Which New Bike?

What Winky said, having just come back from Südtirol with a 9km 10% gradient the only way back to our hotel - triple chain rings pretty useful and not just for fat  boys like me. A lot of the old Italian geezers flying past me were on triple rings.

@Winky - you need a Colnago Master to balance out the ugliness of your carbon monster ;-) 

Oh, yes. You are right. They are sweet looking ride. But if I wanted a steel bike, I'd be more likely to go with a small North American custom builder, though. Portland, the spiritual home of new-world custom steel is just down the road. There is a good guy (Sam Whittingham - Naked Bikes) just a ferry ride away, too.

One of my neighbours has just put in an order for

Somewhat beyond the OP's budget but any excuse to post pics of beautiful bikes.

They've made a very good job of creating a bike that looks like an Autocad generated 3D image prior to rendering.

Where's the rear brake

fatcat: Its real. see http://tinyurl.com/oxf7vzp

rupert: The rear brake is under the bottom bracket. If you look closely you can see one pad at about 8 o'clock behind the chainring.

Giant are ubiquitous but for a good reason; their frames and build quality are first class and they offer great VFM.

Mine is a Composite 2 which has had the SRAM groupset replaced with 105 and Ultegra. Also replaced the stock wheels with some spare Shimano RS10s I had on my Trek SL (minor upgrade on the OK Giant PR2 rims).

Great bike for normal money. Looks ace in black / white / bronze also!

Something similar, in action during the Giro 2009 Rome time trial. I like the colour scheme on this one even though it is predominantly black.

Obviously loads and loads of options but here's two:

http://www.evanscycles.com/pro..._kword__match__plid_

http://www.cotic.co.uk/product/roadrat - bit cheap perhaps for your budget but I love my Soul and you could always up the component spec.  If you plan to use the bike for commuting then think carefully about anything too valuable.

Jonathan

Rod

Congratulations on your new bike.  I don't have a triple, but for very weight penalty you now have an ace up your sleeve should you come across a challenging hill - particularly towards the end of a ride!

At this time of year, with temperatures starting to dip, my daily commute has my mind turning back towards mudguards.  As an earlier poster mentioned, mudguards not only restrict the volume of gritty water being thrown up off the road onto your feet and back, they also greatly reduce the amount of grit gathering on the chain/ grinding the chainrings and cassette cogs.  If your new bike has restricted clearance you could consider a set of these - they look a bit heath robinson but they really do work and weigh next to nothing.

http://www.crudproducts.com/products/roadracer

The other thing I recommend for commuting particularly is a decent set of lights - not sure what the traffic is like where you are, but here in London, the brighter your light I reckon the greater the chance of other road users noticing and avoiding collision with you!

Peter

Oops - should have said for very little weight penalty!!

Peter

...agreed as long as you are not blinding them with the light.

Thanks Peter, Mark.

I have lights, two small LED things that punch above their weight but will suffice. It is already still dark here at 6am( when I leave if I am working early), but the roads are well lit. The rear light is a neat little device that fits into the Fizik saddle, and weighs next-to-nothing, thanks to Ameden for that tip!

The mudguard thing is interesting. In fact we get about the same rainfall here as London, but it all tends to fall in massive stormy downpours that are a) relatively predictable and b) usually worth waiting out. Having ridden in one, you get saturated in every way anyway, but the protection for the chainring etc is of interest.

Still enjoying the bike!