I work at performance and agree some lbs’s have better mechanics but also depends on who works at your Preformance bicycle shop. I did personal upgrades like saddle, peddles, stem, and yes carbon seat post (dampens road vibrations better, again some carbon good full not so much for commuting all hype like fixed geared) anyway and gatorskin tires. I have the fuji newest 3.0 2011 and have over 3000 miles on it. Also if you are commuting full carbon is stupid due to commuter bikes take more of a beating. Most people don’t know that sora and 2303 components are that bad if you know how to work them. That’s really handy since I’m not quite adept at all things bike yet. I also like the fact that they will perform maintenance on the bike for free for life. Even better they have a number of places in Seattle. It’s also a 10 minute drive from my house in DC. I tend to shop quite a bit at Performance Bike, because it’s super-cheap. I tried a few local places for a used bike, but they were all WAY too expensive. But after some discussions with some cycling folks, it was determined the parts were somewhat crap. I had found a few bikes that were new that were cheap. I then tried the second source of all things cheap: eBay. Because I didn’t live in Seattle I would have to negotiate with the seller around a time I was in Seattle (which could be days or weeks in advance), and then there was the issue of bike condition, etc… It just seemed like a painful experience in the making. The problem there though is that most ‘good deals’ on Craigslist tend to last about 12 seconds. I first tried the source of all things cheap: Craigslist.

I would ride it a few times (2-6) a month. This wasn’t my primary bike and wasn’t something I rode all of the time. The problem is I didn’t want to spend $1000+ on yet another bike. Forget that, I had to find a better solution. I was quickly spending $40-60 a shot to rent it for 2 days. Finding a road-bike is downright near impossible, let alone expensive.įor the first few weeks of going back and forth to Seattle earlier this summer I tried renting a road bike. Finding a mountain bike isn’t super-hard. But biking…that’s where things get tricky.

And finding a swimming pool isn’t too hard if you take a few minutes to check out the Swimmers Guide. Running is fairly easy to get in as you can pretty much run anywhere. The problem with travel is that it has the potential to hose up your training plans. In particular, I travel quite a bit to Seattle (where I’m originally from) for both work and leisure.

(And now… I present a return to Tri/Running stuff…)

Fuji bikes review 2013