30% off Peregrines by any chance Sam?

+1 to that 😉

There seems to be 3 types of bikes on this thread:

Cross bikes for racers
Bridleway bikes that are a bit quicker than a hybrid/29er
More relaxed road bikes.

Seems that the bridleway bike brigade are using cross bikes because there isn’t much else out there that fits. I’m building up a Croix der Fer at the moment because I want a bike I can go off and do 50 miles in the Chilterns and go a bit faster on the road, yet still ride all the bridleways I ride on my mountain bike. Its also something I can still get to work in 35 minutes on yet do a longer more fun ride on the way home. Its currently 23 1/2 lbs but that’s with BB7s and wheels that were last used on my Sultan round Kirroughtree

Oh and I looked at the Vaya but the 60cm top tube is too long for me, whilst on the CDF the head tube is way too short so will be running 40mm – 50mm of spacers to get the bar the right height.

EDIT: Oh and shameless plug – I have a smaller CDF/Vapour frame for sale in the classifieds 😉

The Vaya is lovely, but yet another overpriced Taiwanese bike with a ‘heritage’ name badge

I’d love Pinnacle to do a nice steel Arkose.
I’d buy one tomorrow if the spec and price were right.

Having just ridden my “comfort” road bike (Bianchi Via Nirone 7 – relaxed “C2C” geometry) along a ten mile section of gravel towpath as part of a longer ride yesterday I would advise something like a cross bike with bigger tyres, to be fair I had 23c’s on (no other choice due to tyre buying error) but I’m feeling a little beaten up today, bike was fine but it was uncomfortable and even with the slightly bigger tyres it can accommodate I wouldn’t expect a massive improvement in comfort.

I wouldn’t ride RvV then – definitely don’t ride Paris Roubaix.

My cross bike:

Although it was built to ride the LEL on:

1400km in 100 hours (total – ride time was 60 hours). Thankfully its very, very comfortable.

It was referred to up there ^ somewhere but my Van Nicholas Amazon would do all you want. It was my commuter, I tour on it, it’s done LeJog and I’ve had it off road with tyres up to 35mm for the likes of Glentress. Yrs, it’s Ti but nowhere near the cost of a Salsa.

Salsa you say? Mk1 Fargo here, Mk2 is suspension corrected for 100mm forks, MK3 on the way has gears/singlespeed/alfine/rohloffable dropouts and carbon fork option. Only bike I’ve owned that’s more comfortable than my old Dawes Super Galaxy. As a wheels on the ground mountain biker, my mountain bike has barely left the garage this year, I sold the proper road bike as I kept getting it gummed up or bending the wheels by heading off down bridleways I came across on a ride. Comfy, stable, fun, loaded or not.

…and has downtube shifters?

Good luck with that, retro-for-the-sake-of-it…

No, it has down tube shifter bosses, what people want to do with them is up to them.

OP, if your riding bridleways you are not the market for a road bike. Get a touring bike or cross bike. That said neither of those will be as smooth as a top end carbon road bike

BS – the majority of comfort in a bike is a combination of tyres (fatter ones at lower pressure) and geometry. Cross/touring geometry tends to be more comfortable with longer chainstays, tourers more so than crossers in general, but crossers have a wide variety of different geometry nowadays depending on the intended purpose.

That Onone looks the business, how do you find the forks under load? (also what are they?).

Would quite like to test ride that Fargo too.

Be careful, I’ve a Spesh Tricross disk running 28mm tyres and not only is it slow and heavy, but harsh, especially through the front end. I think it is the aluminium fork, I’d definitely look for something with carbon fork for better compliance.

To me a comfy bike needs to be light, since the faster you go the smoother the ride and more fun.

Neil Orrell only stopped riding the 3 Peaks the year he equalled John Rawnsley for finishes about 47 I think ?

To me a comfy bike needs to be light, since the faster you go the smoother the ride and more fun.

If the weight of your bike had a significant effect on your speed then you might have a point.

I have a carbon Spesh Roubaix that usually runs on 25mm tyres, and a Pinnacle Arkrose 3 CXer that I’m commuting on with 32mm slicks on.

Not sure which is more comfortable – got better bar tape on the Roubaix so less harsh on the hands, but that is easily changed. Disc brakes/wheels on the Arkrose make it feel noticeably heavier.

Proper bike fit is what actually makes a bike/ride properly comfortable, whether you do it yourself or pay to have it done by “experts”

Another vote here for the looks of that On-One – Very Businesslike. 😀

Anyway – how about cheapie comfortable bikes? Any more thoughts on the real bargains around?