And they are …. interesting… inconclusive… insightful.. possibly inadmissible as evidence and definitely insufficient to support the well-trammelled hypothesis that lazy ebiking makes you fat.

To be fair, I’ve been four season camping in a what-three-words location nominatively determined as “Critical Information Bias“.  It’s a simple postulation citing the never-less-nuanced “move more, eat less” axiom as a primary source. And that is a fair place to plant our data flag. So let’s dig deep into that data.  Stats Nerds with me, everyone else the summary is down there somewhere.

(I’ve added loads of photos to this post that may or may not be relevant, but they are do represent a chronology of the last 6 weeks riding)

Let’s start with this: if you torture data long enough it’ll tell you anything. What it’s currently telling me is, in the eight weeks since my legs were upgraded to electrical impulse power*, pretty much nothing-  other than the impossible to measure qualitative fun gland has been poked and spiked on every ride. Point the bike at a far horizon, pedal a bit,  channel your inner Picard and “make it so“.

What is quantifiable are some base numbers. Nearly 1000km ridden since radicalisation broke my brain on a weeks eBiking in the South Tyrol** Climbing must be close to 20,000 metres – these metrics would easily pass the threshold of proper riding if that motor wasn’t involved. These were my touchstones for not being like anyone else. Getting older,  but doing it anyway.

Now? not so much. Not even close. Because there is another metric that defies measurement. That totally bolloxed, stairs are a problem, give me all the food then load me onto the sofa and leave me be. When there is nothing left but deeply aching muscles, a pre-hangover buzz and a feeling of extreme worthiness cementing this is the essence of Mountain Biking. Done in but all in.

Yeah, about that. Guilt at absolutely not feeling anything close to that is mitigated by the absolute joy of riding what you want, when you want. Hard to describe, impossible to measure, easy to repeat. You’re a single charge from feeling like that again. And that’s a dopamine hit that’s available every day. Doing a whole lot more with quite a bit less effort.

What else do the numbers tell us? The tyranny of weight gain is familiar to anyone with a slowing metabolism and poor impulse control.  Deep breath, shuffle reticent feet on the scales, remove hands from eyes and we’re half a kilo under pre-laziness measurements. It’s not enough to be considered statistically significant but – for me at least – it’s guilt assuaging and affirmation for what’s going on.

So what is going on? I am just riding loads. All the time. All the trails. Sometimes in a “mixed environment”, sometimes with a clique of ebikes,  I am absolutely not working as hard as on a bike powered by my increasingly withered frame. The low end grunt of the biggest cog, the desperate drive into the pedals to clear a steep trail, the ideology of ‘fuck it we have to get it done’ cycling an analogue revolution.

What I am doing is mostly expected: riding more, putting way more effort in the gym, crowbarring extra sessions at the start and the end of my day because I am not so fucked that the only activity of interest is lying down under a blanket. Riding uphill trails tagged with misery now become a joy, Getting to grips with a motor that is at least three times better than me. Turning it down a bit because there’s a big gap between giving up and giving a shit.

That’s not the interesting part tho. Annoyingly tho, as a man who considers mathematics as pretty much the only way to make the world add up, a list of unforeseen consequences rocked up with not so much as a parsable abstract. Number one is riding an eBike has rekindled my love of proper bikes in a way that is totally unexpected and impossible to measure.

I left it six weeks. Frankly I wasn’t looking forward to plugging myself back into a hinterland that’s been my world for going on thirty years. But it’s been brilliant, Different, really different, it’s not the same thing, not even close but that doesn’t make it anything other than joyous.

I’ve ridden most of my rambling pantheon of mountain bikes these last three weeks. And apart form being unhorsed by a shed queen making its feelings properly known, it’s reminded me why all bikes are good, and what a privilege it is to ride any of them.

That’s not projection or some easy excuse for not putting the effort in. It is a proper light bulb moment that I just fucking love riding bikes. Any bike, any time. Coming home from the Gym this week, I turned the motor off on the Orbea Vibe, saluted a sunset over the wye and marked myself as the luckiest bloke in the world.

eBikes are great. They really are. Not because of what they can do , but because of what they enable you to do. Which is more of what you love. If there’s a way of bottling that, releasing it gently on a shitty day, or toasting a great ride, I’m struggling to see this as a bad thing.

The numbers don’t lie. I know this. I’ve spent 30+ years looking at them. But they don’t tell the whole story. May I respectfully suggest you get out there and write your own.

*Yes I  am fully aware that’s how muscles work. I was going off on a riff about how the two things where the same before apathy set in.

*** We are so getting back to this. Working title “An Englishman happily confused by many Germans“