You can hang out with bike riders in a club or riding group, and you'll see this the very first day! There's ALWAYS one guy talking about his new top-end Canno

You can hang out with bike riders in a club or riding group, and you'll see this the very first day! There's ALWAYS one guy talking about his new top-end Cannondale or about how he's using a carbon fiber frame because the titanium frame was so obviously too heavy. They often spend more time on this than actually riding. These guys (it's usually guys) will also be the first to snear at your econo-bike that you bought just to try out the hobby. Strictly speaking for stuff like amateur radio, I get it - I'm more interested in the building of equipment than the using. But it's not the mean of the hobby; more of an outlier and it's best to realize that and check your ego/expectations of others who may enjoy other parts of it.