In case you're interested, here is what I'm riding these days:
Road:
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| 2011 Fuji Roubaix 1.0 |
I picked up my first road bike in February of 2012. I had spent years with a variety of mountain bikes, but kept using them on the road. I kept getting smaller and smaller tires to help me ride better on the road, but a few trips with some friends from work convinced me that I needed to change bikes, not just tires.
I started looking on Craigslist, and kept finding lots of good options. But as tends to happen on Craigslist, things just didn't work out. The bikes weren't exactly what I was looking for, or people wouldn't call back. The usual Craigslist business. I finally broke down and decided I should just buy a new bike.
I didn't have tons of money, and this was going to be my first road bike, so I didn't need anything super high-end. I stopped by a local bike shop to test out a few different bikes. After trying a Giant and something else, I ended up going with a
Fuji Roubaix 1.0. It's a nice ride, and a great bike for the price. It must have been some kind of one-off at the place I bought it, since they weren't a Fuji dealer and this was the only one that had. It has a Shimano 105 11-28 cassette, and a 50/34 compact crankset. I first heard that term while I was test-riding these bikes: "Compact crankset". I had no idea what that meant, so the bike shop guy explained it to me. I also found a really good explanation online
HERE. Basically, it's a combination of front chainrings and rear cassette that gives you the gearing range of triple chainrings, but in a double chainring instead. The lowest gear is close to what you would get in a triple chainring, good for long steep climbs. But the highest gear is closer to what you would get in with standard chainrings, for speeding on the flats. It's a bit of a compromise, but not much, and is a great option for an everyday rider like me.
So, I've had the bike for a little over a year now, and it's been great. It's comfortable for long days in the saddle, great for climbing, and cruises fast on the flats. And it looks great, too, which is a bonus.
Mountain:
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| 2006 Gary Fisher Tassajara |
Well, technically it's a mountain bike. But I can't think of the last time I rode it anywhere off-road. A number of years ago, I had a mountain bike stolen out of my garage when we forgot to close the door one night. I went looking for a new bike, and ended up with a Gary Fisher Tassajara. This was probably about 10 years ago, so I don't know if they even make this bike any more.
It was kind of a mid-range bike when I got it. Not totally cheapo, but certainly not high-end. But it does the job. I haven't modified it in any way since I bought it, except for switching out tires. I don't ride much in the mountains, so I don't know much about what's good and what's not. It works, it has front shocks but no rear shocks. That's about it.
I would really love to do more mountain biking, but it just never seems to happen. Instead, I typically put the smallest, smoothest tires I can find on it, and use it on the road or the local multi-use trails. When I bought my fluid trainer a couple years ago, this is the bike that was on the trainer, with slicks. Once I got my road bike, I used that bike on the trainer, and this bike just hung in the garage most of the time.
Lately, it occurred to me that I had two bikes, two helmets, two pairs of shoes, two pairs of gloves, etc. I decided I could bring a whole set of everything to work and leave it parked there. So, my mountain bike, helmet, gloves, water bottle, and some bike clothes live downstairs at my office, ready for a lunchtime ride at a moment's notice. When there isn't some insane amount of snow outside like there has been for the last few days, I can usually head out for a quick 16-mile ride or so. I would be able to ride farther and faster with my road bike, but I would rather leave that at home, for training and weekend rides.
Kiddos:
It's not a bike that I ride, but I also have a
Trek Mountain Train that I use for hauling the kids around once in a while. They love it, and it lets us ride farther than they can ride on their own bikes. And it's a great workout for me. I have the clamp set up on my mountain bike, so I've designated that as the "riding with the kids" bike. So, I get the workout of riding the heavier mountain bike, instead of my road bike, plus the added weight of pulling the Mountain Train with a kid. And they seem to be pretty happy being pulled, instead of doing much of the work themselves. So, if I'm looking for a good leg workout while spending some time with the kids, I'll pull out the Mountain Train. Unfortunately, I can only deal with one kid at a time, so sometimes we do alternating weekends or something. I love spending time with both kids, but sometimes it's nice to have a little one-on-one, too.
So, those are my typical rides these days.
