It was love at first sight.
Being in my biz, I’m fortunate enough to know people with excellent taste. The friend that introduced me to my first love doesn’t even ride. She just loves the way it looked. And who can blame her, the Delta V1000 with it’s unpainted polished aluminum frame is to die for. Even after all these years, I get chills just looking at it. Here’s the entire catalog, feel free to drool.
http://vintagecannondale.com/year/1994/1994.pdf
I settled for the much more affordable H300. She’s was my first big girl bike, a large hybrid, solidly built. She was a deep metallic green. In low light, she looked black. I was in love. I carried her up and down apartment stairs. We toured parks and neighbourhoods, happy as a lark. She moved with me, twice.
I kept her for 20 years. She became our only mode of transportation for 6 weeks after hurricane Sandy hit and our car drowned. Except for a few inner tube repairs (which I learnt from YouTube), nothing else fell apart.
But all things must come to an end. The older you get, the heavier everything seem to get. And my girl was HEAVY. She took effort to ride. It was time for other options.
Her successor is a Quick6 hybrid, matte silver. Cannondale has always done a fab job of innovating, without sacrificing hotness whilst keeping prices reasonable. My new girl doesn’t disappoint.
I kept my first love for a while, thinking that I’d hand it down to my girls. But after riding the Quick, it became obvious that she was actually the wrong frame size for me. She was too big!
I finally let her go and it didn’t take long before a buyer came knocking. I hope to think that her new owner is enjoying her as much as I did, and that she’ll see many more miles to come.
