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$.02 frm an ex-diehard roadie Posted by ChuckD [Email]  (#2127) [Profile/Gallery]
(more from ChuckD) on Mon, 2 May 2005 07:38:54
In Reply to: OT: road bikes, jeff, Mon, 2 May 2005 04:21:38 Members do not see ads below this line. - Help Keep This Site Online - Signup |
Go Jeff!
You may have bigger issues of fueling and hydration so make sure you try one before you do it. It gets kind of complicated getting prepared if you've never done a hundred miles.
Some great points already made here, I'd just like to add one or tow more. I was a bike tourist and racer. And I have a bike for each activity. The biggest differences are tires/wheels and frames.
As was mentioned you're going to want a tire that falls somewhere between a racing tire (for energy efficiency) and pure touring (for comfort).
Frames: I'm 6'1" and raced at ~177 lbs. (yeah, those were the days...) I started out on steel frames, a Gitane and then a Battaglin. After a couple thousand miles on those I developed the theory that steel frames were designed for the "Average" rider; someone of 150 lbs. or so. And even if they do make the frame bigger for a bigger person, they don't increase the tube diameters and they increase the distance between the lugs, or joints. They proved to be too soft and lost their spring after one season each.
About that time Cannondale launched their first roadbike on the racing community and I went for it. IIRC, it was the second aluminum frame on the market behind Gary Klein's $2000 work-of-art. Klein's frame had a reputation of being stiff due to the diameter of the downtube (the tube from the headset, top of the front fork, to the bottom bracket, the peddles and cranks). I knew I needed a stiff frame and snapped up the Cannondale. And after a couple seasons I took advantage of their then trade-in deal with $150 credit toward another frame. Still riding that one today.
The point of all this is, I doubt that at your size you'll suffer too much from a stiff bike. Lighter riders should have this concern. What you may want to look for, tho, is relaxed frame angles. And here's where a hybrid may be what you want. On a pure road racing bike the angle made between the ground and the seat tube and head tube are very steep making it a very responsive, and some say nervous, ride. A touring bike will have much less steep angles providing a more stable ride and longer wheel base resulting in a smoother ride. I believe hybrids are this way.
HTH
C.
, Tue, 3 May 2005 16:09:02
, Mon, 2 May 2005 16:20:29, Mon, 2 May 2005 07:38:54 <-- Viewing This Message
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