She is a SMOOTH OPERATOR

Here she is!  Can you believe it?  I finally got my bike.  I'm beyond thrilled and am totally blown away by this amazing bike.  If you're friends with me on facebook (here) then you have already seen this picture.

This is a different bike than I had posted and to be honest, this was not the bike I had originally picked out, but I couldn't be happier with the upgrade.

It's a Scott Contessa CR1 Comp (you can check out stats here!)

After shopping around and looking at many stores, bikes and test riding a few I had decided on a cheaper Scott because I liked the higher components and realized I didn't need a carbon bike, I am new to the cycling world and was looking for a nice, affordable, entry level road  bike. 

One of the bike guys at REI suggested I go with the Contessa Speedster 15 (the purple/black bike I had posted here) instead of the 25 because it had the SHIMANO 105's...yah I didn't know what that was either until I started shopping!  Those are higher end compontment compared to a cheaper bike I was looking at.  I decided I would take a cheaper frame with higher components than a carbon frame with lower end components...ARE YOU STILL WITH ME? 

Always good to talk to people who know what they are talking about instead of just basing your bike purchase based only on color...bummer I know! 

So how did I end up with this bike?  Well...to be honest...I'm shocked because this is a carbon bike and it was not in my budget or my plan but I got a killer deal and couldn't pass it up...so I went for it!  I'm glad I did.  It does have the lower components, but after reading about the difference from the Shimano Tiagra vs. 105's here it doesn't seem like it should be a huge deal for me...until I become an ELITE...LOL! 

Sizing was another issue I was struggling with.  REI has a great video to help out with sizing, HERE.  It's very helpful.  My bike actually doesn't have as much room when I stand over the frame barefoot (but how often am I going to ride barefoot?), but if I had gone with the shorter one we would've had to change the stem on the handle bars and make other adjustments and I didn't want to buy a bike and then have to put more money into making adjustments.  Good news is the size I got seems to work PERFECT.  It's a size SMALL, 52 in Scott Size.  All bikes are not measured the same so you really need to test them out.

Out of all the bikes I have test rode, borrowed from the last couple months...this is by far the best fit and most comfortable which makes ME very HAPPY!


My dad and I on a very WET bike ride!

Buying a bike is a lot of work!  There is way more involved than I ever imagined.  I'm stoked to have it and took her out on a last minute 6-miler yesterday and it was AWESOME!  Plus we have had an amazing 2-days of weather with sun and temptures in the 60's...yah, like I said...AMAZING and perfect CYCLING weather. I can't wait to get better on the bike and do some longer rides. 

Hope some of this info HELPED YOU!