New Bike has Arrived!

After almost 3 months of waiting for a bike that has been on back-order, it finally came in yesterday. (on my rest day of all days) The bike is a 2012 Specialzed Venge Expert, the aero road bike of the Specialized line up. This bike sacrifices a little bit of weight in favour of better airflow. Where a Tarmac is all about the power to weight ratio for the long climbs, the Venge is all about maximum wattage. It's ideal for me in Southern Ontario because there aren't any extended climbs and I do the vast majority of my riding solo, so the reduced drag on the bike is a big plus.

The unboxing!

I picked it up at the shop but took it home for building. Before I left though I grabbed a couple of bottle cages and pedals.

Onto the stand

All done!

Build was very straight forward, even the internal housing was a piece of cake to put it all together. Two black Specialized bottle cages and Shimano Ultegra carbon pedals to top it all off. Of course seeing as I had never used proper road pedals before, I needed some new shoes to go with it....

Some new Pro Road shoes to go with it. The red makes me faster :D

I've only taken it for a short test ride because I don't want to kill myself on a designated rest day. First impression - This bike is FAST. I mean even when I'm just standing on it I feel fast - it's very responsive to putting the hammer down and it just slices through the wind. Having said that though I hope I never have the deal with any strong crosswinds. The downtube on this bike is almost as narrow as the tire but if you look at it from the side, you can see just how much of a blade this bike looks like. It's definitely a looker too, just on my little jaunt around the block I was getting more than a few stares (although that may have more to do with the ridiculously bright red shoes.

Today's workout is just active recovery so I'll only be riding for around an hour. Unfortunately I'll also be doing it on my old shit road bike because it's raining out and I don't want to have my first ride on the new one in muck.