Posts tagged “madone”  

Spotted this in the basement custom area of Mellow Johnny’s. Sure it looks like an old rusty bike, but it’s a top-end Madone with a paintjob to discourage thieves. All the rust spots are painted, the coating looks scratched to metal and there are “stickers” on it.

Totally, totally want.

Uploaded by davidjschloss | more from the Bike Hugger Photostream.

I sell a lot of bikes on craigslist. It's usually a very positive experience - a little trust can go a long way to making sure everyone gets what's best. In this case - I got a great note from the guy who bought a Trek Madone:

Hey Andrew. I am the guy that bought your Madone last November. I wanted to thank you for helping me get started in cycling. I just wanted to give you an update as to how I am progressing. I have ridden over 1500 miles on this bike. My strength and endurance has improved dramatically. I absolutely love getting out and riding. I am averaging about 80 miles per week and with the better weather feel like I can do even more if I have the time. I have lost 30 pounds and hope to keep going.

THANKS for trusting me enough to ship the bike down. It has changed my life.

Hope all is well with you.

Best regards, Jeff

That's some inspiring stuff! 30lbs and a new rider for life. I love to hear these sorts of results. Keep riding Jeff!

A tip from a reader just came in with snaps of the 2009 Trek Madone. I have a 2008 Madone and love it - so what’s new on ‘09? Looks like the folks in Waterloo may have finally gone to a replaceable hanger. For the racing set - this is good news. There have been plenty of frames mangled from crashing on the right side just because the hanger got bent. To Trek’s credit thought I’ve bent my hanger on a couple of different frames and each time the integrated hanger was repareable (i.e. just bend it back straight).

Here’s my concern: Trek runs SRAM. SRAM is notoriously intolerant of mis-aligned hangers. Just being off a little tends to throw me all out of whack. I don’t think Shimano has this issue because their top pulley has float too it - at least that’s the best I could come up with. Anyway, in the case of a replaceable hanger, it’s been my experience that the hanger tends to have some play in it based on how tight the skewer is. Seems that getting it “just right” enough for my SRAM to be crisp may be a challenge. Time will tell!

As I demonstrate in our Madone Huggacast, Trek’s performance-geometry is great for off-season weight gain …

“It’s a different bike,” I’ve been telling people asking about the new Madone … “as great a change as the redesign from the 5500 to the Madone SLs. Andrew wrote a full review over the weekend and we had a similar response.

To me, the bike is the stiffest ever from Trek. It climbs and descends like the old Madone, but corners different with much more road feel and acceleration. That’s because of the sloping geometry and this bike does slope.

The regional Trek rep got Byron a new Madone hooked up with some Aeolus 5.0 wheels for an extended test ride prior to the Ride the Best tour which stops tomorrow at St. Edwards Park in Kenmore, WA. I went to pick it up yesterday for a little test ride to take it through the paces. Short verion: It’s a nice a stiff bike (which I like) in a rather impressive package. The bike looks as cool in person as it does on the flashy website.

— UPDATE - Post Ride the Best test ride —

A few bloggy updates of note

• On the 08 Madones, added a Cyclingnews feature on Levi’s bike
• Added a bullet to Looking for a Sport-Utility Bike that Stokemonkey sales are on hold
• Team Bike Hugger posted about the Stillwater Crit of Destruction

The square v. compact frame geometry debate is back (if it ever left) and we’re being asked, “what size Madone?” Damn good question and we’ll have to see if you’ve either got a stubby stem of one that “reaches for the sky.” When Pam first stepped over her new Specialized Tarmac SL, it was like “what? am I on a mtn bike,” and it’s definitely unnerving to not see a top tub near your knees. I should probably write a “in defense of square frames” post sometime, but you can’t fight progress, so we’ve got the last square bike hold out, pushing out a new technology-driven, sloping top-tube bike with a seat mast and the “seat, feet, hands” approach. (I’m sure there were lots of groans from Masters racers about that)

In the bike shop, you’re going to have to try it, as you definitely can’t tell from the brochure. And to their credit, Trek answers the question here, in a lengthy and informative post.

Wanna get a bike shop mechanic to do a spit take, say, “hey the new Trek Madone has got precision fit socket technology!” Some may just spit their coffee right out their nose, laugh uproariously, shake their head, or remind you of that year the Madones used Klein’s bottom cup design on their forks and how that didn’t work.

From the Madone Premier Event.

Bike Hugger Photostream

Trek launches the 2008 Madones with a brochure site and lots of new technology, including a oversized 90mm wide bottom bracket shell, no headsets, seatmast, new carbon designations, and a fuselage approach. Responding to their competitors, like Specialized, Trek is coming out firing with a “we invented carbon bikes” approach and a frame that’s a half-pound lighter

By de-emphasizing specific materials and instead focusing the discussion on our OCLV Carbon process – a process we invented 16 years ago and have been refining ever since - Trek can leverage our manufacturing, engineering, and design expertise to underscore the unique nature of our carbon fiber frames: a difference we’re confident makes for the best carbon fiber frames on the planet.

While lacking the latest carbon technology, using bonded round tubes and lugs, the Trek Madone is still a favorite race bike contender with it’s predictable, solid handling, reasonable weight, and refined ride. A criticism of Trek is that they rely on 15-yr old technology in their frames. That changed when they started incrementally updating the frames based on the systems approach Lance and company took to bike racing.