LogFAQs > #883534772

I went to 5 places that sell bikes today

2 local bike retailers, a trek bicycle store, which I assume is part of a chain, and dick's sporting goods.

The first local store was friendly and helpful and recommended taking a long test drive past the river, but they didn't provide a lot of information that I did not directly ask for and as a bike newbie, I'm not sure what kind of questions to ask. They recommended a $750 2017 Sirrus sport with a carbon fork and hydraulic discs. It was super light and agile and was definitely different than what I was used to, but it also wasn't an especially comfortable ride.

The second store tried to sell me a Giant TCX for $800, but they wouldn't even let me sit on the thing, let alone ride it. I thought that was very strange. I did not feel very welcome and did not stay long.

The Trek store had 2 different ones depending on what I wanted to spend. An FX 2 mechanical disc starting at 549.99 and an FX 3 hydraulic disc starting at 769.99. With the purchase of all bikes they give an extra 10% on accessories and they are having a large sale on thursday which could bring the cost down even more. The fX 3 I rode there didn't feel quite as light as the first one, but was much more comfortable and handled a bit better. The staff was also very helpful and asked a lot of questions to make sure I had the right information. Sadly the test drive wasn't as nice, just around the oval parking lot a couple of times. But it was still the best experience of the day.

The next stop was actually closed as it turns out the owner recently had a heart attack, but there was a general high end sport store down the street, their bikes started out of my price range and went up from there, so I just looked around at some of their non bike stuff and left. Nice store, nice people, just not what I was looking for.

The last stop was dick's sporting goods. Just to compare the stuff at a box store and see if I wanted to fork out for the higher end stuff. The guy selling bikes knew almost nothing about them and I could tell he was just trying to stretch what he knew to fill the conversation and base his answers off of it, he ended up choosing a $500 hybrid bike,(I forgot the brand name as I didn't write it down, but I think it was either a schwinn or a diamondback) but the bike was probably double the weight of the other bikes I was looking at that day, the handles were hard and uncomfortable compared to the ones I was using this morning, the brakes felt a bit sluggish and quite honestly it was an ugly lime green color.

I stopped one more time at the first shop again, this time the helpful fellow who helped me the irst time was gone and replaced by 2 ruder employees. The first guy got the bike off the wall and adjusted the height of the seat. I was going to give a cheaper one I saw there, but didn't ride a chance to compare to the fx 2 option at trek, but the new employees just pointed the bike off the wall and said I was free to take it down and give it a test ride. No adjustments or even help getting it down. The bike itself wasn't bad, but not as comfortable as the fx and sharper turns were harder to make with it than the other ones.

Sadley all of the ones I was pointed to had a flat handle bar system. I wouldn't have liked trying out the curved handle bars, but they seemed to just be on the more expensive bikes.

Out of the ones I saw today I think I liked the FX3 the best, and the trek store had the best staff by far. So I think I may go back thursday and see what kind of sale they are running. They said they don't have the exact prices yet, but they do know the 2018 models are at least $50 off (they received promotional coupons for the sale) and have 2 years Interest free financing.
---

I am awesome and so are you.
Lenny gone but not forgotten. - 12/10/2015