# Road bike for a 9 year old



## hobbitonabike (22 Oct 2012)

Since OH and I have gotnour road bikes our 9year old is now fancying one and he is really enjoying his cycling. We are trying to decide whether to go for a road bike or a hybrid and were after a bit of advice from those who had been there and done that. Have had a look around online and seen a few road bikes...Islabikes, Raleigh and Viking. Are there any gems we're missing or turkeys we should avoid? Any advice would be very much appreciated.


----------



## Beebo (22 Oct 2012)

I have no experience of this bike but decathlon do a kids road bike, it should be good as all their other bikes get good reviews.
http://www.decathlon.co.uk/triban-junior-id_8129804.html


----------



## Sara_H (22 Oct 2012)

Hi EbonyWiilow, we're in te same position as you, looking to get our son a road bike for his birthday/christmas.

Having sat him on a few we've decided to go for Islabikes as the reach/brakes seem easier for him - the decathlon bike that fitted him seemed cause him problems reaching the bralkes. Also he finds the gears on his hybrid difficult to fathom, the Islabikes seem to be a simpler set up.

So decision made, I now need to sell a kidney in order to afford the blummin thing!


----------



## hobbitonabike (22 Oct 2012)

Thanks guys. Which Islabike are you looking at Sara? He's fast enough on his Halfords beast that we wish he'd never bought...dread to think what he'll be like on a road bike lol.


----------



## hobbitonabike (22 Oct 2012)

That 'we' bought, that should say! Wish he was buying his own lol


----------



## derrick (22 Oct 2012)

Saw one of these last weekend, looked like a proper road bike.
http://www.hargrovescycles.co.uk/products.asp?partno=45223


----------



## Doseone (22 Oct 2012)

I've not heard a bad word about Islabikes. They are expensive, but you get what you pay for and they have good resale value too.

The only thing I wonder is whether a road bike for a 9 year old is too limiting? What I mean is that if you get a road bike, you can really only ride on the road, and if your 9 year old is anything like my 9 year old he won't want to just stick to riding on the road.

If you want to stay with Islabikes you could go for something like the Beinn 26 small which would still be pretty good on the road, but would also be up to some light off road use as well.

Buying a bike for your kids is even more fun than getting one for yourself so happy shopping


----------



## Sara_H (22 Oct 2012)

Doseone said:


> I've not heard a bad word about Islabikes. They are expensive, but you get what you pay for and they have good resale value too.
> 
> The only thing I wonder is whether a road bike for a 9 year old is too limiting? What I mean is that if you get a road bike, you can really only ride on the road, and if your 9 year old is anything like my 9 year old he won't want to just stick to riding on the road.
> 
> ...


Well my son will be keeping his Dawes Tracker for everyday use, he's joining a racing club and the Islabikes is to be used only for training/racing!

Its the LUath 700 small we plan to order, EbonyWillow, the next size down was too small for him.


----------



## Doseone (22 Oct 2012)

Sara_H said:


> Well my son will be keeping his Dawes Tracker for everyday use, he's joining a racing club and the Islabikes is to be used only for training/racing!
> 
> Its the LUath 700 small we plan to order, EbonyWillow, the next size down was too small for him.


 
Did you go to Islabikes for a fitting? Their fitting is supposed to be really good and you can test ride the bikes.


----------



## Sara_H (23 Oct 2012)

No, he tried the smaller sized one that belonged to a friend, but it was too small. 

We've measured him and he's just below the lower recommended sizes for the 700 small, so it gives him room go grow (he's growing very quickly at the moment).


----------



## Andy_R (23 Oct 2012)

We're in a similar positionm and are looking at the Luath 26 - a lot of the younger riders at his club are using either the 26 or the 700 - don't forget using a bike that is just a bit too big can be every bit as uncomfortable and hard to control as using one that's too small (thinking of reach especially). Buying a bike that "they'll grow into" can often be bad practise, and if you're buying an Islabike you can always re-sell it later on for a good chunk of what you paid for it.


