Green Smoothness

Well, I may finally join the ranks of road racers. The sparseness of the MTB races in the area have lead me to pick up some races of the pavement variety. I haven't felt like traveling across Missouri to the St. Louis area for a race, which is where many of the MTB races have been lately. There is a race in Farmington, MO this Sunday (again-near St. Louis), but Father's Day weekend makes that kind of difficult to get away for.

Anyway, I purchased a Soma Smoothie frame from Volker Bicycles that Britton had ordered in for quite a steal. It is just like Dan O's, but bigger and a beautiful green.

I got the frame nearly two months ago I think. Building it has been slow with all of my other projects and honey-do's on the list. Last night, however, I finally got everything together. My maiden voyage was my normal commute to work which I noticed went by much faster than normal. Gears are an interesting thing, after all, this is the first geared bike that I have ridden in over six years.


So, enough rambling, let's get to the bike.

The frame is a Soma Smoothie with a really nice and clean Green, White and Black color scheme with a little chrome thrown in for accents. Up front we have an IRD Pegasus full carbon fork held to the frame by a white FSA headset and a Ritchey pro stem. The shifting comes from SRAM Rival Double Taps which control the SRAM Force RD and a Shimano Tiagra FD that I found in a box at the shop (the SRAM was on back-order). The drive train is made up of 175mm IRD Impala cranks with 34t and 50t rings. The rear cluster is a SRAM Red Power Dome 11t-22t 10-speed cassette. Connecting the gears is a SRAM 1090 hollow-pin chain. Power to the cranks comes courtisy of Crank Bros' Egg-Beaters. My connection to the pavement is assured with Maxxis 23c Detonators which are attached to Kinlin XR300 rims. The rims are laced to Shimano Dura Ace hubs via Sapim X-Ray spokes. The front is drilled 18-hole and laced radially. The rear is drilled 24 and laced 2 cross. The whole package is completed by where I sit my rear. The height is provided by a Thompson Elite seatpost with a Sella Italia SLR Gel Flow saddle up top. The saddle will likely change as this is the saddle that rides atop my SS commuter.

I haven't weighed this in yet, but when I do I'll post it up.

The ride was very nice and uneventful except for a slipping seatpost which isn't an uncommon issue I have come to learn. I have a few tricks up my sleeve to rectify the situation, however. Other than a few tweaks and such here and there I think we're good. Now all that's left is to see how she does at full speed.

Despite the inherent 'roadie-ness' of this post...Stay Dirty.