Vegan Bodybuilding & Fitness

After a several year hiatus following having my bike stolen a few years ago, I'm getting back into it and need a decent but not terribly expensive road bike. In addition to using it for errands some to save a bit on gas, I'll be doing some long rides as part of my cardio routine. I had been running exclusively last summer, but I just seem to constantly have nagging injuries--currently a sore Achilles--so I need to vary my training if I'm going to reach a high level of fitness and stay relatively injury-free.

Anyway, today at a local bike shop I was looking at a lower-end Giant with aluminum frame. Seemed like a very nice bike, but I'd really rather not pay $625 if I can get something decent for cheaper. Does anyone have any suggestions for good road bikes to look at for under, say, $650?

Also, I'm wondering about frame size. I'm 5'7" with about a 29-30" inseam.

Thanks for any suggestions!

Jeff

For that price you better look used.

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I am in the process of trying to lose 60lbs of fat while gaining lean muscle by December 2012
My fitness/transformation log can be found here

Looked through Craigslist locally and didn't see anything that caught my eye. There were no used road bikes that were suitable at any of the local bike shops, either. A guy at one of the shops said decent used bikes get snapped up in a hurry around here because it's a pretty big biking town. New road bikes (mostly Treks and Cannondales) were all at least $750 at the shops I visited today. Since I was eager to get started biking again, I went ahead and got the Giant OCR3 I test-rode yesterday for $625. Seems to be a higher-quality bike than the Fuji I got for about $300 20 years ago (which got stolen a few years back), so I'm happy with it.

I took it for my first ride this evening. Only 10 miles because I had to cut it short due to an impending thunderstorm, and I didn't really push myself very much, just cruised along with an average pulse of about 130, but it felt good to get out on a bike again. I'm looking forward to getting fitter without pounding my legs and perpetually suffering from nagging little injuries like I was doing when I ran almost every day.