----------



## Sara_H (23 Oct 2012)

Andy_R said:


> We're in a similar positionm and are looking at the Luath 26 - a lot of the younger riders at his club are using either the 26 or the 700 - don't forget using a bike that is just a bit too big can be every bit as uncomfortable and hard to control as using one that's too small (thinking of reach especially). Buying a bike that "they'll grow into" can often be bad practise, and if you're buying an Islabike you can always re-sell it later on for a good chunk of what you paid for it.


 Yes its a bit of a toss up between buying a bike that will only be any use for a few months and one that he may have to wait a short while to use (he's not going to be getting smaller!)
Realisticly, he's not going to be using it that much til spring anyway, so we decided to go with the latter option. he's litterally 1 cm below the recomended minimum height, I'm sure he grows that much overnight sometimes!


----------



## summerdays (23 Oct 2012)

When I bought a Beinn 24 a few years ago, we went along to the old Islabike location to see how far off the 24 he was. According to the measurements on the website it was too big for him but I was wondering if it was close to growing into it for Christmas (6 months later or whether to wait till the following year). We arrived and just by looking at him they got out a 20".

I said I wanted to see how far away from the 24 he was and she looked again and said he might just fit, and was he a confident rider? So she got it out and put the saddle to it's lowest position, and smallest Summerdays hopped on, rode straight across the car park, through every pothole and puddle he could find (there were some big ones in the old location!), and loved it. Her smiling comment - I take it you want mudguards with the bike? So my purchase came a lot earlier than I expected by 6 months to a year.

What I'm trying to say is that the figures aren't everything, try the bike if you can to see is worth it. We did buy the next Islabike Luath 26 fractionally too large (he could ride it but felt a bit stretched out) when we had the opportunity to buy one second hand, but then he hadn't outgrown the other one at the time. He used the bike for 3 years - well worth the price we paid.


----------



## Boris Bajic (23 Oct 2012)

It's worth a net trawl searching for a frame size. I got a nice little Trek 1.2 (previous year's model) from Evans or similar.

I'd been looking for ages and was simply not impressed by what i saw on IslaBikes' website and what I saw of their product among friends' children and in bike racks. I didn't (and still don't) get the hysteria. it reminds me a little of the enthusiasm for Cath Kidston kitchenware some years ago. Quite inexplicable yet the product and the lust for it were ubiquitous. 

All 3 kids rode the baby Trek from 9-11 or 11-13 (daughter).

There can be issues with brake-level size, but not big issues. Many children have a bit of a reach issue the first time they use a certain set of levers, but this goes very quickly. It can be exagerrated by the unfamiliar layout of the bars and levers, so a non-issue can appear to be an issue. It's the same with crank length, although this Trek was on 165s, which was nice. Some retailers or manufacturers make a big deal of lever reach. Put a kid on a bike with a big reach to the levers and after two or three rides round a car park, they're totally at home. Mine were descending at speed on the Malvern Hills with a bike whose levers were (according to some child-friendly retailers) way too big for them. The main issue is geometry of frame, seat stem, bars. The adult-sized levers were fine for tiny 9-year-old hands. 

On a first road bike, height difference between saddle and bars is something to consider. The bum-in-clouds riding position takes some getting used to, so you sort of morph them into it over a few weeks. Lots of sodding about with Allen Keys and much patience required of the child, but comfort is key and so is confidence. They will be chucking it into corners and whipping down the hills in no time.

The Trek I bought had 650c wheels, which I hated when I saw it, but got to love as they lent it some scale and made the ultimate transition to 700cs on a bigger frame more of a natural progression.

You will not get many years out of a road bike bought for a 9-year-old. Mine was for 3 children in succession, so there was less of a cost per user.

Bought for £390 and sold for £270, some years later. I think that was good value at slightly over £30 per child who used it. 

Along the way I bought a couple of stems for it as kids grew. I still have those.

Everyone makes different choices and I may have done completely the wrong thing. But it worked for us. All the kids still ride road bikes, one of them in (fairly modest) competition. 

Caution: After almost any other type of bike, a road bike is very 'darty'. It changes direction when you blink. You will no longer be aware of this if you've been on one for a while... but when you first ride one it is a stark contrast. Make sure the kids know this.


