Going back to Parlee

Posted by Mark on March 16, 2009 under bike | Be the First to Comment

Hmm, call me fickle, but I’m entertaining the Parlee again.

I’ve been speaking with Viner for a week or so now and I’m just not ‘enjoying’ the bespoke process. In my mind this should be a two way process, with information passed to the vendor and proposals sent back to the customer, me.

I have a lot of fit data from the Retul session at Bespoke and I want that utilising – the fitting session I had with the Viner factory staff at the Cycle Show didn’t convince me they were listening to my requirements – they seemed more interested in pushing me into a position that didn’t feel right. I went to a talk recently by cycle coach Rich Simmonds, and he said the most critical part of your training was having a bike that fitted. And you’d know when it did, because it would feel like it.

If you’ve ever been lucky enough to have some bespoke clothing made you’ll know when it fits right – you can just feel it. A bike should be the same.

Plus, Viner didn’t seem interested in knowing what bars, stem, saddle, seat pin, or groupset I’d be running. These things are all critical to the contact points on a bike – you can’t design a frame specifically for one person without knowing them.

Time to talk to Parlee again and see what can be done.