Bike Porn- 1st Edition: Me! Me! Me!

I figure that since it's my god-damned blog, and that makes me self-centered and narcissistic by default, it shouldn't be a problem to feature one of my bikes as a Bike porn contestant.

So, Ladies and gentleman, cyclists and Internet stalkers, friends and enemies, I present to you: my Fondriest Domino Plus.



This bike is the current love of my life. I bought all the parts up and had it built.

My previous bike was a Fondriest Don racer U107 ultralight. The frame on that bad boy weighed 1050 gr. AND 'twas the same frame used by Gilberto Simoni when he won the 1st stage of the 2002 TdF. (a little trivia for ya). it was a light, beautiful climbing bike, decked out in ultegra, some carbon bars, and a lovely set of used Mavic Ksyrium SL's. a beauty in it's own right.

I had ridden that bike pretty hard and it was starting to show its age. Actually, that's a dirty lie. the bike was riding fine. I was just looking for any excuse to buy a new bike! YOU ALL DO IT! Don't lie.

"oh, my bike's got a scratch" turns into "i need a completely new frame!"

so over a few months, I started scanning around for a new Fondriest. I love their frames. Their bikes have beautiful, clean lines. They do things with carbon and aluminum that set my loins on fire. ouch.

I found a brand new Domino Plus carbon frame up for sale on Ebay in Australia. For 1/3rd the price of the MSRP. At the time, Fondriest was going through a rocky time and had pulled out of all their US dealers, so they were/are extremely hard to come by. The domino's frame weighs about 1250 gr- not a stupid-light frame, but light enough. Plus, they shaped the carbon to have a super-nice ride- responsive but compliant (so their advertising says!) big bonus- It was a beautiful blue color. oh yeah.

This frame completely struck a chord with my aesthetic sensibilities. I love the clean lines, the form, the naked carbon, and the blueeee. blue is the fastest color.




once the frame came in i started dreaming up what parts I'd slap on there. I knew that Maurizio (Fondriest) would consider it blasphemy to slap on shimano onto one of his Italian bikes (like i did last time) , so i decided that everything on that bike would either be Italian OR carbon. yay for me, boo for my wallet. I bought the components from Total Cycling and Reparto Corse. I found they had the best prices at the time. Total cycling was a steal for Euro stuff, and reparto corse had great prices on FSA goodies.



specs:
Gruppo: Campy Chorus 10 spd (except for the Fr Derailleur- which is carbon Record)
Wheelset: Campy Eurus (fantastic wheels- these are now race day wheels, with my Mavic Ksurium elites being relegated to training duty and maybe crits)
Bars: FSA k-wing carbon (fantaaastic)
Seatpost: FSA K-force Lite
Crank: FSA SLK Mega Exo Compact (yummy carbon)
Pedals: Look Keo Carbon
Saddle: Fizik Arione
Bartape: Fizik Microtex



And there you have it, my pride and joy (pathetically so). The bike's smooth as butter, climbs well, descents like its on rails, and sprints super-well. built up, the bike comes in around 17 lbs, which is fine for me. I'd be better off losing 5 more lbs than worrying about shaving off 400 gr on my bike.

i look at this bike and i want to ride. sure it may be fred-ish to buy such a high-performance machine when I'm just a dinky cat 5, but I don't care. It gets me out there, it makes me want to ride, and that's what counts.



Plus, i get points for Italian flair. Anyone can buy a Colnago- but Fondriests reek of cool cause no one has them.

Graze Mille, Maurizio Fondriest!



Who's Next? If you want your bike featured as bike porn, email me some photos and a description of your whip at cjammet@gmail.com. If it's (as Paris would say,) Hot enough, I'll post it up!