If you wanna ride any non-junky road bike downtown and park it there for 8 hours, only lock your bike in your building with a room that is away from prying eyes and is enclosed with the requirement of a security card. Our building now has one because of bike theft issues.

My building is in probably the nicest part of downtown beside coal harbor, there was about 15 grand worth of bikes stolen from the building's bike cage 1 floor down. My bike was stripped even with security walking around. So thieves will go anywhere to get at bikes that are vulnerable.

I used to have zero problems because the bike rack was right beside the booth for paying tickets. When they removed it, security barely watches that area and I got my bike stripped.

Either that or put your bike in your office like I do until someone says something then you are SOL.

My friend asked me about it, kinda want to do it, but it's all the way out in Langley

Any particular bike shops you'd guys recommend visiting since the Giant Defy series isn't sold in big chain stores?

Try the Giant Store on West Broadway?

^^^ correct. It's just east of burrard and broadway beside board room.

They had a propel advanced 1 that I was interested in with full ultegra groupo for 2700. I thought it was a pretty screaming deal. I hate the brakes though. it's some sort of proprietary v-brake BS that's semi integrated.

http://www.cyclist.co.uk/sites/cycli...2_brakes_0.jpg

Not sure if want....

i think thats a pretty awesome deal for a sexy bike too, but i can't get passed how they route the cables into the top tube

http://blog.sellwoodcycle.com/wp-con...8/Propel_b.jpg

It's down on West 4th, but plenty of other stores, including ones that carry Giant on West Broadway, such as Different Bikes.

That's a pretty good deal. Just get it! The brakes? Still uses the same typical replaceable pads. Cuz more aero bro..

Are those v-brakes proprietary to Giant or is it slowly becoming an industry standard?

simple fix. Sram etap ;)

The brakes are just usually found on Aero bikes =. to be as slim as possible.. they are a bit lighter than the standard brakes if I don't recall .

Might end up getting the Escape since it's cheaper...

Or buy second hand.

Anyone selling their beginning bike to something else?

:badpokerface:

Gaint Defy is a great entry level bike, you don't need carbon to be honest (starts at 2800-3600). You'll be surprised, some alloy tri bars actually weight LESS than carbon.

149 km Can. Day Populaire shoudln't be too bad, it's not too crazy of a climb

one advice I got when I went to check out bikes, go try them out (duh), but try 2 bikes that's within your budget, then go and try out one that's TOTALLY out of your league to see what it's like.

As much as I love all the bike shops at West 4, go to a shop that's NOT crazy busy. Or else they'll just fluff u off, which has happened to me a few times.

Oh right west 4th. My bad. I will get another bike at some point. I'm just too attached to my single gear right now. I actually want to buy next year when my health account is replenished in January and they start clearing out the 2016 stuff.

Propel Advanced 1 (2016) | Giant Vancouver

Sorry 2800. Im sure you can work out a deal with them. I test rode it and it was nice and stiff.

I think the escape will be a good hybrid for commuting for sure. I find vancouver is pretty flat to require a triple chainring. Used bike is always a good way to get into it for sure. If you really wanted to, you can get a crosstrail for $300 which will do pretty much all the city and trail riding you want

2014 Specialized Crosstrail Sport Disc

Perfect, because I have a black Giant Escape for sale if you want to try it out.

What year and size?

You've got PM. But if anyone else is interested, it's 2014, Escape 2, 3x8, size S (51-53cm).

First Look! New Shimano Dura-Ace R9100

Liking all the updates though probably cannot afford. Looking forward to the 11-30t cassette

Just means 9000 groupo can be sub $1000 :D

Holy EFF 55/42 crankset. And 28mm wide rims, those are wider than my MTB rims!

I like the 11-30 cassette range, but don't like the linger cage rear derailleur needed to clear the 30. Wish shimano could keep the short cage, riders or Di2 should know better than to cross chain the small chainring with the 2-3 smallest cogs anyways.

Wow, already gone!

Ya, it was a pretty smoking deal.

Just finished triple crown a few days ago; tips and feedback.

Started at (9:45)

-MUST start with a huge breakfast; going up Seymour was easy as fuck cause it was the first ride.
-coming down from Seymour, I stopped at my car, picked up 5 energy bars and 2nd water bottle
-trekking to Grouse was extremely easy, you can go all the way back down the hwy OR you can use your GPS and find an alternate route *more on this later.
-Grouse was easy if you use the diff route than going up Capilano.

-Heading to Cypress is when it gets interesting.
-GPS wanted me to cut via Capilano water dam (hellsss no, my bike ain't a dirt bike yo, had to turn back and take the hwy)
-Was on Mathers street in West Van but made the mistake of going too far and had to back trek to get back onto the hwy 1
-When I got to Cypress, I had 1.5 bottles of water and still 4 energy bars.
-i put 2 lemons and 6 mint leaves in my water bottle and it was AMAZING.

Mistake 1) riding at 2 PM was a killer, SUPER hot going up Cypress.
2) My Strava + music was draining my battery. I had 89% starting and I was almost at 40%. I only used GPS between Seymour to Grouse and part of it to Cypress
3) I was 3/4 way up Cypress and I hit a wall; had to eat 2 granola bar, but just physically drained; wasn't hungry but was full of water. and i was running low on water; it was that hot.

Bought myself a bottle of coke at Cypress, best coke everrrr. I wanted to call for help at 3/4 mark up Cypress cause I didn't know if I could ride all the way back to Seymour, but I rested at Cypress and cruised back to my car.

Moving time was 7:33:52, took me about 8.5 hrs, I stopped at Cypress for 1/2 hr and pee breaks on each mountain just to give you a rough estimate.

Will post pics later
113.6 km and 3,423kJ. Fuck it was a long day.