I picked up my Trek 1500 a week ago and so far I’ve ridden it 71.2 miles (115 km). That’s a lot of riding when you consider that I live in the Northeastern United States and it’s the last week of December.
I love the way the Trek 1500 rides. It’s a lot easier to get moving than any other bike I’ve ridden. It’s also very maneuverable and feels rock solid underneath me. It’s hard to believe I’m riding 700×25 tires.
I rode 48.3 miles in the last two days on two of my favorite routes: the 23-mile Newtown-New Hope Route that I spoke about in an article about pre-Tour of Hope training back in October and The East Windsor-Millstone Route that I used to prepare for the 2004 Bristol-Myers Squibb Tour of Hope. These are great routes but they are hard to ride in windy conditions, and it’s been pretty windy around here in the last few days.
I’ve been looking for noticeable time differences between the rides on the Trek 1500 and rides over the same routes on my Marin Bear Valley SE. I haven’t seen anything significant so far. There are probably two reasons for this:
- I haven’t been riding much since the ice hockey regular season started. I’ve officiated 58 games since Labor Day and I haven’t ridden much as a result. (I think my officiating last season also complemented my cycling more than it has this year, mainly because the role of referee requires more endurance and continuous motion than does my current role as an assistant referee / linesman.)
- I hardly ever ride in such windy conditions during the main cycling season. On December 27, I experienced northwest winds of 22 miles per hour with gusts up to 30. Yesterday there was less wind: it was from the south at 13 miles per hour with gusts up to 16.
Right before Christmas I got a call from Cecil Ledesma, my friend who rode with me in the 2004 Tour of Hope. He wanted to know how I felt about riding the Trek 1500 and at the time, I had only ridden about 7 miles on it. Now that I’ve ridden over 70, I think that this bike is fantastic. It will help me to get to the next level in terms of my cycling training.
I’m planning to go back to Jay’s Cycles next week for a more exact bike fitting. I also want to make sure that the bike is properly adjusted, particularly in terms of the brakes, shifters, and derailleurs.
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