Boardman road bike anyone?

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More (closely spaced) gears, much better brakes, less frame flex. Both bikes will do the job, it just depends on whether you consider the improvements worth it.

How do the two bikes handle? If you are happy with the 80's bike then stick with it.

You should've asked us before you splashed out! :p

did you mean 11lbs or 11 kg ? 11 lbs would make your bike a weight weenie winner and you say it's an off the peg boardman
a nice old 2nd hand cannondale would give you a sub 10kg bike with most gruppo's on

....and even if you do 'upgrade', there are much better bikes for the money.....

If you're happy with your old one.

A bike fit would be a worthy investment.

Hummmmmm, 11 lbs weight. . . . . . . I have not ridden the Boardman yet in case I do give it back. The gearing is a better ratio but then again I could put a triple chainset on, that with my six gears on the back would equal the Boardman gears......... The beater does flex more due to being steel but is it enough to worry about ? The parts 0n the beater vary from shimano 600 front/rear mech, chainset, break levers. Modolo calipers, campag hubs on mavic ma2 rims. Good enougth in their day I'm sure.
I ride a 24" frame, so what else could I get for £590. or less that is light and modern ? ( as well as the cannondale )

or put a compact crankset which also give a similar range as a triple.

flex isn't much to worry about, £590 give you a bit of a limited choice, you can easily spend half that and make your current bike into a great modern steel roadie

The answer is always to buy more bikes. Always.

neither of them weigh 11lbs, they probably weight double that. So you haven't even ridden the Boardman? Not even as a test ride from the shop?

^ What he said. An 11lbs steel racer? That would be seriously impressive.

Broken scales?!

Check out the comparison Pro Cycling did a few years back between a modern carbon bike and a steel Pinarello (supplied by Tour de Ville). A group of riders each rode a climb on both bikes and the all of them were quicker (by 10% at least) on the modern bike.

The most telling observation was on the handling coming back down, one rider expressed amazement that riders used to race down long descents with bikes that were so hard to handle and had very ineffective brakes.

The most telling observation was on the handling coming back down, one rider expressed amazement that riders used to race down long descents with bikes that were so hard to handle and had very ineffective brakes.

This. I've got a new(er) Carbon Colnago as well as an old steel one.

The carbon is more comfortable, stiffer and descends like it's on rails. The old one is pretty scary at sustained high speeds, even though it has a modern groupset and wheels on. Lots of flex, lots of weave.

Still love the old one, but newer is SO much better.

Broken scales?!

Me thinks.

..... so what else could I get for £590. or less that is light and modern ? ( as well as the cannondale )

Giant's Defy range has models at your price-point, with triple or compact chainsets. Award-winning and widely respected. I wouldn't even consider a Boardman in this company.

*justsayinglikecosimnotevenaroady

Hi Treeman. I did the Etape, Act 1 (Albertville-La Toussuire) this year on a Bianchi C2C Via Nirone. No modifications, except new tyres and (argueably) better brake blocks and a very thorough check out of mechs beforehand. An entry point (£50) bike fitting helped. Didn't have a compact or triple chainset. End of the day, I think its less about the bike and more about repeating "HTFU" to oneself over and over again ...

Hi Treeman. I did the Etape, Act 1 (Albertville-La Toussuire) this year on a Bianchi C2C Via Nirone. No modifications, except new tyres and (argueably) better brake blocks and a very thorough check out of mechs beforehand. An entry point (£50) bike fitting helped. Didn't have a compact or triple chainset. End of the day, I think its less about the bike and more about repeating "HTFU" to oneself over and over again ...

Thanks for the advice, it's good to know.
A bit more advice if you don't mind............... Did you go with a company or arrange it yourself ? Entry form, where did you get your hands on one ?
Was the time limit achievable, I have a couple of friends who want to try it but one of them is a runner and has not done a lot of cycling ?
And, how expensive was it ?
Ta very much

I work at halfords, the board mans do not weigh 11lbs! Well maybe if you took a lot of bits off :L

Even as staff we can't test ride further than the car park, they don't give us c2w unless we work full time - I don't. They charge us 20% pay back fee.

I got my bike from jejames.........

Was looking at the alu frame, askium wheeled, 105 kit grey one, came out of jejames £170 better off (or equal with discount) with a GT series 2, 105, carbon forks and a bit at the back, 105 hubs on cxp22 rims, and it's not a board man

Still wish my dad would of got a new one and gave me his bianchi though, but I'll get one one day, and a cannondale :D

Check out the comparison Pro Cycling did a few years back between a modern carbon bike and a steel Pinarello (supplied by Tour de Ville). A group of riders each rode a climb on both bikes and the all of them were quicker (by 10% at least) on the modern bike.

The most telling observation was on the handling coming back down, one rider expressed amazement that riders used to race down long descents with bikes that were so hard to handle and had very ineffective brakes.

What Andy said.

This. I've got a new(er) Carbon Colnago as well as an old steel one.

The carbon is more comfortable, stiffer and descends like it's on rails. The old one is pretty scary at sustained high speeds, even though it has a modern groupset and wheels on. Lots of flex, lots of weave.

Still love the old one, but newer is SO much better.

exactly what I was about to write - but replace steel Colnago with Merckx SLX and carbon 'nago with S-Works. Fast descending on the Merckx is pretty sketchy at times, whereas the S-Works fills me with confidence to ride faster

If you can buy an OTP Boardman that comes in at 11 lbs then fuck-O-rama have I wasted a lot of money getting my Cannondale to 14.5

Treeman. Dead easy to enter. Go to website - www dot aso dot fr ASO run the etape. All the instructions/prices/etc are in English. Look out for the date 2013 entry opens, and get on the website at opening time on the day. An organised tour has the benefits of hassle free, but £££. I did it myself, low cost flight, hire car, get hotel. Biggest challenge was getting hotel room in Albertville - left it too late. So we stayed up a hill from the start (ie in Megeve), so we had a nice easy 20km downhill to the beginning. Good luck. S

Great, thanks for the advice.

The Boardman concept store thing is now open (or nearly open) in Spitalfields Market. I walked past today and they had the Elite TK20 track bike in there, which looks really quite nice. But then I looked for a picture of it and found one on a level plane, and there's a quite unattractive slant in the top tube.

The shop is definitely more wanky concept store than Halfords, clearly they're going for a bit of a reinvention.