Behold, The World’s Most Useless Bicycle!

You won’t believe this. As far as learning “how to ride a bike” stories go, mine has to be one of the craziest ones out there. My dad got me a folding bike when I was around 9 or so. Nothing wrong with that, right? A used bike, but back then — the early 90s — bikes were pretty basic. The frame, the handle, two wheels, a chain, and a saddle. No handle brakes. It used a pedal brake. What was unusual about this bike though was the wheels. The bike was sized for 20” wheels, but mine had 16” wheels. Did it look funny? You bet! Maybe it was even dangerous, but we’ll never know. Back then laws around this stuff were non-existent. Nevertheless, that was my first bike, that’s the bike my dad taught me to ride on.

Except that didn’t quite go according to plan either. You see, the smaller wheels and the lack of hand-brakes messed a bit my head, for quite a long time. I learned to ride by riding fast. I realised that the faster I pedalled, the more balance I had. My dad was running after me like a crazy person in the park, but I did learn how to ride in just a couple of days. Well, I say ride, though that was more learning how not to fall over.

Those smaller wheels and the lack of hand-brakes came back to haunt. With pedal brakes, when you want to slow down…