Super Acciaio on the road.. some brief feedback.

 Well having described at length how I came to having a Condor Super Acciaio the one thing missing was how does it ride? Its early days to some extent but I've clocked up probably around 750-1000mls on the bike. At the beginning there was the usual procedure of getting your bike position fine tuned. I'd originally set the saddle height, reach etc to as close to my original road bike as possible. I never had geometry data for my previous road bike frame ( Ambrosio Stelvio Carbon ) so my initial rides felt different and I dropped the saddle height by about 1cm and shifted the saddle back around the same. These two small changes had me feeling totally at one with the bike and very comfortable. Tiny changes by all accounts but in my experience to date thats what I've always found. The data I obtained using RattleCad was excellent and its progressed even further than the version I used, makes me want to build up more bikes!

 

 The bike itself is the sum of the parts so I can't attribute the ride quality to simply the frame. I wanted to use 25mm tyres, partly due to the high praise and recommendations they currently receive for shock absorption and rolling resistance but could not find stock at the right price. So I'm riding on 23mm at about 115psi. The bike will move over typically frost spalled surfaces with very little buzz coming through. In fact my hands tend not to feel anything which they certainly did on my previous road bike. So the front end seems to work and consists of Easton EA50 bars,Cinelli gel tape and the Deda carbon fork. The same can be said at the rear of the bike over these surfaces. Over much harsher holes and ruts you do get a hit but.. how can I describe it? like being hit with a hammer through a pillow I suppose.. you know you've taken a hit but it was definitely softer. Northumberland county council's highways dept have certainly aided population control with their road surfaces! It is more comfortable than my Ambrosio Stelvio but carbon frames have taken leaps forward so I cannot compare to a Specialized Roubaix or similar as I have never ridden one. What I do know is I look forward to riding it, the handling is stress free not as twitchy as my other bike. The seat tube and head tube angles for my 55cm both being 73.5degrees. I suspect my Ambrosio's head tube may have been 74 degrees. Weightwise it may not be super lightweight at 18.3lbs but you could make that 16.5lbs simply spend more, it certainly doesn't feel heavy when riding it and accelerating, it just feels right. A nice alternative to many bikes and worth looking at if you're in the market for a new build.

Currently experimenting with tyre pressures using the 15% drop method. I've had to compromise as I'm so light the front tyre pressure would have been around 60-70psi! Anyway at present I'm running 90psi front, 103psi rear to try and get the optimum point for grip, comfort etc, without being too low to cause puncture issues. I found tyre manufacturers had guides along these lines as well and there are a number of online calculators.   

Image courtesy of Condor Cycles, original team colours 2012.