I’ve had my sights set on getting a road bike for some time now. Not only are there lots of great places to road bike in Northern California, but I also wanted to start biking to work (at least once a week for the duration of daylight savings). My plan was to buy a bike as soon as spring rolled around. Unfortunately, Mother Nature and schedule commitments prohibited me from doing any test rides - we’ve had a lot of rain recently and when it wasn’t raining, I always seemed to have some other prior engagement.

Both the weather and my schedule finally cooperated this weekend, and I was able to test ride a bunch of bikes. My top choices had been narrowed down to two Specialized bikes: the Allez and the Roubaix. I’m really fond of Specialized bikes (both my mountain bikes have been Specialized) and the local bike shop (Mike’s Bikes in Palo Alto), whom I like and is really close, is a big Specialized dealer. While living in Belmont, I had checked out Treks and Kleins at a local shop whom I also really liked (Chain Reaction in Redwood City), but that shop was now a bit farther than desired after our move to Palo Alto.

The Allez is more of a race/competition oriented bike and thus has a more aggressive riding position (meaning that your back is more bent/hunched over). The Roubaix, while still performance oriented, has a more relaxed/upright riding position and a slightly longer wheelbase for better stability. Coming from a mountain biking background, I found the Roubaix geometry to be much more comfortable. The longer the ride, the more pronounced this difference in comfort is likely to be. Since I have no plans to race and plan to ride primarily for exercise, fun, and transportation, comfort took precedence over performance. I decided that the Roubaix was the better choice for me.

Of course, within the Roubaix line itself there are various models. The lowest end uses an aluminum frame with carbon forks, seatstays, and seatpost. Carbon is lighter than aluminum, but its use in this case is primarily to provide damping to minimize the feel of small bumps and road vibration. The mid to upper end Roubaix bikes have full carbon frames which further reduce road vibration as well as weight. I said ‘what the hell’ and decided to spend a little more for the Roubaix Comp with its full carbon frame and better components.

Oh, yeah, there was also the issue of whether to get a Triple or a Double (referring to the number of rings in the front). According to a certain Drew Poynot, a wild roadie fanatic in San Diego, “triple chainrings are for old men with bad knees and girls who can’t stomp on the pedals.” While that may be true (in addition to slightly more problematic shifting which Drew also pointed out), it seems like the industry is moving to triple chainrings, at least in the case of low to mid-end bikes. In fact, Mike’s Bikes didn’t even carry any of the Roubaix Comp Doubles. I guess there’s just too many old men and girly girls buying bikes these days. Anyhow, I was comfortable getting a triple because I lack the bionic quads of steel that people like Drew and Lance possess.

I’m not ecstatic about the red and black color scheme (although it is slowly growing on me), but hey, what can you do? I decided not to buy the floor sample that I test rode and opted instead to get a brand new bike ordered and assembled. Of course, this had nothing to do with the bunny-hop tests I performed on my test ride. It’s quite amazing how much higher you can get with a bike that’s 10+ lb lighter! J.K. Although my credit card’s been charged, I won’t actually get my bike for another week or two. I’m eagerly looking forward to it!

Thanks to Dhun, Drew, and Palumbo-Head for all the road bike buying advice!

Update: For posterity’s sake (actually, this will be very useful if I ever decide to sell the bike), here are the specs of my new bike. Saved as PDFs from Specialized website: The Roubaix Story, Features, Tech Specs, and Geometry.

Posted by Roger at 9:27 pm.