All the Wrong Places

It was 49F this morning when I took off in search of the Wednesday morning levee ride, and it still feels really cold to me.  At least it's not dark at 6:30 am right now.  I can't really imagine making my way out to the WeMoRi ride that starts at, I think, 5:45 near the lakefront.  Like yesterday, there were just a few of us on hand, but fortunately the wind has finally started to die down a bit, allowing for a far smoother little paceline out to the parish line and back. Although there is always this mild dull ache over the place where my collarbone broke, the things that were really bothering me today were the stiffness all the way from elbow to wrist from the tennis elbow and a fair amount of soreness all around my right shoulder.  I guess I've been kind of pushing the range-of-motion envelope lately, and between that and the cold air and the weaker than normal musculature, and perhaps the somewhat altered shoulder geometry, I shouldn't be too surprised.  I just hope it all resolves itself over the next couple of weeks because I would really like to make some of the winter northshore rides without being too miserable, or too off-the-back.

So now that I am getting back into a more regular training routine I'm starting to think again about the bike.  It's clearly time to look into finding a new frame and building it up with that Campi 11-speed stuff I got from Matt, but which way to go?  The choices are (a) a nice used frame, (b) a new brand-name frame, or (c) a "generic" frame.  It goes without saying that a, b and c would be carbon-fiber, although I might still consider something along the lines of the aluminum Cannondale Caad-10.  Each choice, however, has it's drawbacks.  Finding a nice used frame in my size with race geometry is difficult, and of course a little risky.  The brand-name route is great, but of course it gets really expensive really fast.  Frames like the Bianchi Sempre would fall into that category. A lot of the frames in the right price category have those ridiculous long-head-tube "comfort" geometries that make no sense at all for the type of riding I do, especially considering my somewhat abnormal handlebar height preference. The "generic" frame category would include frames like the ones Neuvation sells.  Those are usually rather plain looking but still tempting.