Let's hear about your first bike.....

[KayTee]

My 2-years-younger brother got a new Schwinn for his birthday at age 5. That was the first bike in the house. When my parents realized that I was riding the thing more often and better than he did, they got me a big old used, reconditioned, one speed, balloon-tired Roadmaster, metallic blue with a step-through frame, chrome fenders and a wire handlebar basket -- a girlie bike, of course, and it must've weighed 40 lbs. I rode that bike to school and everywhere until I was 12, when my brother got a brand new 3-speed English racer. Then I snuck around riding his bike whenever I could - changing gears was fun! Bike envy, I know, but my well meaning parents were very old school traditional, and girls had to be girlie while boys got to do the fun things (like riding bikes fast). My mother still thinks it's positively outlandish that her 54-yo daughter bombs around on ridiculously expensive "men's bikes" (w/top tubes), grinning like a fool, sweating like a horse and wearing skin-tight britches !

[Crankin]

I can't remember if I had a tricycle. But, my first bike, bought with really good intentions for my 7th birthday, was a very small German bike that probably cost my parents a fortune. I guess they didn't realize what an uncoordinated klutz I was! I was fine with the training wheels, but I could not learn how to ride without them. I do remember boys in the neighborhood making fun of my "teeny" bike. Also, it was different; i.e., not American. So, it got put away. Then, when I was 9, almost 10 my mom was determined to teach me to ride when we were at our cottage on the Cape. The cottage colony had 3-4 flat roads, so she rented me a purple Schwinn and i was riding in 3 days. I remember having absolutely no control and veering across the road, into a friend's car. The best part was she let me ride it back to the rental place (a mile!) with her following me in the car. I was hooked. They got me a blue Schwinn, with coaster brakes and a big blue rack on the back. I had that for a year and then I got a Raleigh 3 speed, with a Brooks saddle. I rode everywhere on it, up big hills and in cold weather. In 8th grade I got another Raleigh, in a bigger size. My riding stopped when I was 16 and moved to Florida; too hot and I got my license. My next bike was when I was 24 and a boyfriend bought me a mongrel 5 speed road bike at the Tempe Bike Shop when I was in grad school at ASU and first teaching. I used to ride it to class in the summer in a sundress! Then, my husband and I got 10 speed Univegas in the eighties. That was it until I got my first road bike in 2001.