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Weird.
Anyway. He had an XO1 that had been crushed and repaired, coupled, and repainted that he wanted to sell. I bought it. And it was too small.
I built it up with moustache bars and really wanted it to work. I took my first long ride on this bike. I rode to Colville on it.
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| Specialized Armadillo tires. WORST TIRES EVER. I rode them for one ride. This is actually when the bike was built up as a single speed with an ENO hub. It was the second wheel I built. I didn't have a tensionometer. I bombed down Bernard/Grove for my first ride. By the time I got to Sprague and Washington, the rear wheel was wobbling all over the place. All the spokes had loosened up. |
Eventually, Liza ended up riding it and it fit her well. Then she started riding something else and we ended up selling it. I regret that. It's ironic, since Liza's current bike, which she loves, is an XO1.
An interesting, but typical thing happened at about this time in my bike life. The iBOB/Riv thing really sucked me into an online world that was fascinating to me. I learned a bunch quickly -- a lot of it, in retrospect, turned out to be dogmatic belief, as so much bike stuff is. But what I found myself doing was getting into fetish mode. You see this all the time with online communities and with bike stuff, it gets crazy quickly. I began to seek out the next perfect bike. Over the next handful of "Past Bikes" you'll see a bunch of bikes -- all basically the same, with slight variations. It's sort of embarrassing. But I was at a point where I spent more time thinking, seeking, onlining, and building bikes than I did riding them.
Here's the pre-blog post on the XO1.
I still love the idea of the XO1 (a true road bike with 26" tires) and if I found a 55cm one for cheap, I'd have a hard time not buying it.
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4 comments:
i wonder if the xo-1 would have had 650b tires if they were more readily available at that time.
for me, i started following grant peterson after the mountain bike magazine that did the comparison of the rivendell all rounder to the cannondale bouncy bike. i couldnt help but want that bike, whether it was the color, the cool downhill shot of the guy in an obvious under bike situation, or what, but i just really dug that bike. i still want it. and i currently dont have a rivendell in stable.
if i found a waterford built rivendell all-rounder, i'd have a hard time not getting it.
This makes me miss my Bridgestone even more...
I was the full on Bridgestone fan in the '90s. Bought a '91 MB-Zip and RB-1 new. Plus a MB-3 for my wife.
Also a pile of BOB newsletters, t-shirts, and other assorted stuff. I still have it all, except for the MB-Zip that I sold about two years ago.
FYI: These folks are putting out a XO-1 replica frame:
http://handsomecycles.com/bicycles/xoxo_classic.php
Dan -- I pondered the XOXO for a while. And if it had 1 1/8th steerer, I probably would've bitten. The grand deal should be 1994 xo-3s: functionally identicals to the 93 xo1, but w/out the mystical aura -- so cheaper.
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