We tried the Tailwind up a particularly challenging hill, putting it in its lowest gear and putting the electric assist on maximum. Even with the bike assisting as best it could, climbing the hill required a lot of physical exertion, although it would have been harder without the electric motor. When buying a bike, it's important the one you purchase fits you correctly. Making sure this is the case might mean visiting a local bike shop that carries it and either giving it a test ride or just seeing which size is right for your height. We recommend looking into not only a brand's testing options but also its return policy, as you want to make sure it's also eligible to be sent back should it not fit. Seeing as the only opportunity for a test ride within 100 miles was only 5 miles away, I dropped in for a visit. The motor assist on this bike is purely pedal assist, though it’s more fair to call it “pedals are moving, motor is on” - since that what it seems to be. Start pedaling, and the motor will chime in at some power, mostly dependent on what you’ve set on the handlebar control. It pretty much does that until you stop pedaling or hit a brake lever. Do recall that this bike was designed around 2008, so a lot of the more modern stuff didn’t exist. However, BionX was around, with their I2C torque sensing motors, so there’s at least some better stuff available. After leaving the cemetery, I pedaled a county road that unrolls over five hilltops with valleys in between. On the downhills, I went to 0 assist and flew down, hitting 36 mph on one of them. In each case I pedaled unassisted part way up the next climb, moving to a numbered assist level only when gravity began to bite. Tailwind is a very apt name for this bike, as the motor gives a palpable assist when it kicks in. Its motor is hub-mounted, and it has a 360-watt-hour battery. The motor stops assisting when you hit 32 km/h (20mph) with the throttle or pedalling. You can still pedal faster but the motor won’t assist. Take on greater adventures with our e-bikes, which stay true to the superior quality that’s made Schwinn famous for over 125 years. So on my comp day off, I decided to swing by Skate Escape, a bike shop near Piedmont Park in Atlanta. A few months ago, after some calling around, I concluded that they were the only bike shop in town that appeared to be interested in carrying the upcoming line of Schwinn Electric Bikes. I guess the other sporty-bike shops couldn’t spare the floor space with all the racks of fluorescent spandex. ???? In any case, I had received an email from them letting me know that they had the basic model in the store for test rides.