Cycling UK Forum

I recently purchased a Specialized Allez to get into road biking coming from MTB. I was thinking about upgrading the bike since I’ve been putting in some good miles on her. I’m use to my mountain bike with top of the line components through out. The Allez has somewhat entry level drive train with Shimano Claris. If I were to upgrade, where should I start?

FWIW here's my 2 penneth:

Tyres - those supplied with the bike are often OEM wire bead heavy versions. A lighter, supple, folding bead tyre can transform how a bike rides. Lots of choice, personally I like the Schwalbe One for weight, grip, durability and rolling resistance.
Nicer wheelset - the supplied OEM wheelset is good and strong but somewhat heavy. Again lots of choice here, look at reviews.
Brake blocks - switch to replaceable brake block carriers and superior blocks such as Swisstop or Kool Stop. They are better, and in many respects stopping is more important than going.
Contact points for comfort - a saddle that suits you and vibration damping gel bar tape make longer rides a pleasure.
The drive train is an expensive upgrade. Claris works well. It just lacks the bling factor. If you need a lower bottom gear you may be able to fit a cassette with a 34 sprocket with just a tweak of the RD b-screw. If you're going to upgrade then 105 is a very nice choice.

Homonym wrote: ↑11 Jul 2024, 5:53am where should I start?

Start by defining what it is about the bike that you currently find lacking and want to improve.

"I want a posher bike" is a perfectly valid reason to want to upgrade, but if that's the only reason then just go and buy one that tickles your fancy in a nice colour, god knows I've bought stuff 'just because' before

But if there's actual tangible faults or shortcomings with the bike that you want to improve on then tell us what they are so we can give useful advice to help and suggestions on what parts might be suitable.

FWIW I think up to 90% of the riding experience can be to do with the tyres. so they would be amongst the first things I'd look to change; wheels next, then the transmission. In that order.

Tyres and Wheels ! Some interesting findings from testing by ex- TDF Pro Adrian Timmis:
[https://m.facebook.com/story.php?id=100 ... 6452842266]

In the past, I've tried to give users a heads-up about the phenomenon on this forum whereby a user registers in order to ask a question for which they could have got an answer immediately from Google. I'm not sad enough to have actually calculated the stats, but I'm pretty sure that more than 50% of these new members never return to acknowledge the pages and pages of help which our more credulous forum members inevitably end up giving them.

What do we think about the following as an alternative strategy to give our regular forum members a gentle hint that they might be talking to themselves? When a new user registers to drop that all-important 'which Halfords bike would be best for my 700 yard commute?' question, those of us who aren't asleep could respond by giving the odds on the OP ever actually returning.

In this case, I'd say it was 5 to 1.

It sounds a bit to me like you might be better off selling that bike and buying a more expensive one.

gregoryoftours wrote: ↑11 Jul 2024, 8:25pm It sounds a bit to me like you might be better off selling that bike and buying a more expensive one.

+1. If you want more gears, or a more responsive gear change, you are looking at a new groupset, which would probably cost more than the bike is worth. There are plenty of rim brake bikes with decent groupsets going for not much money on EBay, Gumtree or Facebook Marketplace. I bought an Allez Elite with a 105 groupset and Fulcrum wheels for £300.

TrevA wrote: ↑11 Jul 2024, 9:42pm

gregoryoftours wrote: ↑11 Jul 2024, 8:25pm It sounds a bit to me like you might be better off selling that bike and buying a more expensive one.

+1. If you want more gears, or a more responsive gear change, you are looking at a new groupset, which would probably cost more than the bike is worth. There are plenty of rim brake bikes with decent groupsets going for not much money on EBay, Gumtree or Facebook Marketplace. I bought an Allez Elite with a 105 groupset and Fulcrum wheels for £300.

Just so. Road bikes with rim brakes and skinny tyres are so yesterday that even used full carbon framed models are becoming cheap as chips.

OTOH, coming from mtbs you might appreciate the current must-have "gravel" machine, but even there little used models can fetch little more than the retail price of the wheels!

I'd upgrade to a gravel or cyclo-cross bike. The condition of the roads around where I live is terrible, so bad that my lovely steel framed Penine road bike was hardly ever used and I ended up just using my mountain bike, but mountain bikes are terrible on the road and you cant get off-road without cycling on roads first. Since riding gravel bikes my road and MTB have become redundant.