The $1,000 — or less — question

A friend of mine e-mailed me the other day, told me he expected to come into some spare cash and was considering buying, among other things, a road bike and accoutrements. Below is the gist of my response. Courtesies not included in the original but provided here were implied. Because I have too much time on my hands, I'll probably follow this with my $1,500 and $2,500 recommendations over the next several days.

Dear Esteemed Friend:

I love e-mails like this. A monkey would be really, really cool but a road bike will never throw shit at you and then laugh. If you got a hovercraft or time machine, however, there'd be no point buying a road bike. I'd take either one (time machine first, hovercraft second) instead of a kickass road bike.

Back to the assumption that a road bike is your first choice. Here are my choices, in order of manufacturer's recommended sale price: Giant OCR3 ($650), KHS Flite 300 ($689), Specialized Allez Triple ($710), Cannondale R400 Triple ($779.99) and Trek 1200 ($849.99). Any of these bikes will get you to your local landmark and back and feeling badass to boot. Common advantages are triple chainrings (the big cogs in front, and triples are a whole lot easier to to ride uphill when you're learning to ride a road bike uphill) and carbon forks (which take a lot of the sting out of riding over potholes and other irregularities). Common disadvantages are that you have to relearn how to shift (shift from bigger rings to smaller on the front as you're hitting the bottom of a hill and your chain is loose instead of waiting until the middle of the uphill when the chain is tight) and the seat (saddle) is a piece of shit not suitable to any ride more than 40 miles (this bears no relation to the sense of badassedness you should feel at the end of your ride).

I derived these recommendations from recollection bolstered by information garnered from www.roadbikereview.com. I knew which models I had in mind but the Web site gave me the specifics I wanted. My search was for road bikes costing between 0 and $1,000. More than half the bikes meeting those criteria had no price and are expensive as shit if you're serious about owning one.

Do purchase the bike at your favorite independent local bike shop (which will carry some but not all of the brands and models I've identified above). When the doing the deal see if you can get the bike shop to throw in some clipless pedals beside the crappo pair the bike comes with.

If they throw in the pedals, that means you'll need shoes. Clipless pedals are worthwhile because they allow you to go some much faster. So much more of the energy from your leg pushing down on one side and pulling up on the other goes into propelling the bike with clipless pedals than with standard flat pedals. Because your favorite independent local bike shop will gouge you on shoes and shorts, get accessories such as shoes and shorts, and maybe even pedals, at some place like Performance Bicycle. Performance is the cycling equivalent of Wal-Mart. But take in your pedals (or your bike if your pedals are attached to it) and tell them you need inexpensive shoes and cleats that are compatible with your pedals. Clipless pedals do have a learning curve. You will fall and be embarrassed more than hurt. It's OK. You'll fall at very low speeds. I've only fallen twice.

Get a pair of cycling shorts. You'll be happier and probably unchafed that you did. Yes, spandex and a crotch pad (chamois — indeed a little alpine goat-like animal used to die for the comfort of cyclists; now it's all wicking synthetics) will make you feel ridiculous. That feeling will last for six months. Then you'll be buff enough you can wear the shorts in your modeling photo shoots. . . . I hope all of this helps. Let me know if you have questions.

Yours in beer and bicycles,
Cycledork