----------



## hatler (23 Oct 2012)

summerdays said:


> When I bought a Beinn 24 a few years ago, we went along to the old Islabike location to see how far off the 24 he was. According to the measurements on the website it was too big for him but I was wondering if it was close to growing into it for Christmas (6 months later or whether to wait till the following year). We arrived and just by looking at him they got out a 20".
> 
> I said I wanted to see how far away from the 24 he was and she looked again and said he might just fit, and was he a confident rider? So she got it out and put the saddle to it's lowest position, and smallest Summerdays hopped on, rode straight across the car park, through every pothole and puddle he could find (there were some big ones in the old location!), and loved it. Her smiling comment - I take it you want mudguards with the bike? So my purchase came a lot earlier than I expected by 6 months to a year.
> 
> What I'm trying to say is that the figures aren't everything, try the bike if you can to see is worth it. We did buy the next Islabike Luath 26 fractionally too large (he could ride it but felt a bit stretched out) when we had the opportunity to buy one second hand, but then he hadn't outgrown the other one at the time. He used the bike for 3 years - well worth the price we paid.


 We had exactly the same experience with a Beinn 26. The Islabikes sizing chart showed mini-hatler as being about 2 to 3 cm off the minimum size (inside leg).

When we got it I put the saddle as low as it could go and straight away he complained that the saddle was too low. Hoicked it up a couple of cms and he was off (he was a pretty confident rider by this point). However, he did drop himself on to the top tube shortly afterwards which rather proved that the Islabike sizing is more about top tube clearance than leg vs saddle/pedal measurement. He didn't do that again !


----------



## Nosaj (23 Oct 2012)

My 7 year old daughter has one of the Decathlon Road bikes and it is a decent bit of kit for the price. Tyres are 650/23. 7 Speed and a big clunky gear change (great for little hands) on the hoods press up to go up a gear press down to go down. Very simple. Brake levers on hoods as well enough space for one 750ml water bottle.

Most importantly the little n loves it

The only downside is that it weighs more than more than my road bike which is double the size!


----------



## Dilbert (26 Oct 2012)

Mine had a few Isla Bike Luaths in all the sizes from a club and I was not overly impressed tbh, and I tend to agree with Boris about the hype. They are not road bikes as such but cyclocross style bikes, and while this makes them a bit more flexible in terms of terrain, fitting mudguards etc, the cantilever brakes can be a bit troublesome compared to dual pivot. The rear mech is a mountain bike one. Generally I don't think the spec level justifies the price, although as others have said they consistently fetch bizarre prices on Ebay, so you may get most if not all of your money back!! 

One thing we found was that the brake levers on the tops (pretty standard on cyclocross bikes) encouraged the kids to ride with their hands on the tops instead of learning to use the hoods and the drops, which is a bad habit to get into, and really defeats the object of having a road bike, so watch out for that. 

The Decathlon range is worth a look, he may fit one of the smaller 700 cc ones - the Triban 3 or 5 both look like good bikes. We didn't get one for my lad in the end as we wanted 10 speed gears so he could easily use my wheels as spares at races, but they seem excellent value.

You can make quite a difference to the reach by fitting a shorter stem, and playing with the spacers on the headset, and its easy to change as they grow. Shimano Brake levers have reach adjustment.


----------



## Globalti (27 Oct 2012)

Seconded the suggestion of a Bheinn 26 small, we've just sold ours to a family with four small kids and I'm confident they will get as much use from it over the next few years as our son did over about four years. It's fast, light and as good on the road with the standard tyres as off the road with knobblies.


----------



## I like Skol (28 Oct 2012)

Boris Bajic said:


> I'd been looking for ages and was simply not impressed by what i saw on IslaBikes' website and what I saw of their product among friends' children and in bike racks. I didn't (and still don't) get the hysteria. it reminds me a little of the enthusiasm for Cath Kidston kitchenware some years ago. Quite inexplicable yet the product and the lust for it were ubiquitous.
> 
> There can be issues with brake-level size, but not big issues. Many children have a bit of a reach issue the first time they use a certain set of levers, but this goes very quickly. It can be exagerrated by the unfamiliar layout of the bars and levers, so a non-issue can appear to be an issue.
> 
> You will not get many years out of a road bike bought for a 9-year-old. Mine was for 3 children in succession, so there was less of a cost per user.


