First one being that I don't have a mountain bike! But there are others. I love, love, love road riding and just don't have time to give to another time-consuming sport. I have always been more of a "specialist" than a generalist anyway; would rather get really good at one thing than dink around at many. Also, the thought of falling doesn't appeal to me at all, nor all the bouncing around on rocks and roots. Not sure this 43-year old bod is up for that!

I do ride my Bike Friday (which has slick 1.35" tires and is my touring/travel bike) up and down our 1 mile long gravel road, and it's not a lot of fun. Bouncy bouncy, rocks flying everywhere, tough stabilizing my narrow drop bars (know a mtb would be different and work better, though!), and feeling that unpleasant loss of traction close-to-falling sensation around the rocky curves. Also, I live in an area where there are miles of low-traffic rural roads to ride, but I don't even know of any trails near me, so I'd have to drive to any rides.

So, for all those reasons, mtb is just not something I can see ever doing - unless maybe I moved to a part of the country where there were more trails than roads and mtb was much bigger than road riding (clubs, etc.) The only local bike club near enough where I live and ride is a roadie club.

Emily