new bike

After months of internet reading, bike-shop browsing and thinking about it, I finally bought a new bike. I'd decided I wanted a flatbar road bike and chose this one, the Specialized Vita.

 

I bought it at our fave bike shop -- United Cycle. We've been customers there for years and have always had excellent service. They have a large selection of bikes and their salespeople are generally knowledgeable and helpful.

United Cycle also featured in my ESL class a few months ago, when -- to put it nicely -- Lance Armstrong made headlines. CBC had a story about how the store was going to remove the Lance Armstrong mural from their store front. The students always appreciate reading news about Edmonton, and this article provided a local touch to an international news story. 

Back to the bike -- It felt good riding around the bike shop yard, but I was a little disappointed with my first long ride. 

My old bike, an urban hybrid with an aluminum frame and front suspension, is fairly light, but definitely more like a mountain bike or urban commuter than a road bike. I use it for commuting to work 4 days a week, I rode it 230 km on the Icefields Parkway, and I've been using it for my weekend rides on country roads. It's comfy and good on hills, but I was hoping to find something a little faster and better suited to long rides. I know that a road bike would be ideal, but I am nervous about the braking on the drop-style handlebars, so decided on the flatbar style. 

I also wanted to keep my initial investment to a minimum, in case I decide to upgrade next year. The Vita seemed like just the ticket. It looks good, too!

Yesterday, on my old bike, I rode 52 km in 2 hours, 14 minutes (this includes a few stops or slow-downs for traffic lights, turns, etc.)

Today I rode the new machine on the same route for about 49 km, but it took me 2 hours, 28 minutes. Now, it was pretty windy -- about 25-30 km/hour from the northwest. Even when I didn't have a headwind, I had a strong crosswind, which at times threatened to blow me into the ditch. During those periods, I worked hard to move at all. So maybe that's the reason for the slower speed. I also got a delayed start, as I set my GPS first and then decided to change my gloves. But even so, I felt a bit of a let-down when I looked at my results. 

The new bike is comfortable. The saddle is superb; I can't believe I didn't switch to this type of saddle sooner. The shifting seemed OK, although there was some clunking that will need to be attended to. Overall, it was a nice ride -- just slower than I expected and (big sad face) slower than my old $200 bike.

Aside from the wind, today was a lovely day to be out in the country: sunny and warm and signs of spring everywhere. I saw  flocks of migrating birds high above. A couple of red-tailed hawks circled over me, trying to decide whether I had any potential as a noon-day meal. A sandpiper called to me from a puddle in the ditch. 

And it seems to be helicopter training season at our local airport: both yesterday and today the sky was full of whirlybirds engaged in various activities. Yesterday one hovered over me in a rather threatening way -- I heaved a sigh of relief when it finally moved on.