New Bike in the 'Corral'
05-16-09, 05:00 AM
#1
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Location: South Denver Metro
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Bikes: GT, GT, GT, Schwinn
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New Bike in the 'Corral'
What a great start to what should be a wonderful year!
Beginning of the Year Dad and I purchased matching 2008 Cannondale Synapse Carbon bikes to do some events on.
2009 Elephant Rock
2009 Courage Classic
2009 Deer Creek Challenge
along with some fun weekend rides to stay in shape.
LOVE the bike, need to think about upgrading the components to ultegra or Sram end of the season.
Then... Before all the spring snow started flying in Denver, I went for a mountain ride with a couple buddies... on my 2001 GT i-Drive Race (full suspension)
One of them riding a 9 year old Cannondale with the Lefty. (hard tail) I picked his bike up and thought to myself - *holy crap! - this thing is LIGHT* ... and got the bug to buy a hardtail.
I'd ALWAYS wanted a GT Zaskar... so, I started searching craigslist (across the country) and ebay. After pricing out a bunch of older ones that I'd have to upgrade anyway, I found a spring sale at Performance that had their pricing on the 2008 Zaskar at a pricepoint I couldn't refuse. After a few upgrades - I now have what I considered the 'holy grail' when I started riding mountain.
So... with those 3 beautiful and kind of expensive bikes in the corral - and the 7 year old finally getting his skills down. The wifey started hinting how nice it'd be this summer to do some family rides with the 1 1/2 year old in the burley. I started thinking... (knowing I'm a ****er) - *these 3 bikes are overKILL for burley pulling. I should look for a 'beater'.*
Again - craigslist and ebay searching, led me down the road of... "well, after upgrades - it's gonna be the same pricepoint if I just bought something new" - So I pulled the plug on a new Bikes Direct Single Speed . After a few upgrades with items I had laying around the house from other builds - I now have my 'family beater'.
First impressions.... not a bad bike for the money... should be great for what I intend to use it for.
What next? 29'er? Unicycle?
only time will tell!
Beginning of the Year Dad and I purchased matching 2008 Cannondale Synapse Carbon bikes to do some events on.
2009 Elephant Rock
2009 Courage Classic
2009 Deer Creek Challenge
along with some fun weekend rides to stay in shape.
LOVE the bike, need to think about upgrading the components to ultegra or Sram end of the season.
Then... Before all the spring snow started flying in Denver, I went for a mountain ride with a couple buddies... on my 2001 GT i-Drive Race (full suspension)
One of them riding a 9 year old Cannondale with the Lefty. (hard tail) I picked his bike up and thought to myself - *holy crap! - this thing is LIGHT* ... and got the bug to buy a hardtail.
I'd ALWAYS wanted a GT Zaskar... so, I started searching craigslist (across the country) and ebay. After pricing out a bunch of older ones that I'd have to upgrade anyway, I found a spring sale at Performance that had their pricing on the 2008 Zaskar at a pricepoint I couldn't refuse. After a few upgrades - I now have what I considered the 'holy grail' when I started riding mountain.
So... with those 3 beautiful and kind of expensive bikes in the corral - and the 7 year old finally getting his skills down. The wifey started hinting how nice it'd be this summer to do some family rides with the 1 1/2 year old in the burley. I started thinking... (knowing I'm a ****er) - *these 3 bikes are overKILL for burley pulling. I should look for a 'beater'.*
Again - craigslist and ebay searching, led me down the road of... "well, after upgrades - it's gonna be the same pricepoint if I just bought something new" - So I pulled the plug on a new Bikes Direct Single Speed . After a few upgrades with items I had laying around the house from other builds - I now have my 'family beater'.
First impressions.... not a bad bike for the money... should be great for what I intend to use it for.
What next? 29'er? Unicycle?
only time will tell!
05-16-09, 07:28 AM
#2
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Join Date: May 2008
Location: New England
Posts: 324
Bikes: 2020 Fuji Bighorn 1.3, 2005 LeMond Buenos Aires, 2013 Jamis Coda Elite
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Hey Dave, nice addition to the corral. I think it's very cool that you and you dad not only ride together but actually bought matching bikes - awesomeness. I didn't have the chance to do that with my dad, but hopefully I will continue to ride with my son; he's 5 now and has a blast riding with me on a Trail a Bike
I like your thinking on bikes too! I had one bike for a very long time and didn't use it that much. Then last year I decided I was going to start riding regularly and decided to get a road bike. For that bike I didn;t know enough to buy on CL (didn't want to buy from eBay because I wanted to see it in person) so I bought the LeMond.
Earlier this year I was hiking with my son and saw a couple of mtn bikers. A light went off and I thought that looks like fun. A couple of weeks later I bought my first mtn bike, the Rocky Mtn.
While researching my first road bike I came across BF and since then have bought several bikes from CL, sold some of them but still have a few and trying to decide which of them I want to keep and for what. Still looking for a touring bike though...
... but can't justify dropping a grand or so esp when I dont actually have any plans to tour - I just like the concept!
I like your thinking on bikes too! I had one bike for a very long time and didn't use it that much. Then last year I decided I was going to start riding regularly and decided to get a road bike. For that bike I didn;t know enough to buy on CL (didn't want to buy from eBay because I wanted to see it in person) so I bought the LeMond.
Earlier this year I was hiking with my son and saw a couple of mtn bikers. A light went off and I thought that looks like fun. A couple of weeks later I bought my first mtn bike, the Rocky Mtn.
While researching my first road bike I came across BF and since then have bought several bikes from CL, sold some of them but still have a few and trying to decide which of them I want to keep and for what. Still looking for a touring bike though...
... but can't justify dropping a grand or so esp when I dont actually have any plans to tour - I just like the concept!
05-16-09, 04:56 PM
#3
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Join Date: Apr 2006
Location: Aurora, CO
Posts: 1,306
Bikes: CAAD9-1, Windsor Cliff 29er
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Sweet rides. It's always nice to hear from a fellow Clyde who lives in the Denver area too.
That Cannondale looks nice. I'm still afraid of getting a carbon frame as I'm worried about crashing and rendering the frame useless. Probably just my misconception though. After losing weight I'm now a Clyde by height and not weight so that wouldn't be an issue :-) Let us know what you think after a while.
That Cannondale looks nice. I'm still afraid of getting a carbon frame as I'm worried about crashing and rendering the frame useless. Probably just my misconception though. After losing weight I'm now a Clyde by height and not weight so that wouldn't be an issue :-) Let us know what you think after a while.
