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I vowed never to drift in to the Darkside but being able to just get home and cycle from the door and also possibly use for commuting is having greater and greater appeal as I'm just not getting out on the full susser. I appreciate i could just ride that (susser) from the door but it's a bit of a drag (literally) on the tarmac. So thoughts have turned to a x type bike, someone was selling a kona variety on here and I did have a bid on eBay on it but I've generally no idea what to look for. Im not all that keen on road riding due to the amount of dickheads about so would like to say blast from here and then take in a few bridleways, canal paths even some wooded bits. What is it I'm after? Anything sub 500 would also be easy to get past the FD.
The December edition of Cycling Plus magazine has a review of six gravel/road bikes.
Plenty of used cx bikes about. I paid £240 on here for my Kinesis Crosslight Pro 5. It looks cosmetically very tired but it's ace and very entertaining to ride off road locally. It also doubles up as an occasional commuter.
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The other option if you don't plan to ride on the road would be to look for a rigid single speed 26" for not much money.
Don't think my knees can cope with a proper ss, I've already got one but it's nicely low geared with ridiculous wide bars which I use for nipping to the pub shops etc and general hooning about. Si what to look for 2nd hand?
December edition of Cycling Plus magazine has a review of six gravel/road bikes.
All of them well over 500 quid!
Either a cx bike or a rigid geared 29er. If the offroad bits near you are fairly tame then maybe the cx. If the off road bits are trigger then maybe the 29er. A 29er with a tyre swap to something like a vee rubber vee 7 in 1.9 wife would be handy on the road and more capable of road than the cx.
For cx maybe look at the boardman cx comp with BC discount gets you close to 500.
Other than that, plenty second hand. Don't get obsessed with discs on cx for that money, mini vee's work really well on cross bikes.
Planet x London road full build for £499 currently.
Just had a look. 800 ish quid? Are there discounts added afterwards?
It was probably 499 half an hour ago. Wait another 25 mins and it'll be back to 499. Or 1150.
If it fits you o.p, you could do worse than this...
http://singletrackmag.com/forum/topic/fs-singular-peregrine-gravelcyclocrosscommuter-bike-vgc-450
What size? A friend was selling his Ridley cx bike.