And the winner is...

The Cycles Toussaint Velo Routier V2!!

or...

Read the entire story of the research, acquisition and assembly of my new Cycles Toussaint Velo Routier v2.

Cycles Toussaint Velo Routier V2 with braze-ons

After a somewhat painstaking consideration of the three most popular entry-level low trail 650b "randonneur" style bikes, I ultimately decided to purchase the second edition of the Velo Routier from Calgary's boutique Cycles Toussaint. The order has been placed, a couple of emails have been exchanged with Angus Cowan (one of the two partners running the company), and the bike is on its way. Now I just watch the CanPar/FedEx notifications and impatiently await the arrival.

Everything sounds better when you say it in French. Velo Routier. Ooo, la, la. It just rolls off the tongue, smooth and elegant. It basically translates as "road bike". Cycle Toussaint Velo Routier sounds so much better than All Saints Road Bike, don't you think?

Though there are many reasons for choosing this frame over the very worthy competitors, the primary reasons I went with the Velo Routier probably boiled down to these:

• Jan Heine's review of the V1 in Bicycle Quarterly was quite favorable, essentially implying that the Velo Routier is the reincarnation of the famous Kogswell Porteur/Randonneur he helped design back in the 2000s. If it's good enough for Jan, I'm hoping it's good enough for my first low-trail bike.
  
• I love the way center-pull brakes look and I really want to try them with dedicated brazed on bosses. I'm given to understand that direct mounted center pulls offer some of the best modulation in the business. I'm eager to test that assertion. 
• The Velo Routier is sold as a more or less complete bike* (see caveat below) while the Grand Randonneur (my second choice) and Polyvalent are sold only as framesets. I tinker a bit with bikes, see to it that the brakes work and futz with the gears to keep them from making too much noise, but the idea of figuring out which headset, bottom bracket and derailleurs fit on the bike is a bit daunting to me. I may not find the package ideal, but this way somebody has at least chosen a "starter" set of components on which I can build. And who knows, maybe the Toussaint guys have put together a package that will suit my needs perfectly. 
• Braze-ons, baby! Look at that seatstay bridge. And what a lovely brake cable stop. Pump pegs? Fuhgeddaboudit. Look, there are certainly more beautiful examples of the welding arts at the NAHBS, but on a production frame? I haven't see anything better. 

*At present the company isn't offering complete, assembled bikes. Presumably they don't have the labour to assemble them. But they are selling un-assembled bikes, providing all the necessary components in a do-it-yourself kit. They ship everything but pedals and a saddle. You do the assembly.

Velo Routier V2 DIY Build Kit

My intention is to build the bike as designed and see what works and what doesn't. If it's perfect, I'll go with it as-is. If not, I'll modify it until it suits me. I will probably start out with the Brooks Cambium C17 saddle and see if that works. I currently have it installed on the Fuji, which has primarily been used for fairly short rides. I haven't yet tried it as a long distance saddle. So we'll see how I like it. If that doesn't work out, I'll probably try the Specialized Avatar from the now defunct Madone or my trusty old Selle San Marco Era Pro. I'll go with "modern" pedals, moving my Speedplay Frogs from the carbon fiber super bike. Once I've had time to evaluate the standard build, I'll decide if I have to make changes. Having said that, here is a listing of stuff I may want to change.

What, me worry?

I've placed the order so I must feel confident that this is the bike for me, right? Oh that consumerism were so simple. It's an inexpensive mail order bike of a design that is new to me, with components I
have never laid eyes on. So no, I'm not entirely sure it's going to live up to expectations. Which is the exact reason I'm buying an entry-level bike, rather than having one custom tailored to my specifications. I can afford to have this one not work out and chalk it up to experience. I've done my homework as best I can and hopefully all will be well, but here are some of my concerns and lingering doubts.

