Originally Posted by beng1

You will get far, far, far, far more for your money if you buy a used brand-name bike in your area for the same money or less. Actually to start out just get any old bicycle in good shape with drop bars and get riding. Ask relatives and friends etc. if they know of any old road bikes laying around that might just need tires. I just got a Bianchi road bike for free that was sitting by a trash dumpster, put good tires on it I fished out of the trash-dumpster of a local bike shop and had it ready to ride 24 hours after I found it. There are literally no good deals when it comes to new bikes, they depreciate 50% either in a few days or weeks for the low-end ones like from WalMart, or for the high-end ones they will depreciate that much in a year or two, and that is if their carbon frames don't crack or something and make them worthless. Get a good solid old steel road bike and you will get something you will be able to ride for many years and it will never lose any value at all, in fact a lot of older road bikes are worth more as time goes by.