Big Gear for Big People

There may be some out there who think, "They just don't make cycling gear for someone my size." Not true. The bicycle I am now riding is made by a company called Specialized, they make road bikes, mountain bikes, etc. The model I purchased is the Crossroads Elite XL (the XL is for the size of the bike). It's a big bike, if you look at the picture of me riding it on the last post you might not be able to see how big it is but when Taj stands next to it the handlebars are chest level to her. This is a model that is discontinued by the looks of Specialized's website, the last year they list it is 2007 and not in the color that mine is at that. I don't know all the tech specs on the bike but I do know that as soon as I got on it was comfortable. The pinched nerve in my back didn't even hurt a bit. For anyone my size looking to get onto a bicycle comfort is important. I had a bike I had purchased for $10 at a junkyard last year that was uncomfortable to ride, I didn't ride it much. The front forks of the Crossroads has shock absorbers and the seat post does as well. Combine that with the seat being spring loaded and it is as smooth a ride as I have ever had on a bicycle.

I bought it at River City Bicycles in Portland. My wife and I went straight to River City instead of any other shop mainly because she had recently gone bike shopping with a friend of hers from work. Her friend Sarah went through the complete bike fitting that they offer in which they measure you in all sorts of ways to make sure you get a bike just right for you. It is necessary to book an appointment for that kind of fitting, which we did. Turns out that I didn't need that in the long run though. You need the pro fitting if your going to get a competitive road bike fitted to you, not if your just buying a bike to ride around town on. For that all you have to do is show up and want to buy a bike. The sales people do take the time to make sure your getting a bike that is comfortable for you though. I tried out one other bike before they brought me the Crossroads, I couldn't even get up and pedaling on that other one though. Any bike shop should help their customers out with this sort of thing though, any that want your business that is. River City has one of the largest bike showrooms I have ever seen and a friendly staff, so I do recommend checking them out if your looking for a bike.

Other items I picked up at River City were fenders for the bike, a rear rack, a pannier that is a perfect fit for my laptop, and a helmet. Once again a large selection of all of these items is helpful, I have a large cranium so I needed a larger helmet than I had been using. The pannier has a pull over rain slicker to keep my electronics from getting wet when I ride in the rain and the fenders help to reduce the amount of water I throw on myself as I am riding along. The bike itself was less than $500, after all the add ons it creeped up to the $800 mark but the additions have been well worth it so far.

A few days after buying the bike I decided that I also needed front and rear lights since I would be riding on the road. Luckily for me Bike Gallery's annual spring sale was starting that week. Taj, Corey, Obi (our dog), and I loaded into the car and headed down to the closest location to check out lights. I went with an LED front light, it isn't the brightest light and I wouldn't want to try and ride at night with it as my only illumination. The main point of getting it though was to use as a front flashing light to get peoples attention. I ended up spending another $50 on lighting for the front and rear. On the way home we decided to make a quick stop and left Obi in the back seat with the bag containing my new lights. Now it isn't all Obi's fault, normally when he gets to go for a ride taj buys him a small chew toy if he is a good boy during the ride. Needless to say by the time we got back to the car Obi had done his best to devour the $50 worth of lights that we had just picked up. Amazingly we were able to put the lights back together and they still work. My front light has the worst teeth marks on it and the water resistant rubber button is gone but it works. The rear light was in three pieces but it was able to be put back together and only has a couple of small marks on it from the ordeal.

Most of my posts in the future will likely be about my experiences riding. Occasionally I might talk about some whiz bang gadget that I like along the way. But mostly this is a way to keep myself motivated and on the bike.