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My new TT bike
by Simon Willis
 RCUK BIKES 07 / 03 / 07
 

RCUK Bikes Robert Smith's Planet X Team Bike

My Planet-X Superlight Team Bike

I spent my 2nd year of University saving up for this bike. I saved all the money from 128 hours of part time work to buy this bike and I love it.

It has an aluminium Superlight Team frame with triple butted, triple heat treated tubing and is nice and stiff but has a relatively relaxed geometry which makes it comfortable on longer rides. It is mainly running Shimano 105, but with a Truvativ Triple crankset for the worst hills in the lakes and peaks (and my general lack of fitness). All the finishing kit is Planet-X and I have recently changed the bottle cages to their Carbon Fibre ones (because I could), the saddle to their Superlight Team road saddle, new tyres (all worn out) and put some new multicoloured bar tape on. It weighs just over 8.1kg even with 32 spoke wheels (to compensate for my 2nd row rugby build) and flies up and down hills, limited only by myself.

I bought it just before they changed the colours (I prefer the frame colours of my bike) but just before they started selling complete builds at ridiculously good valued prices. It was still a steal but I could have got that little bit more for the money, these things happen :-)

So far I have done around 5000 miles on it since I got it last year, but most of these have been on longer rides. The last trip before I tore my knee cartilage (playing rugby) involved 20km off-road with skinny tyres, my friends were on mountain bikes and I still kept up (not too serious off roading thank goodness). It is currently sitting in the kitchen egging me to go out, hopefully soon I will get back to cycling when I have recovered!

Perhaps not as special as a hand made jobby but I wouldn't choose another road bike over it, perhaps just change some of the components. I worked for it and I love every second that I spend on it.


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Discuss this article, 1 of 8 messages, read more:
Nathan Boschma 
Posted: 08/03/07 10:03:02 02
Nice ride Robert. I also looked at getting this frame for a build up but they didn't have my size frame at the time - they were all sold out which shows how popular they were. How do you find your new saddle????
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