Reviews of the Dia Compe 750 brakes have been mixed, with Jan Heine particularly referring to them in his Bicycle Quarterly "first ride" review as "mushy". I have found the same issue with the Gran Compe 610s I have on the Fuji, though they are mounted to the fork with a back plate and rear bolt rather than directly to the fork bosses. Should Jan's assessment prove true, I have a set of 1974 Mafac "Racers" I can scavenge from an old Urago a buddy passed down to me. Based on what I've read on the forums they should fit and I think they're pretty close to the vaunted Mafac "Raid" brakes that Jan loves so much.

The drive train is a MicroSHIFT 10 speed friction set-up, with bar-end shifters powering a lowish (46/30) double up front and a super wide (11/36!) chainring in the rear. I'm really hoping it works out because I increasingly need that wide range for climbing. Remember, I'm transitioning from typical Shimano Ultegra 50/34, 11/28 brifters, so the change could be significant. I've got Suntour down-tube shifters on the Fuji, and it's mostly fine once I get used to it; I'm looking forward to trying the bar-ends where shifting should theoretically involve a bit less awkward reaching.

Courtesy Lovely Bicycle

My biggest worry about bar-end shifters is about the swoopy cable routing and the front-mounted bag. Builds I've seen online have looked extremely kludgy and inelegant. If I can't make that work to my satisfaction I may go to mounting shifters on the down-tube which makes everything a lot simpler. Or I may even be dorky enough to try a stem-mounted solution, which frankly makes a ton of sense to me, despite being almost unheard of since the bike boom. We'll have to see.

Speaking of front mounted bags, the Velo Routier has a bit of an issue with front racks. The first version of the frame came with a custom-designed rack that was an obvious last-minute kluge (Evan admitted as much in the BQ review). To get around the brazed on center-pull brake arms, the rack struts rose steeply from their connections on the fork crowns. This leaves the rack's platform hovering way too high over the fender, which both looks stupid and probably compromises performance by having the weight of the handlebar bag higher than necessary. I'll do a little measuring when the bike gets here and see if I can make a Velo Orange rack work with the brakes. Just eye-balling it, I'm guessing it's possible and I'm not the first to try, so...

VO Randonneur Front Rack

Some folks on the forums (fora! okay, I'll stop doing this now) have noted that the Kalloy KL-100 Alloy quill stem and handlebars are a bit flexy, so I'll have to see how that works out. I can bring over the Nitto stem from the Fuji and there's a really neat looking Pivo stem on the aforementioned Urago that might work. But I may just have to replace the handlebars with a new set, possibly some Nitto B132 Randonneurs or the equivalent from Velo Orange. I'll have to see once they get here.

The low gearing in the front causes some anxiety too, but most of the 650b's are set up with the 46 tooth chain ring, so maybe it's the right thing. I'm coming from 52/42/30 and 50/34 chainrings, so the thought of losing four or more teeth on the top end causes me just a bit of pause. But I'm open to the possibility that this will be a positive transition to a slightly less stressful way of riding, less concerned with top performance and more aligned with comfort and distance. I just hope the stuff isn't junk. I rode some MicroSHIFT brifters on a vintage aluminum Pinarello Galileo on a trip to Italy a few years ago and they worked just fine. So, that gives me some slight comfort. Fingers crossed.

The VR is currently winging its way across the North American continent!

Join us for the next episode of MondoBlahBlah, when the Velo Routier arrives!!!

Supple-mentary Readin'
In the mean time, see what others have been saying about the Velo Routier.

https://www.nationalobserver.com/2016/04/18/cycles-toussaint-fast-comfortable-and-bit-bling
https://rideyourjourney.com/2015/02/23/velo-routier-frame-v-2/
http://www.brooklynrandonneur.com/2015/08/
http://www.brooklynrandonneur.com/2016/03/cycles-toussaint-velo-routier-v2-ride.html
https://stonehog.com/2014/03/03/initial-velo-routier-notes/
https://stonehog.com/2016/01/06/trail-riding/
https://stonehog.com/2015/12/23/new-toussaints/
http://www.cycleexif.com/cycles-toussaint

You take the high trail, I'll take the low trail

Previously on MondoBlahBlah...

Okay, so I've decided I want to try a low trail "Randonneur" style bike with 650b wheels and wide tires. Now what? Where do I find one? The local bike shop? Maybe in Seattle or Portland, but not in Bethesda, Maryland.

