Hi all, got a question here:

I am getting my first "road" bike in a week or so for 3 reasons:

preparation/training for a Century ride in Spring 05 with Team In Training (http://www.teamintraining.org)

Commuting

Light off-road and fun rides

My Gf's boss has recomended a cyclocross bike, a Surly and a SoulCraft, as well as pointing me to a LBS that does cyclocross. Would a cyclocross do well for my needs here? My main concern is the Century ride, and the training in preperation for it, but if a cyclocross can do that AND get the other needs done effeciently, then...

Plus it sounds fun to have that flexibility on a non-hybrid...road/dirt. Any help or advice is much welcomed!

Lufty

I have a Surly Cross-Check. I have not tried a Century ride. The most I have done on a day has been 25 miles. Many people have posted about the Cross-Check's capability in light touring, but I have not noticed anyone posting about centuries. If you are trying to be competitve, the extra weight of the Surly may keep you out of the running.
I use mine for all around riding. I can go on roads, trails, rail-to-trail , sidewalks and parking lots. I am a clydesdale. The extra strength of this frame, plus the ability of putting on fat tires made this the right bike for me.

Downside: I had to special order the bike without seeing or test riding one. The local LBS do not keep it in inventory.

A cyclocross bike should be fine for a century ride as long as you're not approaching it as a race. I would put on lightweight 700x23c tires for the century and fun rides. Use heavier 700x28c for commuting and light off-road riding.

yeah, a cross bike will be fine for a century as long as you are not racing. I've got the Surly and use it exactly as you describe and its been fine. I commute 11-12 miles one way about 4x a week and have had it on full on mtb trails as well as a 70 mile weekend ride and plan on doing a century sometime this fall. The stock Crosscheck build comes with 32 modified knobby tires but I use 25's for commuting/roads since I'm a Clysdale ;) the stock Alex rims are recomended for 23-32 tires.