Edit: Budget Increased £500 (go to pg2)

noidea123

My first bike was a Viking Milano. Think it cost about £250 but did the job for me. Pretty light as well. Have no idea whether they're supposed to be ay good or not

The Northern Monkey

Ok, so thanks to a bit of compromising with my GF, I now have a max budget of £500
I'm not sure what to look at so hopefully you guys may be able to help...

What I do want:-
Integrated shifters (had a go on some the other day and their superb!).
preferably a carbon fork if possible.

Ideally i'd like to buy from a LBS or somewhere I can try the bikes, so i'm mainly looking at halfords and evans cycles.

Cheers for any ideas

BTW, I don't have to send the whole £500!! (less would ideally be better, take into account i'm only a beginner, the better spec could be wasted on my limited ability!)

kingrollo

http://www.evanscycles.com/products/spe ... e-ec016019



How did you get on with decathlon - they had a great bike in for £400 - a couple of weeks back ?

kingrollo

http://www.decathlon.co.uk/EN/sport-3-4 ... NFO-DETAIL


Here you carbon stays......

The Northern Monkey

I tried decathlon for the cheaper bike, but they couldn't get one shipped to them. I think the bike was "end of stock" so they couldn't get it there.

I did see some very nice carreras at halfords when I went, but couldn't try any because they were all small.

i think thats gonna be the most difficult thing for me.... getting to try the right size out!

The Northern Monkey

OK then, I went to evans cycles and saw these two bikes...

http://www.evanscycles.com/products/sco ... e-ec016351

and

http://www.evanscycles.com/products/tre ... e-ec016471

What do people think?

Any others from evans of a similar price?

B

kingrollo

The Trek looks the better of thost two - Wos going on with the scott - calling an alloy frame 'titanuim' or is that just the colour.

The bike below is outside your budget - but another chat with the GF - It comes with 105 kit - which is a good standard - and can be found on bikes costing £1500+

http://www.wiggle.co.uk/p/cycle/7/Giant ... 360037570/

kingrollo

or within the budget - this looks a class machine

http://www.all-about-the-home.co.uk/gt- ... 1145-p.asp

have seen them as low as £350m - depends on your size

or the 2009 version at £529 (should have all sizes) + Carbon fork

http://www.tredz.co.uk/.GT-GTR-Series-4 ... _21067.htm

dg74

I'd recommend having a look at Python bikes too! Only because I'm riding the RX3 and find it excellent.

http://www.pythonbikes.com/race.aspx?bikeid=5

STEFANOS4784

kingrollo wrote:

or within the budget - this looks a class machine

http://www.all-about-the-home.co.uk/gt- ... 1145-p.asp

have seen them as low as £350m - depends on your size

or the 2009 version at £529 (should have all sizes) + Carbon fork

http://www.tredz.co.uk/.GT-GTR-Series-4 ... _21067.htm

Very similar in spec to others he's looking at though, no point in adding too many to the mix because the list could go on forever. You'll still get a lot more bike for buck buying pre-loved. Providing, of course, you know the correct size.

kingrollo

Come on then spill the beans ......what did you buy ? .....or did the GF talk you into buying a ring ?

STEFANOS4784

He's taken the advice and legged it back to the MTB forum :roll: