NickA

Hi everyone. You can put me in the category of "I used to ride in my 20's, and now getting back into it in my 40's". I don't know why I skipped the last 20 years, but all that matters now is I'm back out on the road.

I picked up a Trek CrossRip about a month ago, mainly because I thought I might hit a light trail or two during my road rides. Now I don't see that happening. I'm riding about 150 - 200 miles a week right now, all road, and wondering if I'd be better off with a dedicated road bike, or stick with my CrossRip and maybe just upgrade it?

I know the CrossRip is a good all around bike, but will I gain anything by getting a bike tuned for just the road? I'm thinking entry level like the Trek 1 series, or even the Specialized Allez Sport. Those are the two brands locally I have access to (and Schwinn).

Barrettscv 

Welcome to Bikeforums!

I would try better tires, first. Often Cyclocross bikes are equipped with heavier knobby tires that really reduce performance on pavement without much of an advantage on softer surfaces.

I have found that the rolling resistance of top quality tires in the 700x27 to 700x32 size range to be similar to the rolling resistance of moderate quality road-bike tires in the 700x23 size.

Consider these larger tires for super low rolling resistance;

https://www.challengetech.it/products...roubaix-006/en , these are wider than labeled, about 29.5 mm

https://www.compasscycle.com/tires_comp_700_32.html , these are true to size, about 32mm wide

The ride quality of the Parigi-Roubaix tire I have on my Cyclocross bike is superb. They have also been moderately flat resistant and durable.

Lazyass

Might look at changing to a road cassette but I would throw some slicks on it and hit the road.

dnslater

I agree with the others. I'm assuming a cyclocross bike might typically be a tad heavier than a road specific, but probably not by much. Smoother tires would help. I assume this bike has a triple up front and an 8-speed drivetrain in back? You might think about upgrading to a more road-specific drivetrain on the rear, but if you have enough gear for your ride, than don't worry about it.

Many modern road bikes have a 10 or 11 speed rear drivetrain and on relatively flat land you never need to change the front gear.

caloso

All you need to "tune it for the road" is to swap in some slick tires and install some bottle cages.

NormanF

Yup. Get some hybrid slicks and you've got the best of both worlds.

NickA

Thanks for the advice everyone. Sounds like upgrading tires will be the biggest advantage. I'm good with the gearing; it does have a triple but I'm always on the middle ring and never wanting for more gears.

I really like the bike, and I'm comfortable on it. And I live in the North East so my outdoor riding days are going to be limited soon, so maybe in the Spring I can look into upgrading the bike if I feel like I need to.

TrojanHorse

A cross bike will be much more useful in sloppy weather in the NE so maybe you need to consider N+1.

NickA

Ha, I totally agree! Ever since I started riding again I can feel the addiction kicking in. I'm like this with technology too; I have an arsenal of cell phones, but I'm a developer so I actually need them. But cycling has so much more technology in it now than it did 20 years ago, that I'm getting the best of both worlds.

Darth Steele

you develop while riding? now that is mobile development to the extreme.

TrojanHorse

winston63 

I put some slicks on my cross bike (Kona Jake the Snake) and it's pretty good as a road bike. Yeah, I'm probably a bit slower than I'd be on a dedicated road machine and the bike is undoubtedly a bit heavier, but so far it's working out pretty good.

NickA

In theory, yes. I don't listen to music while riding, and I'm a solo rider, so it helps me figure out a problem or bug that I might have been working on all day.

Darth Steele

jeez, thanks killing our vision of you on your road bike with a laptop and dual screen 21" monitors coding in c#

the time(s) while riding is probably one of the more mentally productive time in the day for me as well. If anything it is very mind clearing.

now with that said, I don't get the correlation to the cell phone and you not listening to music while riding... but OK, welcome to the 41

Ofcourse you know that I am only pulling your leg

What technologies do you develop with? language, framework, etc etc..

NickA

I think I don't listen to music is because I like to hear the cars coming up behind me. And I'm using the phone to track my ride and the GPS sucks up the battery so I like to conserve. A cycling computer will be my next investment.

You were right on the money with C#. Lately I've been doing a lot of mobile development using Xamarin. It's a great tool for us C# developers. Other than that I'm writing web applications in ASP.NET/C#.

Darth Steele

Cool, even though I have the Garmin 810, you only need a device to track cadence, heart rate and speed and has the ability to export the data (.gpx file)

CatEye has some very capable devices at reasonable prices under $150 . My cycling improved by leaps and bounds once I started tracking my cadence and heart rate on my rides.

Xamarin is OK

Visual Studio 2013 is pretty cool

Leinster

I ride with a couple of guys older than you who have slicks on their cross bikes, and if they ever miss a Saturday ride it's to go to a cross race, on the same bike, with knobblies. If you do feel that upgrade sensation burning a hole in your wallet, get a nice light set of road rims with a narrower cassette and slick tires.

bikerjp

You'll gain a second bike giving you two with different purposes. I ride my cross bike to work and around town. I have also used it on zone 2 rides where I wanted an excuse to be slower.

If you are talking about selling and buying something else you might look into getting a lighter set of wheels and running road slicks on them. Then you can swap back and forth and change the character of the bike pretty easy. A cross bike won't be all that different from a road bike with the exception of the crankset and typical wheels. There are some other differences but not that crucial.

Jiggle

I ride a cross bike on the road. It doesn't slow me down.

IcySmooth52

I'll put another statement/vote towards: Get the tires!

I often tell people a cross bike is like a endurance roadie with the clearance for the tires and mud. (There's more too it, but on the road that's all the difference).

Jaeger99

I'll join the chorus of "change the tires!". When I wanted to improve the on-road performance of my hybrid, I swapped the (somewhat) knobby 35s for slick 28s. Night and day difference and a huge improvement.