It's hard to believe that any sport could be more snobbish and elitist than golf, but sadly, Romulus sees many distressing similarities between gawf and cycling.

I have yet to find a suitable euphemism for "elite" so let us probe another expensive sport in hopes of further enlightenment. Because the Bay Area is not Ohio, Illinois, North Carolina, or Florida, I've forsaken golf as my favorite leisure activity in favor of cycling, despite the infinitely higher casualty rate for two-wheeling it. The eight hour days and hundred dollar greens fees for a round of golf - which works out to about a dollar per stroke for the average weekend hacker - are too burdensome, so I've poured my energy and resources into cycling as both a practical and family matter. What golf and cycling share is the common theme of style versus substance. On some level there is a pervasive ‘pay your dues’ mentality to every sport; it makes sense to hone your golf skills on a dilapidated municipal course, just as most cyclists get their start on hand-me-down clunkers three sizes too big.

You probably know somebody who carries rusty thirty year old clubs, dinged up golf balls, no glove, fairway woods instead of metals, a pre-WWII mashie putter, frayed Chuck Taylor’s in lieu of spikes, and a golf bag more akin to a duffle sack from a cheap promotional giveaway. We know this person because he/she routinely waxes every Nike-Taylor Made-Calloway-Titleist-Mizuno-Spalding-clad duffer in sight, stroke or match play. And said person also has a cousin cut from the same cloth, only this character doesn't golf - he/she demonstrates clumsy cycling brilliance instead. They show up to races/rides with an oxidized 7-speed steel framed bald-tired rig awash in political stickers, rigid forks, cantilever brakes, toe clip pedals, mildew cotton t-shirt, their uncle’s bicycle helmet from the early 80’s, and no-chamois-worn-elastic spandex. Yet just like the golfing buffoon, these stylistically challenged pedal punishers pulverize the peloton with a parsimonious production of perspiration.

Of course, on the flip-side of this observation are the folks who dress the part, be it golf or cycling, but who are seldom worthy of the attention they call to themselves. Back in the day when I toted bags for a living the caddies had a saying that was 99% true - the cat showing up with the fancy car, sterling equipment, and designer clothes is most likely to fuck you on the tip and even more likely to chop up the course worse than a Dick Cheney cluster bomb. Having thus established the commonality of "posers" in both golf and cycling, let's free-ride a bit deeper into these regal cultures. We can liberally borrow a popular technique for comparing “apples and oranges” called -- The Tale of the Tape.

And the debate rages on with no clear winner. As with most of life’s epicurean pursuits, it’s usually a matter of choice that guides our passions. Better still, lifestyle is most often a measure and reflection of one’s financial resources. Seen through this somewhat narrow prism, cycling and golf will always be tinged with palpable snobbery, just as the next NBA legend will sport inner city scars and tattoos. But if I let that argument flow without a rebuttal, then I’ve just wasted a thousand words. No, in fact, I'm going to argue that the cycling community, in its sometimes inadvertent though often misguided effort to model the fallacies of the golf industry, has created a fragmented elitist sport that is wasteful, manipulative, uninspired, and terribly mismanaged. Tune in next time for part deuce.