I could run down to the local Masi dealer and see if they'd be willing to bring in one of their Speciale Randonneurs for me to test ride, but at 41 mm of fork trail it's only barely "low trail", and with no fork braze-ons for the type of mini rack typical of any bike labeled "Randonneur" I'm loath to include it among my choices. And that round crown fork is just a deal breaker for me. So, nice try Masi, but though it's headed in the right direction, the Speciale is just not quite there yet. So with no local bike shop choices, it's off to the internet!

There are only a few companies producing low trail frames and forks that satisfy my requirements. It's still a niche design and the reality of the market is such that the really nice models tend to be a bit to the pricey side. Here I would include the Boulder Bicycles All Road and the Box Dog Pelican. These are gorgeous, small batch, American made bikes, lovingly crafted by artisan craftsmen. Once you get them outfitted with the kinds of accessories they are designed to have, you'd be lucky to get away for under about $4,000. A very reasonable price for a well made bike likely to be handed down to your children, especially in an age when a Chinese-made mid-priced plastic racer can easily run much more than that. But it's a lot to pay for a bike with unfamiliar geometry. It's a lot to pay to see if you like it.

So before going all-in on the low trail concept, a lot of us want to try the entry level, to see if it is all that it's cracked up to be. After all I didn't buy a $5,000 carbon fiber racing bike until after I had ridden a much less expensive aluminum version for nearly a decade.

There are really two options to get into a low trail 650b on a budget; two companies that have taken the risk of producing economical bikes for Bicycle Quarterly (BQ) fans. Soma Fabrications of San Francisco and Cycles Toussaint of Calgary, Alberta. Both companies offer Taiwanese frames based more or less on the designs championed by BQ for about $500 US. I should add that Velo Orange of Annapolis, Maryland also makes such a frame, but their Polyvalent is about $100 more expensive. All three bikes share very similar geometry, the ability to ride wide, fendered tires and easily mount front racks for those gorgeous French handlebar bags. All are made with similarly sized chromoly tubing (.8/.5/.8 the smaller sizes, with .9/6/.9 on larger frames), which Jan thinks is a bit stout, but which is probably about as thin as you're ever likely to see on a production bike - remember, these have to support 135 pound racers and 280 pound cruisers. I am to the heavy side of the cyclist weight classification, closing in on two hundred pounds, so the slightly thicker tubing is probably just fine.

The Polyvalent's Disk-ready fork

Though there are tons of tiny differences between the three models, the primary functional difference between them is the brakes. If you feel strongly about brakes, this is an easy way to choose. The Soma Fabrications Grand Randonneur has forks for cantilever brakes, the Velo Orange Polyvalent has forks for disk brakes and the Cycles Toussaint Velo Routier has forks for the ever-so-exotic brazed on center-pulls. The center pulls and cantilevers are pure retro, though the cantilever frame bosses can accommodate linear-pull brakes, which are said to offer greater braking power than cantilevers. Anyway, if you want a low trail bike built around your preferred style of brakes, there you go.

Style Points

Of course you may be more concerned about style, and there are marked differences there too. The Soma GR has a really lovely white frame with maroon accents. The Velo Routier in its current version is "tricolor", basically royal blue with a red and white logo. The new Polyvalent is offered in a lovely "deep emerald" green and a sort of pastel lilac. I personally hate the lilac, but find the other three really attractive.

The Polyvalent has the extra disk brake braze-ons, which no self respecting retrogrouch could tolerate but which probably provides the most confident braking of the three. The fork crown also seems to be somewhat unconventional, though it's hard to tell from the photographs on the site.  The Velo Routier has traditional, classic frame geometry. It does feature pump pegs on the left seat stay, which allows you to sport a snazzy pump in a really cool place, if you go in for that sort of thing.

