Jim, As someone who straddles the line between Rivendellish sensibilities and club rider hammering, I can relate to the seemingly divergent desires of your customer. And I wonder whether there needs to be such a stark dichotomy drawn between a "practical" bike and one suitable for fitness-oriented clubby rides.
Others have suggested a Surly LHT. My thought is another: why not one of the new Surly Pacers, which are designed for standard reach brakes? It could be built up in a racy, weight-conscious way with a smart mix of Ritchey or FSA parts and a SRAM Apex or Rival gruppo. A Burly could be affixed when necessary. And I'm blanking now, but aren't there pedals out there that have simultaneous clipless and regular shoe capabilities? Perhaps she could be outfitted with two wheelsets, one with some Jack Browns for Burly duties, the other with some "sensible" (to me) 25mm performance tires, such as Michelin Krylion or Panaracer Type-D. The only thing that might get in the way of a truly dual-purpose Pacer would be the rack, which would add unnecessary weight and drag when used for club rides. Sounds good to me. Wouldn't mind one myself! Aaron On Thursday, May 17, 2012 6:09:55 AM UTC-7, Jim Thill - Hiawatha Cyclery wrote: > > Just Ride was on my mind yesterday when I tried to help a woman decide on > her first nice bike. She wants a sporty-ish bike for Burley-pulling and it > would be nice if it had a rack. Easy enough. But she's also athletic and > aspires to the racer archetype. I should add that she's the type of woman > that most men would notice in any crowd, which means that various bike > dudes have tried to "help" her with all sorts of advice. All the usual > suspects were present: the necessity and efficiency of clipless pedals, the > magical properties of carbon, and the (baffling-to-me) popularity of > time-trial bikes, none of which are necessary, or even desirable, in a bike > for daily errands and family rides. Anyway, she was clearly struggling with > the perceived compromises between making a bike useful and making a bike > fast (or at least light/expensive enough to impress the racer wannabe > crowd). I thought to myself: this would be a lot easier if she could drop > the racer notions and stop hanging out with guys who read Bicycling > Magazine as a comprehensive source of cycling wisdom. > > On Thursday, May 10, 2012 1:15:32 AM UTC-5, Jim Thill - Hiawatha Cyclery > wrote: >> >> Maybe there should be a spoiler alert here - be advised that I will be >> discussing various aspects of the new book, so navigate away from this page >> if you prefer the content of the book to be a complete surprise. >> >> I finished reading the book tonight, which if I can summarize in a line, >> is about all the good things about bikes that appear only when you toss >> racer prejudices and attitudes out the window and Just Ride. After the >> first few chapters, I thought that maybe the editors really sanitized GP's >> historically familiar against-the-grain opinions to be more blandly >> vanilla, hopefully to be appealing to a broader audience. The general >> content wasn't unpredictable to me, having read the Readers and Catalogs >> and most everything else Riv going back to 2004 when I wanted a touring >> bike and couldn't find any to buy except the Atlantis (that's how I first >> found Riv in the internet universe). But I was somewhat surprised that >> there was little to no discernible lug evangelism or quill stem absolutism >> or singing the praises of friction shifters, and the Retro-Grouchiness was >> held to a dull roar. >> >> But as I got further along in the book, I started to think that maybe Mr >> Petersen has simply mellowed about the trivial details over the years (I >> know I have!). Or maybe more accurately, there's less to be peeved about in >> the bike industry now than there was 10 years ago or even 5 years ago. >> After all, smart, sturdy bikes with ample tire clearance and useful >> braze-ons and some attention to classic, non-billboard aesthetics have >> become, dare I say, normal. If racing bikes and gear are the status quo in >> the world, then I must live in a lucky bubble in South Minneapolis where I >> ride and fix bikes every day, as I see lots of reincarnated 1980s >> sport-tourers, old steel MTBs, and new(ish) Surly Cross-checks and LHTs on >> a daily basis, but feel like I see relatively few "road bikes" being ridden >> by obvious faux-racers. To the extent that bike trends have steered toward >> the benefit of the "Unracer" over the past decade or so, my opinion is that >> Grant and Rivendell played a large part in it. This is not to say that all >> smart bike designs and product offerings are shameless Riv-ripoffs, but >> that Grant gave voice to a backlash movement and opened a long-neglected >> market to a lot of smart, creative people who maybe couldn't or wouldn't >> have done it without some pioneering coattails to ride on. >> > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. 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