Taking This Down To The Lowest Gear

I used to work at a fairly high-end bike shop that sold really expensive road bikes, some in the ballpark of $8,000.

A regular customer, a man in his fifties, brought in his carbon fiber road bike for a tune-up. Before writing up the work order, I checked over the bike.

Me: “Sir, it seems that your chain is worn. It will require replacing.”

Regular: “Oh… Can you just replace the top half of the chain? Since that’s the half that takes all the stress.”

This guy was a regular cyclist with a bike that retails for thousands of dollars who had no concept of how a bicycle chain worked.