Soma Fabrications Grand Randonneur

The latest Grand Randonneur has the loveliest fork of the three, with an elegant "French Flick", a tight bend low on the forks that provides the rake. But the GR has a sloping top tube, which definitely marks it as a "modern" bike, while the other two have level top tubes. There have been some complaints on the forums (I know, it should be "fora" but who says that?!!) that the GR frame looks too small, in the way many modern bikes with "compact" geometry do. Jan Heine noted that in his Bicycle Quarterly review. But I've also read that the geometry is stacked higher in the front providing a more upright position. I don't have one to measure, so I can't say. Still, "traditional" bikes like this generally feature level top tubes and actually tend, as their predecessors did, to be a bit bigger than "modern" bikes, showing less seat post and stem length. That difference marks the GR as a stand-out, though not necessarily in a good way.

Velo Routier Semi-Horizontal Drop Outs

One other note that might determine a winner among these three choices. The second generation of the Velo Routier has a semi-horizontal rear drop out (the other two have the now pretty much standard vertical dropout). It allows for easy conversion to a single speed or internally geared hub both of which can require chain tensioning by sliding the axle fore or aft in the drop out. You see this on a lot of older bikes, but not on many new ones. This is a deal breaker for some riders, as it can make it a real pain in the ass to change tires, particularly on a fendered bike. So there's that.

And finally, Soma and Velo Orange bikes all seem to feature proper head badges, and pretty attractive ones at that. The Velo Routier has a decal in its place. Not a big deal for me, as I'll usually have a handlebar bag covering it anyway, but head badges are lovely things and it's kind of a shame Cycles Toussaint chose the decal instead.

Alright, so having painstakingly considered all the options, which one did I go with? The answer after the break...

Moving on

2011Trek Madone 6.2 DA Lite - Before

The mid-life crisis is officially over. My carbon fiber UCI-worthy super bike is no more, done in by a forgotten roof rack and the low ceiling of a parking garage. Oops! I finally found out what happens when you strike an unmoveable object with an unstoppable force. Your bike shatters! After years of riding hybrids and entry level racing bikes, this was a self indulgent 50th birthday present to myself born of too many hours watching fit young men race around Europe, their logo emblazoned speed machines beckoning like sleek sirens. "Buy me. You'll go faster and climb better and all your cares will melt away," said the review in Bicycling magazine. In fairness, I have to say that aside from the frequently creaking press-fit bottom bracket, I really enjoyed the old Madone. It was everything you could hope for in a full-on racing machine. 

2011 Trek Madone 6.2 DA Lite - After

Well, no use crying over cracked carbon. I got over 7 years out of it. Not much in bicycle years, but in plastic bike years... Who knows?

Anyway, time to move on. A loss can be an opportunity. Destruction can lead to creation. Less is more, more is less. Get over it bikey boy. Truth is, I was already nearly past my imagine-yourself-as-a-racer years when I bought it. And though it climbed beautifully and positively bounded forward with even the slightest weight put on the pedals, it didn't really fit the kind of riding I was already doing - longish, relaxed trips out into the cornfields of Montgomery County's Agricultural Reserve across miles of asphalt only a tractor could love. So while I am sad to part with my old friend, not to mention my youth, I am happy to move on. This is obviously a cosmic sign that it is time to embark on my retrogrouch years. So, let's get on with it already. Time to buy a new bike!

'86 Fuji Allegro

But what kind of bike? I'm over carbon. I still have my old aluminum go-fast "racing" bike if I want to fantasize about being a racer. And I've got my bomb-proof around town bike. When I set up my '86 Fuji, I intended it to be a kind of all 'rounder, everything from bopping down-to-the-grocery store, commuting to work to longish weekend rides. To some extent it has satisfactorily satisfied those requirements. But with it's 27 x 1 1/8 inch wheels, 6-speed gearing it's not quite my ideal all-around, all-day ride. And it has significant wheel flop, especially when front loaded with a lovely French style handlebar bag which is my preference for the most common riding I do. So it doesn't satisfy my desire for a comfortable but responsive bike I can ride all day to often unfamiliar destinations.

