Kevin’s had an e-bike for commuting, a Trek Crossrip+, for a couple years. Great bike; fairly long range, but he’s never used it for a “real” ride. That pride thing, and no good reason to if the idea of riding is to get into shape and/or brag about dropping dad.

Today it wasn’t a choice. His knee is still causing him lots of trouble, and the options were either to not ride at all, see if he could get over Jefferson before feeling too much pain (and then have to return home), or ride his e-bike and see if the lighter load would save the knee.

It wasn’t the ride I expected; it was still pretty slow up Old LaHonda, as he tried to figure out the right combination of gear, speed and power level that would keep his knee from being too unhappy. But he made it, and we made it over the other side. There wasn’t really an option to do an extended ride though, since we really didn’t want to risk him hurting the knee more, and he was a bit nervous about running out of battery. He didn’t need to; it was a 25 mile loop, he started with 4 bars and finished with 3. Lots of range left. Easily could have done West Alpine, even at full power. Maybe next time.