I bought my 62cm silver Appaloosa about a month ago and have tinkered obsessively to get the setup exactly as I want it for a light tour this summer (2000km, all told, through the Yukon and Alaska). The bike has front the and rear Surly racks and SKS fenders, fairly heavy oversize aluminum pedals, a kickstand, a brooks saddle, and so on. It weights AT LEAST 35 pounds--maybe closer to 40--and I absolutely love it. I'm 6'5" and tip the scales at about 265, and I'm never lighter than 250, so a few extra pounds of bicycle is pretty much unnoticeable. I generally average about 15 mph. My all time record on a flattish local route was an average of 20 mph, and once I hit that mark, I gave up trying to exceed it. The Appaloosa will be my tourer/shopper/hauler.
This afternoon I ordered the last blue-and-cream 62cm Sam Hillborne from Vince at Rivendell. This bike will be built for long (and short) local rides. No fenders, no racks, 32-35 gumwalls, with a brown Brooks and maybe leather bar tape, plus a lot of polished silver parts. I don't imagine I'll be more than about about 1 mph faster on it than I am on the Appaloosa, but it will be a completely different aesthetic and will run a moustache bar (probably Nitto rather than Albastache). It will be my fast (all things being relative) bike. The bikes are similar in geomerty, but that will suit me just fine. I'm hoping to last a while with just three bikes--Appaloosa, Sam Hillborne, and my Jones Plus for off-road duties. Plus a winter bike, of course. Just had to share my excitement. Jay -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