I want a bike that's at home on pavement but isn't afraid of the occasional dirt road or cinder bike path. Not a gravel racer. Not a Paris–Roubaix racing bike. Just an all-around flexible bike I can ride anywhere. With that in mind, over the next few episodes I will be documenting the process of researching, buying and getting oriented to a new bike. If you have nothing better to do, I invite you to join me on this journey of discovery.

The natural, and perhaps predictable place to start would be the last homely house east of the sea. Elves and hobbits and dwarves and mithril lugs! As you may know, I've long been a fan of Grant Petersen, so you might think this would be the time for me to jump in and finally buy that A. Homer Hilsen I've long dreamed of. Mmm, such tasty lugs. I admit the thought is tempting.

So what's stopping me?

Well, Jan Heine, for one thing. You see, there are currently two philosophical luminaries in the steel bike world; Grant Petersen of Rivendell and Jan Heine of Bicycle Quarterly. And while they probably agree on a whole bunch of stuff (steel is an awesome frame material, fatter tires are more comfortable and useful, etc., etc.,) there is one thing about which they disagree. Geometry.

Courtesy of (Cog)nitive Dissonance

I suspect it's largely because they each have a different preference for what they want a bike to do. Grant seems to think 4 hours is just about enough to ride on a given day. He wants a bike to be generally useful and insanely versatile. He wants it to be sturdy, intuitive and have a neutral ride quality. Ride it on pavement. Ride it on dirt. Ride it on gravel. Doesn't matter. It will have the same self-assured character. Sure, if you need panniers the tubeset will be a bit thicker, the chainstay a bit longer, maybe some other minor adjustments. But whether it's a bike for roadies to take on fast club rides, a loaded tourer or commuter/grocery bike, anything Grant designs always rides like a Rivendell - stable, neutral, predictable. One bike to rule them all. Grant's bikes, consequently, feature "mid-trail" front-end geometry.

Jan on the other hand, is a randonneur, the ultra-marathoner of the cycling world. He wants to ride until he drops. Twenty-four straight hours in the saddle? No problem. And he wants to do it fast. He also wants to be ready for anything that could happen in twenty four hours on a bike, like weather changes, hunger, darkness, etc., so he wants to carry food and extra clothing. He doesn't want to stop to eat or dig around in his bag, so he wants it up front (have I mentioned gorgeous French handlebar bags?). He wants fenders and integrated dynamo powered lighting.

Jan wants the bike to be light and springy. He's not racing against other riders, but he's racing against the clock, and he wants a performance bike, a lively bike, a bike that "planes" like a hydrofoil that rises from the water as it achieves the optimum speed. In fact, Jan uses the word "optimum" a lot. In his mind a bike that is properly proportioned can attain a near supernatural equilibrium, a perfect balance of dynamic forces held in harmonic tension that, in unison with a sensitized rider who has a metronome like pedal stroke can produce an effortless, transcendent cycling experience.

Bicycle Geometry

The model of Jan's ideal bike is probably a 1952 René Herse, made by the famous French "constructeur", whose eponymous trademark Jan now owns. Tubes are thin, both in diameter and in the thickness of their steel, preferably butted .7/.4/.7 tubes; chainstays are short; wheel diameters are small (650b x 38mm and up); and most importantly, the fork trail is "low". This geometry makes for a bike whose steering is extremely responsive. The steering takes a light touch - some would call it "twitchy" - and it is optimized for carrying a front load.

Not exactly a Protestant Reformation level schism, but Jan, thanks largely to his excellent magazine, has single-handedly revived interest in low trail bikes with 650b wheels. The problem is, at the time he started this revival, more or less fifteen years ago, there were no low trail 650b production bikes being made. To get one you had to find an antique or have one custom made. These days the 650b wheels are much more common and Grant, a lover of wider tires, uses them on all his smaller frames to avoid the kinds of geometric tomfoolery a builder has to do to avoid excessive toe overlap on little bikes. But production low trail frames are still hard to find.

Alright, I'm intrigued. Jan Heine and Bicycle Quarterly has convinced me I should try a low trail 650b "Randonneur" style bike with wide tires. Now all I have to do is find one...

Next! Finding the right low trail bike.