Bicycle enthusiasts - looking for recommendations

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if you could bump that price up a bit you could get a really nice entry level cross bike. You cant treat it like a mountain bike but they're a blast on light trails and ride as much like a street bike much better than you'll get out of a cheaper commuter.

nice cannondale

Excellent recs all.

Are you older than 60? That stem and stack height. Damn.

Sounds like you need a cyclo-cross bike. You can definitely find them in that range although 1600 opens a lot more doors. Only downfall to buying cyclo-cross is that it will be more expensive for what you get (in terms of shifter components). They are basically a road bike with larger tire clearance and the bottom bracket is usually a little higher (therefore the sizes run a little different). A lot come with disc brakes for better stopping power in the wet/mud. They aren't as common, although getting more popular, so the price is a little bit higher. But you can put on knobby tires and hit the trails, or throw in slicks and no one could probably tell it's anything different from a road bike.

My cyclo-cross bike is a low end Fuji 1.5 cross. Aluminum frame (and not a particularly great one), tiagra components (meh), and avid bb5 disc brakes (not the greatest at all). It MSRP's for around 1200, granted I got a previous years model for 900. Wheras I know a guy who just got a deal on a Specialized Roubaix road bike with 105 components for 1300. That's a much higher quality bike, but it's a road bike, so it's a little less. He actually got a call a few days later from the bike shop saying they'd let him return the bike and get an Ultegra model for 1400 total. You absolutely don't need components of that level for your first bike, tiagra will do, just goes to show how much more you can get from a road bike.




Not my bike, but this is what I have. I have 28mm gatorskin road tires on it for now. It's what I exclusively rode before getting my triathlon bike.

Will defjniteky check out. Wasn't aware a "cyclo-cross" bike existed.

Buy a decent mountain bike/XC frame. Mountain Bike/XC parts are for the most part cheaper.

I use a Trek X-Caliber which should run somewhere around $800-900.



Just replace the mountain bike tires with a little less beefy Cyclocross or Commuter tires. Would add another $40 or so.

(I use two tire sets, one Commuter, one XC.)

This. $79.00 at Walmart on sale. $1200 really?

Get a hybrid bike

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Get a hybrid bike

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If they are significantly cheaper with similar quality components, and you never expect to do some semi-long rides, there's nothing wrong with a hybrid. But don't be scared of a road bike. The curvy handle bars don't somehow make it difficult or uncomfortable. On the contrary. Road bars give you 3 different places to put your hands. On a 25+ mile ride, you are going to want to move around. Plus, I find riding on the hoods more comfortable that riding straight bars. Yes you can make a road bike super aggressive where you are bent over and everything, but you can also make it just as comfortable as a hybrid bike, hence why I don't quite know why they exist (unless for some reason they are significantly cheaper with similar quality).