What a surprise my Trek 1400 winter beater has been. It is a wonderful bike. Found by the side of the road at the end of the summer with a tacoed rear wheel, I initially figured the 105 group it had would be useful on a future project.
Put together some time in the very early 1990s with bonded aluminum, the Trek is light and stiff. Corrosion around the bottom bracket and chainstays made me nervous, but it cleaned up nice with a new wheel, freewheel, chain, bottom bracket and consumables. It has held up well. Besides most of February and its 115 inches of snow, I have ridden the Trek without worry and mostly without incident.
The only trouble it has given me is the front downtube shifter boss. It's bonded like the rest of the frame, and it has come off a few times. Since it is a beater, it's nothing a little J-B Weld can't fix. The response I guess would be to say stop shifting to the small ring!
This not a goodbye. With all this snow and muck, the Trek and I are looking at another month, at least, of riding together before the Fuji comes out of hibernation to take over primary riding duty.
So a salute to old, free road bikes that happen to fit perfectly and perform nearly flawlessly.
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