I recovered from a leg injury using my (then) bike and became absorbed and got into the business. I rode a series of flat bar, drop bar, and odd bar (Bridgestone) bikes over the time. In my life's next stage, in my late thirties, I agreed to join a trio of folks riding across the country in motel and diner mode and accepted the reality that my RB-1 just didn't fit enough for riding 8-12 hours a day. I had a production budget but unfortunately long legs and short torso.
I looked for an under-square frame until a custom endeavor loomed and called Grant for advice. He said my lead time was too short for a custom, but he had the perfect bike for me, it was production and in shipping containers, en route to California. He described the purposely short top tube, 2cm hear tube extension and 2° upslope of the top tube. He actually related inspiration from the French rando bikes, including the model's name; Rambouillet. It arrived the night before I had to meet the others in Yorktown, VA, I sadly readied my XO-2 as the back-up. Instead I got to use Yorktown to Jamestown as my shakedown ride to set the bar and seat positions. The Rivendell riding position ethos was bliss out of the box and my cohorts on Serottas built by their local pro bike guru were all stretched out, 3" drop to their bars and Dura Ace or Ultegra racing triples with STI. Over the miles I was careful not to gloat over how nice my bike rode. I was entirely well cared for on our long days in the saddle and much more able to handle the terrain as it presented itself, without a post-ride crippling to shake off like them. The real validation came the day after my 39th birthday in south central Colorado foothills when I had a rear tire blowout from a puncture while descending at a pretty high speed. Flats usually happen with enough time to slow down and safely roll to a stop before they are uselessly floppy, not this time. I had a few curves in front of me and not enough width of road to negotiate with the immediately empty rear tire which rolled out from under the rim, let the bike yaw and launched me high-side onto the fresh granite chip-top road surface. One of my cohorts was behind me and rode off the road and flatted herself. the other two were far enough away that they were unaware for a while. Several of the spots where I touched the road on the way to a stop was a bad abrasion called an avulsion and my left shoulder was "not right" as my fellow rider pointed out as I changed and pumped up her tire after fixing mine. The others rejoined us and were very concerned but among the four of us we had three cell carriers and zero signal bars, had deep gray clouds approaching from the west hadn't seen a vehicle in hours and one of them was going into shock. My idea was to ride to the next town. I pulled my jersey hem up over my shoulder to sling my arm and rode away. The comfortable, non-physically contorting fit of my Rambouillet made the next 42 miles an easy ride. My trip ended with on a detour to Colorado Springs and a flight home. The shoulder doctor put me on a couple weeks light duty while my avulsions healed so he could better appraisals how things were working. I knew I had a separated shoulder, he wanted to assess further mechanical dysfunction beyond that. The Rivendell riding position on my bike also facilitated tolerating riding sooner than later. I'm a fan of the fit to say the least. Andy Cheatham Pittsburgh On Sunday, December 16, 2018 at 12:43:00 AM UTC-5, nick wrote: > > So I'm probably relatively young for this forum. Mid 30s. I have a few > aggressive bikes and my Appaloosa. Anyway, I woke up one morning a couple > weeks ago in a severe pain and could barely walk. After a couple CT scans > we found out it was a bulging disc in my spine. My snowboarding and > cycling injuries seem to be catching up with me. Since then I've gotten > enough strength back to resume a normal routine with cycling but when I go > on my road or cross bikes I get a ton of sciatic pain if I push too hard. > The Appaloosa alleviates all of that. I get that part of these bikes now. > I'm just stoked I liked the form and function of Rivendells to begin with. > > I was sitting in the hospital looking at Roadeos. I have a problem. > Might be cheaper to buy a new stem. > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
