I know that given time and money I can sort out the CX’s running issues with parts bought in from the States and Australia – more on that later.
First, though, I'm more concerned about sorting out comfort, handling, and especially the braking, and that starts a lot closer to home.
Riding position first. The US-spec high, pull-back bars are horrible – everything from the angle of my wrists to the angle of my arms and the way it puts all my weight down through my spine is just plain wrong. I want the more natural (to me) position of standard UK-spec bikes.
Fortunately, along with the CX came most of another UK bike in bits, and there's a set of bars in there which will do until I can get some less scabby ones. The donor was a London despatch bike and looked like it’d been dredged up out of the mud near Tower Bridge, but at least the bars are fairly straight, and they can go straight on.
Well, sort of. The
