I bought this beautiful machine in the September end-of-season sales. It arrived the day after The Circuit of Kent Sportive, at the tale end of a glorious long stretch of hot sunny weather. As soon as it arrived, the weather changed; exactly the same thing that had happened when I bought my Giant Defy Composite 2 last year! With the cold wet weather and other things conspiring against me I wasn’t able to ride it until this evening, 10 days after I got it! That was the longest time off my bike since way back in March.
The ride is wonderfully smooth. It’s very comfortable, even over rough ground, and yet the frame is really stiff. The di2 electronic shifters work well and add to the feeling of luxury. I think I’m going to love riding it!
Only when I’ve have had more time riding it, and over some of my favourite routes, will I be able to comment further on its performance.
Currently I feel that the handlebar stem is too long so I’m going to try and change that.
Edit (22/9/13): I have now changed the stem from 120mm to 90mm and it is much more comfortable. Although, when I am down on the drops I can see the front wheel hub in front of the handlebars – this usually indicates that the stem is too short. However, another metric for measuring correct bar placement (when placing your elbow touching the front of your saddle, your outstretched fingers should be just shy (1cm or so) of touching the bars) indicates that the new position is correct!
Edit (03/11/13): I have now ridden several hundred miles on this bike and I love it. So far I have:
- Fitted new wheels – Campagnolo Shamal Ultras with Michelin Pro4 tyres
- New cassette – 12-30, replacing the original 12-25
- New stem – 90mm
- Ultegra 6700 carbon pedals
Issues:
- Headset rattle (fixed here)
- Di2 battery indicator test didn’t work (fixed by re-inserting battery).
- Di2 sometimes doesn’t shift to small chainwheel