race winning sommer bike

I got this bike because I won a stage race in Texas, just barely. I was there trying to qualify for the Junior World Championships trials. I had to go to a race somewhere outside Colorado to get enough points to make it to the trials. I won two of the three races, won the field sprint the first day. When I crossed the finish line I threw my arms up, which I didn’t know was illegal in Texas. I got a 30-second time penalty, and two other guys were then ahead of me. I was so mad I went out hard in the criterium the next day and lapped them. The prize for that win was this bike, made by a Texan builder named Sommer.

The 24-inch wheels were pretty radical, and pretty inefficient. The big chain ring was necessary with the small cogs to make things as fast as a 700c wheeled bike. I rode it in a couple time trials, after waiting two years to finally get it from the guy. The aero bars were added later on, they are just trimmed off upside down road bars. The shifters are out on the tips, they had bar end shifters but no one used them very much, they just weren’t cool. Just one of those image things.