All Maintenance Tasks · Every ride
The ABC Check Before Every Ride
Nearly every mechanical problem that ruins a ride announces itself while the bike is standing still. A soft tire, a loose quick release, a brake lever that goes further than it did yesterday: all of it is visible in the time it takes to find your keys. This is the single highest-value habit on the site, and it is the only one that costs under a minute.
Interval
Every ride
Before you roll out, every single time
Time on the job
45 seconds
Once you have done it a few times.
You or a shop
Anyone
The stop signs further down are the real answer.
Applies toRoadMTBHybridE-bikeKids
How often, really
Every ride means every ride, including the short one to the store. It matters most after the bike has been out of your sight: after a shop visit, after a car rack, after it sat locked outside, after somebody else rode it. A bike that lives indoors and gets ridden daily can be checked quickly; a bike that has been moved by other people gets the slow version.
The interval on this page is Every ride. Before you roll out, every single time.
What you need
- Your hands
- A pressure gauge or a pump with one, kept where the bike lives
Doing the job
A is for air
Squeeze each tire hard between thumb and fingers. You are not measuring anything, you are looking for the tire that lost pressure since yesterday. A tire that feels noticeably softer than its partner has a slow leak, and a slow leak found in the driveway is a minor thing. Top up with a gauge if it feels low.
B is for brakes
Pull each brake lever separately and firmly. The lever should stop well short of the handlebar and hold there without creeping. Roll the bike forward and pull the front brake: the bike should stop and the rear wheel should want to lift. Roll it back and pull the rear: it should skid rather than roll.
C is for chain and cranks
Look at the chain. It should be dark and slightly oily, not orange and not dripping. Turn the pedals backward a few times and watch the chain run through the rear derailleur; it should move quietly and evenly, without a link that jumps or hops. Give a crank arm a sideways push to check nothing is loose.
Check that the wheels are attached
Quick release levers should be closed, tight enough that closing them left a mark on your palm, and pointing where they cannot catch on anything. Thru axles should be fully seated and tightened to the figure the manufacturer publishes. Then lift each end of the bike a few inches and let it drop: rattles are worth chasing down before you leave.
Drop the bars into your hands
Straddle the front wheel, grip the bar and try to twist it against the wheel. Nothing should move. Hold the front brake and rock the bike forward and back with your other hand resting where the fork meets the frame; a knock you can feel there is a loose headset, and it gets worse fast.
Turn on whatever needs to be on
Front light, rear light, and anything else that runs on a battery. Doing it in the driveway takes two seconds. Discovering a dead rear light at dusk on the way home is a different kind of problem.
Stop and take it to a shop
If any of this shows up while you work on the abc check before every ride, put the bike down and let a mechanic look at it. None of these are things to ride out and see how it goes.
- A brake lever that reaches the handlebar, feels spongy, or is noticeably softer than it was last week. Do not ride it out to the shop; walk it or drive it.
- A knock or click you can feel at the headset when you rock the bike with the front brake held, or any play you can feel at a wheel when you push it side to side.
- A tire that has gone soft since the last ride and will not hold pressure, or a bulge, cut or bald patch you can see in the tread or sidewall.
- Anything on the bike that moves when you push it and did not move yesterday. The pre-ride check exists to find exactly this, and the correct response to finding it is to not ride.
Where this usually goes wrong
- Doing the check while already rolling. You cannot judge lever travel or wheel security at speed, and a fault found at speed is a fault found late.
- Checking your own bike carefully and skipping the check on a bike a child is about to ride, which is where a loose wheel or a soft brake matters most.
- Treating a squeeze test as a substitute for a pressure gauge. It finds sudden leaks, not the slow drift that costs you every week.