I'm mostly a mtb rider, but I decided to bite the bullet and buy a road bike. After finding out that my LBS has one in my size (52) that was heavily discounted, I bought it (despite it being more than my original budget). I had the LBS swap out the stock 115 mm stem for a 120 mm, and the pedals are Look Keo Classics.

Nice looking bike... How do you like it?

this is my first road bike, so i've got nothing to compare it to. but, so far so good. my only complaint is the saddle creaking. i've lubed the rails meticulously, and the noise was gone for about an hour but then it and came back. other than that, i like the bike.

i could have ridden more, but work schedule and those crazy LA drivers and traffic has kept me off the saddle more than i'd like. so after 800 miles on my speedster s10, i'd thought i'd post an updated review of the bike.

bike setup:
the only thing i've changed to date has been the stem. the 120 mm stem i had the LBS put on when i bought it was an eye sore (profile design h2o). i also decided i wanted a shorter stem. so i bought an ITM forge lite carbon stem in 110 mm from probikekit.com. i've also been playing with the saddle height and angle, and i think i now have a set up that's comfortable for me. i've had the LBS look things over at 500 miles, and they cut the steer tube so i can have the stem lower w/o having spacers on top (in addition to adjusting things here and there and making sure everything's okay). great service from my LBS, btw.

ride:
no complaints. ride is a little stiff, but maybe that's because i run 110 psi on my tires. haven't had any flats yet. no creaking from the saddle. after lubing the rails many times after the first few months, the noise just disappeared, and i don't even lube it now. however, the saddle is a bit uncomfortable after about 50 miles. i don't notice any flexing of any of the parts, but i only weigh about 150 and i'm still a new roadie so i might not know if anything is flexing. but the bike just feels solid, whether i'm climbing or descending.

planned upgrades:
i'm looking into replacing the stock saddle with the fizik arione as i heard good things about it. the stock saddle worked okay once i bought a decent pair of bibs, but my max mileage w/o feeling discomfort is about 40 to 50 miles. as i'm planning on doing a century early next year, i'll need more comfortable saddle.