After a tentative start trying to get my feet in to the strap and cage pedals. I head for the sea, well sea level any way and begin what turned out to be a 5 mile climb up in to the local hills. Sounds worse than it was as this only took me to around 600ft but still it got the lungs going and it was over 3 weeks since I'd last been on a bike.
First impressions of the bike are good its stable even with what to me seem like treacherously thin tyres, the over sized handle bars are a nice width and give a feel of quality, the ride of the aluminium frame does not seem to be too harsh and the V section wheels seem strong enough.
I test the brakes on the way down and leave black rings around what had previously been virgin white rims. There's not much feel to the brakes to start with and my concerns about the painted braking surface move to the forefront of my mind as it starts to rain when I come down the sweeping S- Bends of the old Newtownards TT circuit. there seems to be a direct correlation between the amount of rubber building up on the rims and the ability to stop or slow down. This is probably just the brake pads bedding in but I don't think I'll be washing the rubber off the braking surface when I clean the bike.
I certainly wasn't flying down the hill but did push on a bit it top gear as my confidence grew in the 28mm tyres to get round the bends in the wet and deal with the uneven road surface, I even used the drop bars more to try out the position than out of any great necessity. I was surprised by the lack of any great sensation of speed compared to using a mountain bike where its all tyre noise and wind in the face but may be I was more cautious than I thought.
In total I covered 17 miles in relative comfort on the first run out. I deliberately choose a hilly route over a longer flat one as I wanted to get an impression of the bike rather than my ability to cover big miles.
Over all I'm pleasantly surprised the riding position is comfortable with lots of options where to place your hands compared to an MTB, The saddles not too bad either on first acquaintance but this is always a matter of personal preference and every thing worked as it should.
The gearing which I thought at first, on the climb, was a bit notchy turned out to be fine. I suppose the gears are wider spaced than I'm used to but the combi levers are fantastic on both the up and down shift. Clean quick changing with just a flick of the fingers of push of the thumb and a credit to the staff at Decathlon who asked for an hour to check the bike over / set it up before I took it home.
The first run out then was a good work out for me with all the hills and a chance to get used to the ways of road cycling and being close to faster moving traffic again some motorist don't give you much room.
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