Any ideas what this Trek bike is? Buying advice!

[jroberts147]

Hi,

I'm very new to road cycling and just about to buy my first road bike. I've got quite a tight budget and ideally only want to spend around £500 on a good used bike (58cm-60cm).

I've been offered this Trek Discovery Channel bike for £500. It's pretty much mint condition.

Does anyone have any ideas as to what model it is? I know it's hard just from a picture, but any help would be much appreciated.

Do you think this would be a good start off bike?

Also, should I be buying a very expensive pair of Specialized carbon road shoes or will a basic pair suffice for what will be fairly short road rides?

Many thanks,
John.

 

[Froze]

Trek painted a lot of bikes with that paint like a standard Trek 1000, a 1500, or the Madone 5.9sl, and probably others with the Discovery Channel paint job to make it look like the bike that Lancelot Armstrong used in the TDF. So you need to get the real model and then determine if the bike is worth it. I would not pay more for the bike then whatever the actual model is worth just because of some paint job that duplicates what Lancelot rode.

 

[alfeng]

Originally Posted by jroberts147 .

I'm very new to road cycling and just about to buy my first road bike. I've got quite a tight budget and ideally only want to spend around £500 on a good used bike (58cm-60cm).

I've been offered this Trek Discovery Channel bike for £500. It's pretty much mint condition.

Does anyone have any ideas as to what model it is? I know it's hard just from a picture, but any help would be much appreciated.

Do you think this would be a good start off bike?

Also, should I be buying a very expensive pair of Specialized carbon road shoes or will a basic pair suffice for what will be fairly short road rides?

FWIW. It's a good bike at a fair price (IMO).

TREK's customer service is very responsive. If you use the contact information on their site and send them the frame's serial number they can send you the relevan information that you want.

• it looks like an aluminum frame w/ CF fork & Shimano 105 components
• it would-and-should be a very nice bike for someone who considered himself to be well beyond a beginner unless the person is image conscious & needs to have the latest-and-greatest or lightest bike or most expensive bike or ______.
• hopefully, your height is very similar to that of the seller's

Shoes with carbon fibre sole are "okay" but are definitely not required.

• I know someone who rode from the East Coast of the Unied States (Baltimore) to California wearing a pair of Sperry "deck" shoes ...
• IMO, you can probably worry about cyclng shoe at a later date -- after a month-or-two (sooner? later? never?) and then you'll have a better idea about the type of shoes and/or pedals which will be better for the type of riding that you will be doing.

 

[Froze]

When I posted the image link wasn't there, it looks just like a 2007 Trek 1000, an entry level bike. I think that bike sold new for $500 to $600 which means used probably around $300 in American dollars. If any one knows for sure if it's not the Trek 1000 please chime in. If I'm correct then there is no way I would pay what the asking price which is about $772...which is more then the bike sold new for!

 

[alfeng]

Originally Posted by Froze .

When I posted the image link wasn't there, it looks just like a 2007 Trek 1000, an entry level bike. I think that bike sold new for $500 to $600 which means used probably around $300 in American dollars. If any one knows for sure if it's not the Trek 1000 please chime in. If I'm correct then there is no way I would pay what the asking price which is about $772...which is more then the bike sold new for!

You could be right, however the bike in the picture appears to have 105 components, but maybe not ... and, I presume that means the retail was probably in the $1300+[COLOR= #008000]US[/COLOR] range PLUS the VAT tax means the local to the buyer-seller retail cost could have been in the $1500US range ...

​

 

[Froze]

Then the bike is probably a 1500 series if it has 105 components. Doing a fast internet search, I found the used prices to between $400 to $500, in American money of course.