Now! I’m in need of a new bike, nothing too special, some sort of mountain bike that’s not too heavy and will get me from Edinburgh to Aberdeen next spring. The weight is quite important though, because I nearly crippled myself in the summer, trying to ride a cast iron Halfords bedstead across the borders.

So I’ve got one eye on ebay and freecycle and generally putting the feelers out, with the other eye on a potential post-Christmas bargain.

And then I stumbled across this. The worlds most expensive bike, apparently. www.aurumania.com. Each bike is plated with 24-carat gold and covered in swarovski crystals. The handlebar grips are made of hand-sewn, chocolate-brown leather, and it’s even got a moulded, leather, hand stitched, saddle. Only ten are being made and they’ll cost a whopping 80,000 euros each. “Who would be stupid enough to buy one of those?” I hear you ask. Well the first one was snapped up by a guy in London, so he could hang it on his wall. Which is where, I presume they’ll all eventually, end up, decorating the walls of people with more money than sense.

Presumably the whole point is shameless attention grabbing, so that mugs like me, write about it in blogs like this. But, it got me thinking. Going to the effort of engineering a “track” bike, (no brakes/fixed gear) and then, gold plating it and getting some poor sap to hand stitch the handlebar grips and stick crystals on. It must weigh a bloody ton!!!! So you know you’re not going to get your best lap time out of it, on your private velodrome, and also, if you come off it, those swarovski crystals are gonna rip your skinny legs to shreds. Plus… you can’t ride it down the shops, cos its gold and the gravel on the drive will chip it to bits. So after one obligatory ride, from the dining room to the guest wing, (just so you can tell the chaps at the club, that it really is a proper bike and you’ve actually ridden it!) …then you’re going to hang it on the wall of your tasteless pseudo Tudorbethan mansion and forget about it.

So you’ll need to invest in the little wall hook, which costs an additional 5 grand, (again gold plated, of course, and covered in crystals.) But, you see… I’m just hoping it’s man enough for the job! There’s a lot of weight on that thing now. You want to make sure that your butler, up your gold plated step ladder with his gold plated/swarovski encrusted screwdriver, uses a decent wall plug for that little job. So here’s a tip… Why don’t you test it out with one of those cheap cast iron bikes from Halfords first.

Anyway… I’m now taking pre-orders on a limited run of 10 gold plated, crystal encrusted dog turds, for the discerning collector. £10,000 each. Register your interest here.

By Dave on November 24, 2009