 
I think I am firmly planted in the Boris camp on the topic of Islabikes. I admit they may be good quality but otherwise they do not seem to cry out as better than any other quality bike from the mainstream 'proper' bike brands. I feel there is something of 'the emporers new clothes' about the enthusiasm portrayed for the brand by some parents. This was partially confirmed for me during the summer when both my boys attended a track cycling training session when the coach and assistant both tried to help a young girl riding an Islabike who was struggling with the brakes. Brake lever alignment was soon sorted but both were left muttering and grumbling when they realised there was no reach adjustment on the brake levers fitted! FFS, this was a 20" wheel bike aimed at 5-8yr olds so some requirement for adjustment would be a certainty in my book!


----------



## summerdays (28 Oct 2012)

One of the things I liked about Islabikes (sorry I'm a convert), was that the frame sizing was different to other brands so that my son was able to move up wheel size sooner than on other brands. As the youngest in the family it meant he was better able to keep up without putting him on a bike that was too big for him. I don't think he is really small for his age but certainly not above average height, he had only been riding a 20 inch bike for a year and a bit when we bought the Beinn 24 at age 8. And it took until he was 11 to move up to the Luath 26. He would not fit onto most standard 26 inch wheeled bikes and certainly not any small adult frames. (He probably sounds tiny in comparison to other peoples children but when I see him with school friends he looks to be a similar size to them).

I'm surprised at the brakes - though I've never needed to bring them closer to the handlebars since they are designed to be closer in the first place. (Are you talking about on the Beinn or the Luath).

I've also had good aftersales service when a part arrived slightly damaged, I just photographed it and the replacement part was with me in a couple of days.


----------



## hobbitonabike (28 Oct 2012)

Hmm some interesting thoughts. Think we are going to have to get down to some serious research!!


----------



## atbman (28 Oct 2012)

The first bikes we bought for our Kids Club were Decathlons, because there were no other road bikes for children which didn't leave us partially limbless. The youngsters loved them and one or two parents went down that route. However, once Islabikes came out - lighter at the same size, better and more child friendly components and more flexible ('cross and road) - parents started buying for their own children.

It may be that, since Islabikes were pretty much the first full range of properly designed kids bikes on the market, people's opinions are still affected by that. However, our selection is pretty much booked out every Saturday and many of the kids get bought them for Christmas, birth and grownoutoftheirs days.

There is also the fact that the latest versions are now lighter and therefore even more child-friendly. This isn't to say that there aren't any other good ones on the market, because there are, but we'll stick with them until something better comes along (and we can get a grant to buy them)


----------



## hobbitonabike (10 Nov 2012)

Ok...we have ended up with a Dawes Espoir 3000. We went through to Wheelbase and ds had a ride on a 24". After a bit of a shaky start he was soon flying round!! Its now being reindeered off to Father Christmas to be delivered for christmas morning!! Bike looks good. Just a touch over 11kg and has proper shifters which he thinks is great cos they're just like mum and dads lol.


----------



## hoopdriver (10 Nov 2012)

Again, another vote for Islabikes - excellent bikes for kids.


----------



## Andy_R (6 Feb 2013)

We have just ordered this for small boy:





I wonder why he wanted it in Yellow?


----------



## summerdays (7 Feb 2013)

Andy_R said:


> We have just ordered this for small boy:
> View attachment 18617
> 
> I wonder why he wanted it in Yellow?


I didn't even know it came in yellow!!!


----------



## Andy_R (7 Feb 2013)

summerdays said:


> I didn't even know it came in yellow!!!


Neither did we until I 'phoned to order the bike and was asked if we wanted the special edition. The gentleman at Islabikes emailed me the image of the special edition and as soon as Jake saw it, he said "YESYESYES!!!"


----------

