its a beautiful bike in the flesh, and the level of componentry is just awesome.

I think if Rohloff hubs were the norm, and someone invented normal gears/deraileurs etc then they could well be dismissed as ineffective, high-maintenance, and a poor perfomance item in all but the best cycling conditions! I cant believe how awesome the rohloff hub is. Kudos for having the balls to take a punt on it.

I think everybody has their moment ''falling off at the lights" when first getting SPD's. I was so paranoid about it the first time I got clipless, I went for a ride in the middle of nowhere, and did my falling off in private! hehe.