My road bike is becoming worn out and I feel that it won't take much more 
commuting and exposure to the UK weather so I am looking to get a 
replacement. My commute is an undulating 19 mile round trip with two steep 
hills on the way in with a mile of continuous ascent at the end. The route 
is virtually all rural (apart from the first 300 yards) and all but two 
miles is on unclassified roads. Some of these roads are poorly surfaced. 
What I am after is something that will cope with this commute but is also 
feasible for 50 mile club rides, thus is reasonably fast and aerodynamic. I 
was considering a hub geared bike but is it possible to have hub gears with 
aero bars? I don't really want straight bars as I am susceptible to wind 
resistance (my Birdy feels like I'm cycling with the brakes on compared with 
my road bike). Does anyone have any suggestions? I have a budget of up to 
£1000.

Thanks

Adam

"Adam Lea"  wrote in message 
news:-bqdnX8biNxeN1zVnZ2dnUVZ8jmdnZ2d@bt.com...
> My road bike is becoming worn out and I feel that it won't take much more 
> commuting and exposure to the UK weather so I am looking to get a 
> replacement. My commute is an undulating 19 mile round trip with two steep 
> hills on the way in with a mile of continuous ascent at the end. The route 
> is virtually all rural (apart from the first 300 yards) and all but two 
> miles is on unclassified roads. Some of these roads are poorly surfaced. 
> What I am after is something that will cope with this commute but is also 
> feasible for 50 mile club rides, thus is reasonably fast and aerodynamic. 
> I was considering a hub geared bike but is it possible to have hub gears 
> with aero bars? I don't really want straight bars as I am susceptible to 
> wind resistance (my Birdy feels like I'm cycling with the brakes on 
> compared with my road bike). Does anyone have any suggestions? I have a 
> budget of up to £1000.

Audax bike/light tourer. Rohloff would probably be the only gear choice for 
"reasonably fast", but your budget blows that.

I always suggest something based on a Kinesis Racelight-T frame at this 
point, and see no reason to deviate from this habit - your trip sounds quite 
like the riding I do.

Mudguards, rack, 28mm tyres, hub dynamo - so not an all-out racer.

With the wearing-out bits, choice is between posh and look after it, and 
cheap and replaceable. Campag mirage kit on mine tended towards the latter, 
but it actually does very well. Tektro longish reach dual pivot brakes are 
still very nice after 3 years (though the releasing thing has seized through 
not using it), and the tiagra chainset is mucky and has had new rings.

cheers,
clive

X-No-Archive: yes

I Would go for something like this
http://www.condorcycles.com/fratello.html
http://www.condorcycles.com/geo/geo_fratello.html

The web site is very shit can not stand flash.

I Know its a still frame but I think for commuting this has advantages 
over Aluminium in that it repairable.

Got mudguard clearance


Peter

On Sat, 06 Sep 2008 08:44:30 GMT, "text.news.virginmedia.com"
<nospam@somewhere> said in
<Oprwk.53815$E41.45531@text.news.virginmedia.com>:

>I Would go for something like this
>http://www.condorcycles.com/fratello.html
>http://www.condorcycles.com/geo/geo_fratello.html

My f-i-l has a Fratello, nice bike but I'm not sure how robust it
would be as a commuter.  I'd be inclined to go for something with
26" wheels, and opt for Sun Rhyno rims - our triplet had those and
we never once needed to true them.  Or the Alesa Explorer, that's
tough too.

But hark at me, for my 15 mile round trip commute I bought a
recumbent and ran it on Schwalbe Stelvios :-)

Guy
-- 
May contain traces of irony.  Contents liable to settle after posting.
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk

85% of helmet statistics are made up, 69% of them at CHS, Puget Sound

On 6 Sep, 10:56, "Just zis Guy, you know?"  wrote:
> On Sat, 06 Sep 2008 08:44:30 GMT, "text.news.virginmedia.com"
> <nospam@somewhere> said in
> <Oprwk.53815$E41.45...@text.news.virginmedia.com>:
>
> >I Would go for something like this
> >http://www.condorcycles.com/fratello.html
> >http://www.condorcycles.com/geo/geo_fratello.html
>
> My f-i-l has a Fratello, nice bike but I'm not sure how robust it
> would be as a commuter.  I'd be inclined to go for something with
> 26" wheels, and opt for Sun Rhyno rims - our triplet had those and
> we never once needed to true them.  Or the Alesa Explorer, that's
> tough too.
>
> But hark at me, for my 15 mile round trip commute I bought a
> recumbent and ran it on Schwalbe Stelvios :-)
>
> Guy

My brother also has a Fratello, as does a friend of his.  Each of them
has a 15-20 mile round trip in North London, and neither has
encountered durability problems despite (friend in particular) being
rather hard on the bike.  Admittedly, neither bike is over a year old
and they're both decent mechanics, but I've heard nothing but praise
for the bikes.  Don't know about 50 mile club runs but we had no
problem doing 24 miles in Richmond park despite hangovers a couple of
weeks ago!

My Trek 1000 (not sure what the current equivalent would be) is
probably a little light and nippy for what you want.  I love it
though :-)

Henry