Cycling it is part 1

Well...its been quite some time i am out of college and honestly i am feeling the void the moment i come home from office. While i was at Infy, MBA prep had kept me occupied quite a good deal and now i miss it ...Living in a new city with not many friends didn't help either ...
so that's when i seriously started looking for activities to do ....My first stop is the Yoga classes ( not that i am interested , but too much of parental pressure ..can't help whether u are 2 or 26 :P )....but my office timings doesn't suit them....I very much know jogging is not sustainable ...planned to join french classes , but didnt feel good spending a good 12K on learning some foreign language when i have many to learn here ....thats when i came across "Baroda Cyclist Club"- An active cycling club in Baroda ...and all the old time cycling memories were back . 
Unlike most other kids, i got my first cycle when i was no longer a kid (16 it is) . Its a second hand Hercules bought for Rs 700 ....I rode it till my second year Engineering and in a way i should vow my selection at Infy to cycling as i so passionately explained how i would go for rides in my infosys campus interview ......

coming to the present day , once i decided to buy a cycle , i decided to have a modest budget of 5K to buy a gearless bike which serves my purpose  ( not yet heard the term "cadence" :p ). But the more i read about cycling ( read religiously about cycle components , models for 20 odd days ..and brands like Btwin, Fuji, Trek had become quite familiar)
But the models out there are so many and it damn confusing to pick one

Ok..i know this entry is now becoming too long , but if some one is seriously looking at buying a cycle  ( its a good thought ...even though how much fun ur friends make ) ..here is a list of suggestions which seems to be universally true  ( most experienced cyclists agree on)

• Dont go for Front or rear suspensions ...They are not at all required even on our potholed Indian roads ..They just make cycle heavier and u need to exert more effort to maintain the speed
• Hard sadle ( the seat) is good. You would get used to it in some time and good for your tail bone :) 
• Gears or no gears is a personal choice. But the advantage of having gears is that u can maintain a high cadence ( its no of rotations of pedal in a minute and u should aim for 80-90 for a good work out) . Gears help in maintaining cadence with out straining your knees ( again its a matter of choice, we all rode gearless bikes quite well years back)
• Any good brand cycles have gears by Shimano or SRAM . I dont know much about SRAM, but regarding shimano - they have a progressively sophisticated gears which makes shifting gears quite comfortable ( Tourney< Altus<Alivo ..read more ) .
• I Paid a good 3.5K more just to have a higher end gear 
• Rear gears are more imp than front gears ( so u might compromise on gears at front but not for the rear ones ...ya ya nowa days there are 24,27 gear bikes unlike 5-6 gear bikes we are used to )
• some good sites with wealth of info
• http://www.bikeszone.com/
• http://www.choosemybicycle.com/
• http://www.fitjog.com/

Its damn difficult to finalise a bike as many options are available. The best thing to do is to visit a couple of cycle showrooms and take a test ride ( yes , they do provide test ride for cycles ) 

Hmmm...this is what i had done in choosing my cycle ...by the way , i had increased my budget to 20K + by this time :) :)... I rode a couple of cycles ( Trek 3500, Fuji Traverse, Schwinn sporterra ) and fell in love with schwinn for its gear shifting. So here is the cycle i ordered. It costed me 26K ( MRP 29650) . Though it sounds crazy to spend such kind of money on cycle ( which doesnt even looks quite flashy) , i believe its worth to spend on . The rides which i plan should justify the cost. Its more than a week that i ordered my cycle and in a day or 2  would be getting it ....Eagerly waiting for it now :) :)...After all we all loved cycling as kids :D :D

Update: I had to put a brake on my cycling plans and cancel my purchase as I was asked to relocate to Indonesia for 3 months....more on that in the next post