Jamis Quest Femme vs Jamis Ventura Race vs Trek 2.1 wsd

[wppt]

Hello all,

I've managed to find only 1 bike in stock that fits me in a 100 mile radius and had the luck to try out another bike that would have to be ordered. It sucks to be short! I'm looking for advice from people with riding experience on the 3 bikes I'm considering or general advice based on my current bike and what I want from a road bike.

I sat a Trek 2.1 (http://www.trekbikes.com/us/en/bikes/road/2_series/21wsd/) 47cm frame today and felt that it was a good fit and also sat a 48cm Jamis Ventura Race tho not the Ventura Race femme (http://www.jamisbikes.com/usa/thebikes/road/ventura/10_venturaracef_spec.html) version I'd actually order. The Jamis dealer also mentioned the Quest Femme (http://www.jamisbikes.com/usa/thebikes/road/quest/10_questf_spec.html)

The Trek and the Ventura are both aluminum frames with carbon forks and have compact cranksets, while the Quest is steel and can come in a triple which is what I currently have and am used to. My current bike is an '05 Fuji Finest with a triple and various Shimano Sora parts. I have become dis-satisfied with some of the components and upgrading is almost as much or more than just buying a better frame bike with all the better components. All 3 bikes are upgrades to Shimano 105 and/or Tiagra components and all are about 5 lbs lighter.

I ride for pleasure and for fitness, I'm using road riding as a way to burn the fat and slim the limbs, I came from a mtn biking background and it took me a while to get comfortable with the not-so-upright position of the road bike but I found I enjoy the power it gives me to ride on the hoods or to drop down, I enjoy powering down hills and then trying to power back up them although I'm trying to change from a masher to a spinner to help out my knees. My typical terrain is rolling hills to nice killer hills, hardly any flat plains (definitely not in Kansas anymore)

I want to go further, faster and am looking at doing at least 12miles 5x a week at 16mph+ and hopefully a 40-50 ride once a week, a local club also runs 30-50 mile rides at 20+ and that's a goal for next year as well as maybe a few century rides. I'll even consider races if I get fit enough though that's not a priority, I enjoy the peace of the tour to the heartpounding sprint(that belongs on the singletrack) and I'm looking for the bike that will take me there with the least amount of upgrades and the durability to last for years and I supposed the comfort to handle 100-150 miles in one day.

thanks in advance for any all comments/advice

[ctdancer]

WPPT- OMG ! I could have written this post myself !
Wish I had some better info for you, as I'm still trying to decide if I'm really ready to commit to a true curly bar road bike, or modify the flat bar on my 2 month old Trek 7.3FX...

I'm leaning very strongly towards the 1)Jamis Quest Femme 2) Trek 2.1, I really like the idea of the steel frame Jamis, and 105 comps...BUT I checked out the BikeDirect and found this super cute3) Motobecane Pro for hundreds less than the Jamis/Trek with a better mix of comps....

I'm so new to road riding I'm still not totally sure what I'll find comfortable in the long run. At this point I haven't even found a really comfortable saddle for 20+miles, but I am pretty sure the Flat Bar is too limiting in the riding positions offered. My husband can covert my bike or he can build a bike for me- just wish he knew what makes the very best sense for me right now.

Having said all this my husband agrees that for the money, BikesDirect offers the most bike for your money, BUT you can't test ride their bikes, so once you get it all set up, if it's not a good fit, you're out of luck...
Modifying my 7.3FX into a curly bar will certainly make it impossible to get a trade at my LBS for the Trek 2.1...

Hopefully someone here will respond with some helpful advice.

[sarahspins]

Modifying my 7.3FX into a curly bar will certainly make it impossible to get a trade at my LBS for the Trek 2.1...

Depends on what you're swapping, honestly... I assume by "curly" bars you mean drop bars? You might not need to go to that extreme.. I put a set of Soma Sparrows in my 7.2fx and I rode it happily for another 10 months before I bought a "real" road bile. They were a nice compromise for me between the flat bars that came with the bike, and drops. I had even investigated moustache bars and changing out the shifters, but I opted for the Sparrows since it involved less changing out of parts.

Since you can mount MTB on the Sparrow, and the bars "should" fit your current stem, there's literally nothing to swap out other than the bars themselves - you could put grips on the new bars (you could use the ones you already have on the flat bars, or buy new ones), or tape them, but it's a very easy switch back to the stock bars if you were to use the bike as a trade-in later.