I've been slowly but surely building up a killer cyclocross bike during road season. I've done this by scouring eBay for the parts I want, watching several of them sell, then swooping in to get a good price. I've picked up carbon chain guards, a saddle, crankset, a stem, and various other parts over time. If I couldn't beat the discounted Bikeman.com prices that I get from being on the team, then I added that to the final order and picked up the remaining components from them.

Well, I now have everything I need except for a frame. And for the last couple weeks, I've been getting closer and closer to getting that frame ordered directly from Javelin. Mainly the delay has been with talking to the guy on my team in charge of being liason to Javelin. But it's also becasue Javelin is acting very strange at the moment. Their website hasn't been updated in quite a long time (kinda like this one) and there's not number posted on their website that will get you to talk to anyone that knows any more.

But finally, today I got a call from Rob Henley at Javelin. He informed me that the price I thought I was going to get for frame, fork, and headset was for frame only. Well, that made the "deal" not such a good deal anymore and I wasn't terribly happy. They had a great price on Alpa Q CX forks, but it was still more than I'd been planning on spending. So I started looking for other options.

But when I started looking around, I realized I'd become a bit attached to the Javelin frame. I liked the top tube cable routing and the conventional headtube. Kona routes on the downtube like a road bike and Ridley and a bunch of others use integrated headsets. I also liked the silver color and I've been happy with my Javelin Amarone--quirks with the company nonwithstanding. So I wanted a Javelin.

And I found one: a 54 cm Primitivo on eBay. And whatdya know but the thing is already built up, at a great price, and resides in Leesburg (15 mins from work)! It was a pretty impulsive thing to do, but just before I went to bed tonight, I bought the whole thing. I plan to strip it of its parts and sell 'em to recoup some of the cost. And whatever I don't feel like selling, I'll probably save to build up a SS/Fixie for after 'cross season.


My only real worry about the bike is that the 54 cm may be too small for me. But after trying Peter's 57 cm, I think the standover is a little bit too high on that one--and this is one size below. The top tube is awfully short at 53 cm. Hopefully a 120 mm stem will be just right and the headtube isn't too low.