Re:
Some good points there Ranger. The successes of Team GB, two wins in Le Tour and grand opening stages held in Yorkshire have done wonders for the profile of cycling as a sport and generally encouraging people to take up riding (aside of the rabid anti-cyclists). It's also great that more women have been encouraged to join in too.
There are some fantastic looking road bikes out there, both cutting edge new and vintage. Fixies and single speeds are in abundance and have probably got more people into cycling, may be because you can just get on and ride without hours of grimey tinkering. A visit to any bike shop clearly demonstrates where the market is.
Mountain bikers have always been on the wild edge of things and are outsiders even more now. Road racing has all the glamour and coverage on TV. You have to scrape around on the web for clips of MTB racing and it's mostly just reported briefly in editorial copy, say, on BBC Sport for example. Although ITV's Cycling Show has run MTB-related features often.
I commute through London on my [retro] bike and get a lot of people asking about the unusual bike. And looking like a mountain biker too I'm automatically at odds with the rest of the general cycling population there. I guess I'm like some 'old timer' pootling around with a vintage car.
I'm just wondering if Retrobike has reached a saturation point. Are people growing bored of it having got the bikes, got the bits and fulfilled their dreams from their younger days? Fads come and go, people move on. Hopefully not just yet, though. For me, finding RB was a revelation and rekindled many things. It reunited me with my rusting bike which in turn improved my health for the better. It sparked many other beneficial things and interests too. For that, and the wealth of knowledge that lives on Retrobike, I'm truly thankful.