Originally Posted by
retroshifter
I don’t think have ever seen one of these in person. I wonder if many were sold. At the time I was interested in this and the Rockcombo since I didn’t own a mountain bike and thought of myself as a roadie. Then I got a Bridgestone MB3 which had a more road bike feeling (to me at least). I quickly realized mountain biking with flat bars was challenging enough and lost any desire for drop bars for off roading
I had asked Bruce and he said he didn't remember how many were produced. I've heard about 200 and about 400. Given how few I've seen since I bought mine in 1989, I suspect the number is somewhere between the two.
According to the folks at Cupertino Bike Shop, where I bought mine in Aug 1989, mine was the first Japan-made Rock and Road sold in the US. I don't have any actual proof of this, just that that is what I was told when I made the purchase. Given the article was published in June before I bought mine, maybe it is the first one Cupertino sold? I had gone in to buy one earlier that year (as soon as I learned about the Hakkapeliitta tires), put down a deposit, and I was the first in line to get one when they arrived. Serial # is 89F2305. Guessing that 89 is the year and 2 is the month. If 305 is the 305th frame made, then it being among the first sold doesn't seem realistic. Not that it really matters. It's just that I've been xurious all these years. Thoughts and/or decipher help?
The components on the bike were not an exact match to those listed in the article. I'll do a new post to my IG (haffassa.tempt) with more information. There are about a dozen posts going back to 6/9/19 that include pics of the bike. Better pics are probably 6/8/20, 4/25/20, and 6/9/19.
Though the bike has undergone only a few changes over the 34+ years (tubeless tires/wheels most recently), I've kept the original parts in storage. It spent most of its years wearing Scott AT4 bars. The flat bars were great on the trail, especially with more powerful MTB levers and cables. And the bends on the ends and the loop/point fronts were nice on the road for commuting and touring.
