Foundry Broadaxe

 I headed over to Bent Creek for the Foundry Broadaxe demo,  the Salsa guy had brought a medium and a large, along with a lot of Salsa bikes just in case someone was not smart enough to ride a Broadaxe.  I knew what I was there for and didn't spend much time looking at the array of Salsa Bikes pouring out of the truck. 

 The Broadaxe is what I wanted to ride,  to find out for myself just how awesome it is.  I had heard stories but wanted to feel it for myself.  I pulled out the medium and got it set up before rolling down the gravel road and eventually bombing down Wolf Branch. 

 On the gravel road, it was smooth, stiff and responsive.  I moved forward with the lightest push of the pedal and felt smooth. 

 After a couple miles of gravel, I turned off the road and dropped down the singletrack.  It did not take much time to get used to the responsive stability of the carbon fiber frame.  I rolled over a couple of technical trail features with no problem, the 29 inch wheel rolling over with agility.  

I had taken a little side trip earlier up the grunt climb on Ingles Field, so I could test the climbability.  It was what I expected and a little more.  The bike is so light that I was able to power up the climb with less resistance.  And when I turned around and cropped back down,  I realized quickly that I was not used to gliding over rock gardens as quickly as the bike enabled me to glide.

On down Wolf Branch, I let the reigns out over the tight twisty techy sections and rolled through with no problems.  The rooty sections towards the end were smooth and I was able to power over them in the big ring. 

The bottom line:  I love the Siren 55 SL ( 69er) that I am currently riding, but this bike is high on my wish list...very high....as in number 1.  I can tell that over the course of a 4 plus hour, the light weight, and stiffness would conserve a lot of energy, and would definitely result in faster race finishing times. 

Dreamin'......