I bought the Tarmac because it was rated as a comfortable performance bike - the Zerk inserts in the stays and fork are supposed to take the harshness out of the ride.
they seem to do the job. The wheels that came with the bike were Mavic's - I swapped them out for Easton orion IIs - much lighter weight. Now with all that said, I would think I would notice a big difference even on shorted rides, this really isn't the case. As with all things on distance riding its a cumulative thing - hard to notice over shorter rides unless the change is significant.

I appreciate all the ideas, I am going to try going down the fit path for awhile.

Now as fat as HTFU - I sure need to do that on a lot of fronts, I need to get back on the training schedule and get off my arse.