For the last four years I’ve been riding around on a late 1980’s Raleigh steel frame with beautiful chrome lugs. A friend of mine had dutifully chopped off the tail end of the rear triangle and welded on horizontal dropouts to make it fixed gear friendly. Lightweight, easy to haul around and speed through town on, I really didn’t think I would ever need another frame.
But all good things must come to an end.
I recently cracked the head tube through and through – not an easy fix. So I decided to go frame shopping. After reading reviews and talking to some of my more bike crazed friends, I headed up to American Cyclery to talk to my buddy about frames. Turns out he knew a lot, and then some.
The Soma Rush is his design! And though I thought that I would never be able to replace my old friend, it has turned out to be an amazing frame. The transfer of power from pedal to pavement is amazing. The frame is strong, flexy in all the right ways, and has a nice geometry to it that really flows well from old to new. I was looking for something that wouldn’t be a big change from what I loved, and in many ways that’s what I got. Even more so, it’s like I got my old frame back with improvements! I have to say that this frame is bringing me back to why I rode a bike as a kid. The fun, fast and adventurous nature of a bike that loves to be ridden.