During Herself’s recent visit to Aspen she was compelled to endure a bit of the hee and the haw and the ho ho ho directed at her bicycle, a 2006 Soma Double Cross.
As you know, we are not slaves to velo-fashion here at El Rancho Pendejo. Shucks, I have been known to turn up for a road ride aboard my own slightly newer Double Cross, which has cycled through a number of incarnations — cyclocross bike; light touring bike with fenders, rack, and sacks; townie with swept-back bars; you name it.
At present it’s an eight-speed, “all-road,” drop-bar bike with two bottle cages, IRD Cafam cantis, Dura-Ace bar-end shifters, a triple XT crank (46/34/24T) with Ultegra/XT derailleurs and an 11-34T cassette for a low end of 24x34T (19.2 gear inches), bar-end shifters, Shimano 600 brake levers, IRD Cafam cantis, Mavic Open Pro rims (Dura-Ace hub up front, Velo-Orange behind), and 700×36 Donnelly X’Plor MSO adventure knobbies. Just the vehicle for a short dash around the Elena Gallegos Open Space or a rolling road ride through the foothills.
If you’re me, anyway.
Herself rarely leaves pavement and never rides in foul weather, and so a bike’s capacity for fat-tire fun and fenders isn’t even on her radar. Especially when we consider that while her Double Cross is a 42cm and mine a 55, hers actually outweighs mine by (wait for it) three pounds.
Steel is real — real heavy, if you’re a 5-footer and not rocking the lightweight components.
Don’t get me wrong. The Double Cross is a fine frameset, and I’d buy another in a heartbeat if Soma still did a canti version. But we outfitted hers on the cheap.
She’s pushing about 1.2 pounds more rubber than I am with every pedal stroke, and hasn’t got that 24T granny for the steeps. Plus her saddle, handlebar, seat post and wheels are all heavier than mine. Ditto the controls: chunky 105 STI brifters instead of my bar-cons and pre-Ultegra brake levers.
So, even though I’ve been dropped like an empty bidon by dudes rocking raggedy-ass kit and rattle-canned DUI-mobiles, I can see how the “you get the lunch, I’ll buy the bicycles” types might find Herself’s whip a tad plebeian.
In my defense, I will note that at 5 feet tall and under a hundy, she’s hard to fit. Still, since she makes all the money around here while I do … uh … hold on, gimme a sec’, it’ll come to me. …
Shit. Not much, it seems. I should probably do a bit of shopping, hey?
Call it an impulse, if only because I’ve heard one pitch from a friend of a friend of a friend for something along the lines of a Bianchi Impulso GRX 600. Anyone else got a recommendation they’d like to share?
Mad Blog Media 
Re: bike for the Mrs.
At her size youse should look for an old Georgina Terry. Maybe with the 24” front wheel.
I think a Soma Buena Vista Disc in Tiburon Blue would do the trick. Build in up all 105 with two piston mechanical disc brakes and Bob’s your uncle! They make in down to a 42CM. Herself rocking a real nice road mixte would be some serious style! Who’s laughing now? It would be like someone walking into a jam session with a Santa Cruz when everyone else is playing run of the mill Martins.
Litespeed makes an XS bike, too, with various builds. I’m really happy with that gravel bike I bought. Have two sets of wheels. One with 700-38 off road and one with 700-32 mixed road/light off road. But other than that bike, all my bikes are as ancient as your fleet.
I guess the other option is lighter build kit on that Soma. I think I added a couple pounds (of rotating weight, no less) to my Salsa LaCruz when I put 700-35 Schwalbe tires on it. You could ride those tires through a firefight between Albuquerque teens armed with Glocks with Glock Switches and they would not flat. But boy, they weigh. Plus the rear rack, lights, and heavier city designed wheelset. I could make that bike fun again, I suppose.
Not sure it will help but I run a Gunnar Sport. Depending on the set up, you can get them much cheaper than the normal full-on Waterford. Gunnar makes frames in pre-made sizes to cut costs and but has plenty of sizes, good quality, are owned by the Schwinns and excellent builders who work with you. Also…
CRAP! They both closed mid 2023! Well, I guess I’ll never be able to get mine fixed by them under warranty again. D**n it all!
I just recently bought my 5’1″ far better half a Salsa Journeyer gravel bike. The aspect of the bike that appealed to us, besides the fact that Salsa has an overabundance and is therefore selling them on the cheap, is that the one I got for her isn’t the smallest size! They come in very tiny sizes. Her bike claims to be a 51cm but measures 38cm center to top, while the next size down, the “49cm” measures 34cm. They’ve available with 700c or 650c wheels. A “49cm” with 650c wheels would be basically a kid’s bike.
We made sure to get one with mechanical disc brakes since a) she likes to use cross top levers, and b) we didn’t want hydraulic disc brakes (it really seems to me that the disadvantages of hydraulic disc brakes far outweigh the advantages).
Another appeal to the Journeyer is that (rare among new bikes these days) it uses an English bottom bracket. Because of this, we were able to easily remove the stock Sora 2×9 drivetrain and install a good ol’ reliable 3×9 Ultegra/Sugino/XT drivetrain.
Add on a rear rack and small panniers and, voila!, damn near perfect little bike.
Call it an impulse
Call it compulsive
Call it insane
But when I’m surrounded I just can’t stop
Sorry, couldn’t resist.
Patrick,
Michele can definitely empathize with Shannon’s plight for limited opportunities for small frames for the petite but powerful. Her frame size is 43cm. For many years she was limited to custom frames from some of the finest in the industry including Rich Gängl and Ben Serotta and even rode 650’s at times. In 2010 she happened upon a Specialized Amira that fit her like a glove and she ended up putting somewhere around 100k on that Ultegra fitted frame. She loved it, but it was dying a slow death and then came the BUG in 2020 and the blite of frames and bike parts, not to mention that bike companies didn’t care about the female market. What a cluster when you ignore 51% of the population. Anyway, after a lot of research she found the folks at LIV in 2023 (the female side of Giant) who seem to be the only outfit that caters to this group. She’s since purchased a Langma Road bike and a Devote gravel bike. She loves them both. I would encourage Shannon to consider the LIV brand who has a dedicated Global Brand Manager in Cassondra Spring.
Make It a Great Day,
Michael
Thanks to everyone who chimed in with a recommendation for Herself’s new whip. We’ll start checking out a few of them directly. The next couple weeks will be heavy on entertaining visiting relatives, but after that it’ll be Shopping with a Vengeance.