[0_____0]

In sports especially, I've found that the people I admire within that discipline will readily dispense gear advice, and not knowing any better myself, I take their advice full and whole. I got into mountain biking this way. A couple years in, I now have formed opinions about components, know what kind of riding style I have etc. but it's helpful at first to substitute someone else's preferences for your own so that you don't get caught up on details when you're starting out.

[PragmaticPulp]

Advice is great, but you can’t become a great mountain biker just by buying the right gear. Great riders on $500 Craigslist specials will run circles around amateurs on a $10,000 top of the line bike.

The point is that you can follow in someone’s footsteps, but you have to do the work. You can’t simply pretend to imitate people or their mannerisms or their gear and expect the same results.

[tylerhou]

But the point you are missing is that if you focus on doing everything "correctly" at first, you're not gonna get anywhere (and may do the wrong thing).

Imitating other people's gear isn't "correct," but shipping matters more. You will do the work eventually, and it's better to get a little experience so you know the right work to do.

[PragmaticPulp]

My original point was that cargo culting is a trap, but following in the footsteps of someone else is not. I don't think that disagrees with what you're saying.

[ineedasername]

Most professionals in sports are paid by gear manufacturers to have a specific opinion.

There's a much better path here: Don't develop preferences until you have enough experience to make informed decisions.

[0_____0]

I think we're saying the same thing. I meant taking advice on where to enter gear-wise from not professionals, but personal friends who ride at a level that's maybe 95-98% in the sport (but still far from pro)

[ImprovedSilence]

Haha. Ive never met a cyclist in any discipline who gave advice for improvement based on buying more gear unless I was in a bike shop and they were selling something. The “real” advise is always along the lines of “it never gets easier, you just go faster”, etc.. (Although the tongue in cheek joke about triathlons are its the one sport you can get better at by spending tons of money on gear..)

[0_____0]

I can be more specific. I was looking for an entry point into MTB. My experience with bikes was things that cost 100-200$ on craigslist, and initially I set a budget that would have netted me a bike-shaped object, or at least something that I would have traded up from by now. I trusted them enough to substitute their knowledge for my own, and the result is that I'm 2 years into a sport and am just now coming across aspects of my equipment that I want to change.