Garmin

No longer do cyclists depend on locals for directions. We depend finding a recharging socket instead...

- 

Stopping to consult a paper map? Asking for directions? Following a signpost? That's like using a phone box, developing a camera film or writing longhand. Nobody does that any more.

For most of us now, route finding is done by a chocolate-bar-sized handle-barmounted computer more powerful than the ones astronauts took to the moon. It orders you where to go, squawking at wrong turns like a nesting bird's alarm call. It can also - depending on how much you want to pay - cross-plot your power output, heart rate, cadence, altitude and speed, while displaying incoming texts and emails so you can still worry about work.

And it'll probably be made by Garmin, the market leader in the £550m global market for bike computers. So prevalent is the Swiss-American multinational's tech that some refer to any make generically as 'a garmin' (even if it's by their main rival Wahoo, thus annoying both companies).

Electronic bike computers appeared in the 1980s, but couldn't show your location: satellite GPS info was restricted to the military. Knowing you're making good time isn't much use if you're lost. But by 2000 anyone could access the signals.