considering how large LA is, and there is still plenty more used on second hand sites. In the midst of the pandemic, I managed to grab a full ultegra bike for $400. Real beauty of a hand made Italian stallion. The only reason why I got this bike was because the owner had just bought a brand new gravel bike, because that is all the rage right now in the bike world and people are trying to get rid of their road bikes. Gear acquisition syndrome has plagued this sport since its inception, but it works in the used cyclist's favor when you can reliably get gently used gear for dirt cheap. Word of advice from one cyclist to another: resist the trends. Buy used. Buy old. Spend used car levels of cash on anything else in your life besides a bike, because in 10 years that $1500 bike will remain the same great bike it was but will become $200.
- awithrow 6y ago
  It might depend on where you're located. My wife was recently looking for a < $1000 bike in Denver and it involved going all over town and checking every store that sold bikes. $2000-$3000 was generally what stores had on the shelf. We asked a few places what was going on and they were saying that the <$1000 bikes were hard for them to order and anything they got in would sell the same day. She eventually got lucky and found a 2yr old used bike for $400 which is exactly what she wanted. She just got lucky and got to the store just as they were putting it out on the floor.
analog31 6y ago
I think it's actually both bad and good. The bad is that prices are up. The good is that higher prices and news of a bike shortage might be drawing more old bikes out of garages and back yards.

spanhandler 6y ago

The other day I looked into rowing machines (ergs). The one that seemed like the no-brainer best choice according to basically everyone is sold out everywhere. Heavily used ones are going for like 20% over retail on Craigslist. So much for that. I've been meaning to DIY a squat rack in the garage but I need a bar, and I haven't even bothered to check that. I assume they're hard to find and selling for over-normal-price used, same as everything else.

asdff 6y ago
I've been squatting with elastic resistance bands. Works great and I don't need to shove a rack somewhere.
- spanhandler 6y ago
  Oooooh I have a couple sets of those kicking around, if I double them up, that might work. I wanna start doing some other big compound lifts, too, but that'd be better than nothing.

socalnate1 6y ago

Can confirm; I've been trying to find a sub $1k mountain bike in Southern California for a week without luck.

asdff 6y ago
Why not just go used? I picked up a road bike for a great deal in LA recently. I just checked LA craigslist, and there are over 400 results for "mountain bike" and > $1000.
- socalnate1 6y ago
  Once you filter out pieces of junk, bikes that don't fit my specific height and aren't within an hour drive, that list unfortunately gets a lot smaller. I expect that filtering to become more relaxed as time goes on though. :)

asdff 6y ago

It depends on what kind of biker you are. If you are one to don spandex and drop a grip on a bike, then yeah it's tough to get a 2020 Trek right now. However, if you lower your standards a little, humble yourself and realize that you aren't Lance Armstrong, that you won't notice the difference between a 2020 ultegra groupset and a 2010 ultegra groupset, then there are plenty of bikes. Even my local bike shops look pretty stocked which is odd considering how large LA is, and there is still plenty more used on second hand sites. In the midst of the pandemic, I managed to grab a full ultegra bike for $400. Real beauty of a hand made Italian stallion. The only reason why I got this bike was because the owner had just bought a brand new gravel bike, because that is all the rage right now in the bike world and people are trying to get rid of their road bikes. Gear acquisition syndrome has plagued this sport since its inception, but it works in the used cyclist's favor when you can reliably get gently used gear for dirt cheap. Word of advice from one cyclist to another: resist the trends. Buy used. Buy old. Spend used car levels of cash on anything else in your life besides a bike, because in 10 years that $1500 bike will remain the same great bike it was but will become $200.

awithrow 6y ago
It might depend on where you're located. My wife was recently looking for a < $1000 bike in Denver and it involved going all over town and checking every store that sold bikes. $2000-$3000 was generally what stores had on the shelf. We asked a few places what was going on and they were saying that the <$1000 bikes were hard for them to order and anything they got in would sell the same day. She eventually got lucky and found a 2yr old used bike for $400 which is exactly what she wanted. She just got lucky and got to the store just as they were putting it out on the floor.

analog31 6y ago

I think it's actually both bad and good. The bad is that prices are up. The good is that higher prices and news of a bike shortage might be drawing more old bikes out of garages and back yards.