A Ride and Review

As I'm planning on road racing this year I quickly looked in the ole' bike stable and quickly realized that I don't have a road bike (which of course, makes racing road bikes a bit difficult) The 2002 Kona Jake the Snake right now is currently playing that role, but come road season its certainly going to be time to switch over to a road bike instead of just a cross bike.

Fortunately working at Wheat Ridge has given me the opportunity to try out a number of bikes and see which ones I like and Uncle Sam is hopefully going to come through with the tax return to finance it.

Today I took out a 2011 Tarmac Comp (nevermind the ginormous saddle bag the zipper broke on my regular size one)

As far as the Specialized Tarmac line up- it couldn't be better, both the SL2 (Tarmac Comp) and the SL3 (Tarmac Expert) frames are incredibly stiff and when you get out of the saddle on a long climb the bike moves underneath you quickly. With that said that stiffness that is felt through the entire frame translates into you feeling just about every bump in the road. Some might say this gives it a more "lively" feel, some might say it just simply beats you up. My opinion tends to rest somewhere in the middle of the two. If your looking for a race bike however and on a budget to get bang for your buck it might be a good option.

On the way up Squall Pass at 8-9 thousand feet or so toward Echo Lake and Mt Evans

The Tarmac Comp is equipped with Fulcrum Racing 6 wheels which from what I can deduce are actually the same as the 7s you would buy retail. The bike also sports the new 2011 revamped Ultegra drivetran- which I've unfortunately found a bit lacking. I'm not sure if its the new design and getting the bugs out from Shimano, but it seems to me that the shifting is not as crisp and efficient as it was on the 10's. I've ruled out that its not just bad adjustment as I've played around with it a bit and also ridden 3 separate bikes that were equipped with it.


Anyway, if you are looking at the Tarmacs as a race option, I would suggest looking one level up from this bike to the Tarmac Expert- for an extra 600 bucks you go from the SL2 to the SL3 frameset, a wheelset that you could race on and a subtraction of 2+ pounds off the weight of the entire bike (the Tarmac Expert w/ Ultegra @ 16.06 lbs and the Comp at 18.2) You also get a regular crank set instead of one of those silly compacts that come with a boatload of gears you will never
use.


Ride on friends, Ride On!