Hello,

I am looking for a good bike shop in Santa Clara.

Or a good places to find used bikes.

I will be getting back into biking after a 16 years of not riding.
I will start with a 2 mile each way commute to and from work.

Then I would like to move into mountain biking.
I am a bigger guy 6'1 240. What size bike should I look for.

What is consider good on a low budget?

Any help would be great.

http://www.shawscycles.com/

Hrogi, whaddya think this is, miata.net?? :p

Welcome and good luck w/ your search. Oh, so to add to your shop list, others here have recommended Calmar on El Camino Real.

**Edit: just re-read OP. If you're willing to travel a little, there are/were used bike shops further up ECR in PA by Stanford that might have some bikes of interest for your needs. Let your fingers do the dialing, I guess.

Calmar Cycles (http://www.calmarcycles.com)stocks a pretty good selection of mountain bikes. I would check them out, I've never had a bad experience there.

I really don't want to recommend anything to you because I don't want to skew your opinion before you get started. Best bet, is to go to a few shops, sit on some bikes, and see what feels comfortable. Even if it extends your budget a little comfort is worth its cost!!

You could always get your size and style figured out at the shop and then look around on craiglist or ebay for a used bike if you're looking to save some bucks. Either way, the best way to do it, that I've found is to just head on over to the shop, explain your needs, and your budget and see what shows up.

Good luck with your search!! welcome back to riding

Although Shaw's is in Santa Clara, and they are one of the best bike shops I've ever been to, I would not suggest the OP go there; they won't have what he's looking for and he will probably not have a good experience.

For used mountain bikes that are local to you, try craigslist. That way you can spend a very small amt of $ at first and see if you like it. Once you have commuted/ridden trails for a while you will have a better idea of what you like and don't like about your cheap bike, so you will be able to make informed decisions about what to buy next.

when u decide to getting into road cycling

shawscycles +2

--
SharpT

go to Calmar. they are good guys.

Thanks all for the help..

Well this is not miata.net, but it seem to have a great folks around here.

I will check out these paces... I do not want to be so cheap i get my self a bad bike. But I do not want to spend so much that it takes forever to pay off...

But I need to get away from the cars for a while and enjoy the view a bike gives you...

Remember, if you find some stuff you like.. feel free to post it up here, and you never know.. somebody here probably owns one, or something similar, they can give you some open feedback.

Thanks for the tips. I plan on going to Calmer this week.

i will check out shop near Standford as well..

Craigslist is one way, but I know so little about bikes..
Well something will come up...

Glad i have 90%of the tool needed to fix a bike already.. now I will just have to learn how to make that work..