You may be deciding to purchase your first bicycle with the intention of spending your time going through the motions and using it as a practice to learn how to ride a bike.
Or if you have recently learned how to ride a bike and now feel excited by the prospect of going out and buying yourself a brand-new flashy bike. Regardless of your age, being able to buy your first bike is always a joyous experience that you look forward to a lot beforehand and carry fond memories of into later life.
Table of Contents
Keep Your Bike Secure and Keep the Thieves Away
It’s wonderful and an enthralling feeling to get a beautiful expensive new bike and be able to enjoy riding it outdoors for the first time. However, sadly thieves also love taking nice expensive new bicycles too and they will pounce on any opportunity they come across to do so. We suggest that you stay alert, keep hold of your lovely bike, and try and avoid as much as you possibly can giving them the satisfaction of stealing your bicycle easily.
There are many different types of bike locks on the market today and there is even a compact folding bike lock design. The most important recommendation to bear in mind when choosing which bike lock you should get to prevent your bike from being taken by thieves is never to get cable locks as they’re very easy for thieves to break and then steal your bike with a minimal amount of fuss. Instead, you should look into getting u-locks or chain locks for your bike.
At home, you should also try and store your bike indoors or locked securely in a shed in your outside space overnight.
Look into Getting Bike Insurance
Unfortunately, as well as being exhilarating and fun there’s also quite a long list of things that can go wrong when you are riding a bicycle. As a result, you should definitely look into getting bicycle insurance to cover yourself, your close ones, and your precious new bike. If you’re after a quality bike insurance policy from a reliable national insurance agency, go and take a look at Velosurance. Their insurance policies will provide you with coverage for personal injury and medical costs. It can also the theft of your bike, accidental damage, damage, or loss in transit (on transport such as aircraft or courier trucks for example), and any roadside assistance you need if you get stranded with your bike.
If you were to be unlucky to have a bad fall off your new bike you would definitely feel that bit more comfortable and reassured knowing you had proper bike insurance in place to help cover some of your medical bills. And knowing you would be able to repair or replace your new bike should it ever get damaged or stolen will mean you will soon be back enjoying riding a new bike a lot quicker than you would be without having insurance. When getting a new bike, insurance is a necessary accessory that you should definitely invest in.
Make Sure You Maintain the Bike Properly
New bikes need maintaining and regularly taking care of or unfortunately they can quite quickly become old, rusty bikes and not work as well as they used to.
Get yourself a top bicycle repair tool kit to help you maintain the bike and fix brakes, pump wheels up, tighten and loosen screws, adjust the seat, repair any punctures, and much more.
Punctures can be a nightmare and you need to make sure that you are fully prepared and equipped to mend a bike puncture if you go for a cycle in a remote rural location where there’s not much civilization and people around. You may decide to carry around with you a small size puncture repair kit inside your backpack when you are out and about riding your bike.
Maintenance and repair issues are part and parcel of owning a bike, much like is also the case when you own a car. After you make sure you have got all the right equipment and tools for maintaining your bike properly, you will get used to fixing and mending things on your bike regularly.
Be Sensible When Riding Your Bike
Of course, no matter your age when you get a new bike it will always be tempting at first to test it out and go whizzing around on it. But going too fast can cause injury to yourself or other people, create problems with the breaks and steering the bike safely, wear out the tires quickly, and is quite dangerous in general. So, stay sensible and don’t try and ride your bike way too fast.
Getting a new bike and taking up cycling in 2021 is a fantastic idea. Cycling is a great way to get fit and take in nature in all its glory.