Giant Defy 1 or Trek 2.3 or Boardman Team

LBS is widely used as
LBS is widely used as shorthand for one’s local bike shop.

It’s not a stupid question – you either know or you don’t. And now you know it too 🙂

I see it is even mentioned on Wikipedia, citing the glossary of the hugely respected Sheldon Brown:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Local_bike_shop

Riggers wrote:I can

Riggers wrote:

I can understand the desire not to want ‘leftovers’, but in June???

Hey, don’t look at me! All I know is that it has been an uncommonly busy spring at the LBS and they were told popular models & sizes were very low or sold out in March.

Someone or something ate the trailing ‘s’ from the Condor link. Grrr.

The Condor Range

Riggers wrote:How can they

Riggers wrote:

How can they run out – it’s only JUST June! The 2013 C range is mooted for release in July, but that’s far from guaranteed.

Dealers and importers won’t want loads of unsold 2012 bikes knocking around. Giant, Kona and others have found this happen before and discounting hits both margins and brand value.

Have you thought of Condor? Their frames go to 64cm: http://www.condorcycles.com/our-bike
One of the RCS team riders, Luke Grivell-Mellor, is 6’5″ and runs huuuge frames.

CC Folk,
Thanks for the
CC Folk,

Thanks for the advice & encouragement – especially the list of ‘normal’ (ie over 6′ 4″!) riders who’ve succeeded in cycling.

I’m doing a 5-day 510 mile charity ride in September and currently have only a 1978 Holdsworth I bought new to train on. I hadn’t used it for at least 20 years, but it’s been fettled and now doing runs with my local club. Combined age of rider & machine: 94!

I’ve ‘bombed’ so far in finding a 62cm or better frame size with Cube, Giant, (bit of a misnomer there!), Specialized and yesterday Cannondale, whose CAAD10 was received very well in the reviews I read. Even the importers can’t help. How can they run out – it’s only JUST June! The 2013 C range is mooted for release in July, but that’s far from guaranteed.

I like titanium and approached Enigma, but they can’t fit their build time into the time available. I’m enquiring about Van Nicholas this weekend at ‘Fat Birds’ in Hunstanton.

I’ve got a boardman just now
I’ve got a boardman just now and its awesome (can’t recommend it enough). I also know people who have Giant bikes and they are well happy with them too. Always had good service at Halfords, can’t knock the guys. Some of my local bike shops are good too (some are not – bit of a mith that the LBS is always good in my opinion). 😀

Feel a new thread coming on
Feel a new thread coming on ….

Stijn is 199cm and Van Summeren is 198cm. (source: Wikipedia …and that never lies :^o )

Does anyone know of a taller pro rider?! 😕

How tall is Vandeburgh?
How tall is Vandeburgh? Tallest pro I seem to remember? 😕

Although Pozzovivo is 4’4!! 😀

I have a Boardman as my winter hack. The front wheel’s spokes were not under any tension so needed a rebuild to stop them touching both brake blocks when I put the power down. Really good bike now!

Riggers wrote:I’m quite

Riggers wrote:

I’m quite amazed that at 6′ plus, I can’t seem to buy a bike ‘off the peg’, but must go ‘bespoke’, with all the cost & delay that entails.

Rubbish. Giant frames use what they term ‘compact’ geometry, take a look at this chart:
http://www.giant-bicycles.com/en-gb/technology/compactroad/45/
A decent shop will do a bikefit on every sale – check saddle height & setback, swap the stem if necessary and so on.

As for Specialized, sales apparently went through the roof with the warm weather in March/April and I was told that they can’t keep up with demand for the most popular models.

If you think you’re hard done by I guarantee that you wouldn’t want to be 5’4″ and hoping for a range of road bikes to choose from 😐

Riggers wrote:

I just wish they wouldn’t waste my time having to read worthless reviews….

It’s easy – don’t buy it. In my experience C+ reviews are long on enthusiasm and short on nitty-gritty. Their ‘best on test’ means nothing, it’ll probably come in 3rd and “disappointing” or “unremarkable” next time around, and to be honest today’s bikes are so good anyway you’d struggle to unearth a lemon.