Giant TCR - now available to you!

My 2004 Giant TCR Alloy. Currently on eBAY, do a search for 2004 Giant TCR XL and you should be able to find it. Own a piece of bthoss history! The listing is scheduled to end around April 10th, so hurry if you want it!

This bike came to be mine kind of by accident. I had been haunting a great local shop, The Hub, and had ordered a Giant OCR, with carbon frame. My first attempt to dabble in carbon. While it was on order, Alex from The Hub called, with a proposition. He had another buyer who really, really wanted my OCR. And was willing to pay to get mine, rather than wait for his own. Alex had tracked down the TCR bike to offer me, and wanted to make a deal. I cruised down to The Hub, took it out for an extended test ride, and wheeled and dealed a bit. I really liked the ONCE yellow paint, mostly because my Centurion is yellow. Wound up getting around 30% off retail, and I couldn't resist. After a few vital upgrades (compact cranks chief among them) it was turned into quite an awesome bike. Absurdly short chainstays, fairly aggressive geometry, and yet overall pretty comfortable with great handling.

The Hub, by the way, is a great shop. The SUB also came from there. It's in Webster Groves, kind of a long haul for me. But if you are in the area, check them out.

It was, predicatably, used for most road-riding needs. Any longish rides, group rides, and of course the MS150. Comfort was borderline for centuries, as my feet would go numb, and I had to constantly shuffle my hands to different positions. Oddly, my posterior was fine, probably due to the awesome Flite saddle. I always blamed the "buzz" of aluminum, but maybe that was all in my head. The frame does have a high-pitched tone to it, though. Frame "tone" is an interesting topic (for nerds), maybe I'll post about it someday.

After 5 years, it's time to go. I'm moving on to a carbon frame, to finally see what all the hype is about (after 15 years or so of procrastination), so the Giant must go.

And, in the "too little, too late" department, the new Ultegra is finally getting rid of the stupid cables-sticking-out-the-side-of-the-brake-hoods thing. Solely because of SRAM. I had never thought about it, riding gigantic frames as I do, but TK of local fame pointed out to me that under-the-tape gear cable routing can cause trouble on smaller frames, in some cases. So Shimano's cable routing may have had it's merits, but sure looked stupid. Learn something every day.