The Excalibur is Ridley's best-selling race frame for good reason -- many good reasons, in fact. Some of it is self-evident: At 1100g it's a light frame at an unmatched price with no sacrifice to stiffness or performance. Unlike the triangulated "Sharp Edge Design" you find on the Damocles and Noah, the Excalibur is built in a monocoque carbon fiber design with oversized round tubes. Here's a good tip for you: If you're interested in assessing the likely stiffness of a frame without even riding it, inspect the girth of its tubing junctures -- that's where the tale is told. It's analogous to a suspension bridge or a tall tree, where beefy ends give the structure as a whole resistance to torsional flex. Take a long look at the headtube/down tube juncture and the down tube/BB juncture of the Excalibur and then utter one big "WOW."

While you might look at the Excalibur and think it's a mere kermesse bike -- the sort of "grip it and rip it" rocketship suited for little more than the warp speed sub-2 hour circuit races so popular throughout Ridley's homeland of Belgium, think again. It was the team bike of the UCI Continental Pro Team Unibet, led by riders no less formidable than former Tour de France Green Jersey winner Baden Cooke and Liege-Bastogne-Liege champion (and infamous bon viveur) Frank Vandenbroucke. Unibet riders cracked the top-20 in 6+ hour epics such as the Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix, as well as a host of other rough-and-tumble spring classics on the worst roads of Belgium and northern France. Team Unibet knew the secret of the Excalibur: Its oversized tubing gives it top fuel racing-like acceleration and resistance to flex, but it won't brutalize you when you head out the door for a 5-hour cruise in your 53x19.

Why do we have this bike on sale, you might ask? It's because Ridley offered the Excalibur in this Black/Silver paint scheme during the 2007 season, then changed to two different colors for 2008. In addition, the SRAM Rival componentry on this is vintage 2008. This is essentially a 2008 bike from 2007 production.

Do a quick cost analysis and you'll see that no other bike in the marketplace can match this package. The retail price on an '08 Excalibur frameset is $1800. You're basically paying for the frameset and getting an entire SRAM component package for free. The Excalibur frame is ProTour proven, and SRAM's Rival component package has all of the technological upside of Red and Force, but at a huge cost savings since Rival is built with alloy instead of carbon fiber. We round the package out with a top-notch Ritchey handlebar, stem, and seatpost. You get a Fizik saddle plus Fulcrum Racing 7 wheels and Michelin tires. Out of the box, this is a ready-to-ride, throw-down race bike.

The Excalibur is available in 4 sizes from Small to Extra Large. Given its compact geometry, we strongly suggest that you focus on the virtual top tube length as you make a determination of the proper size. The frame comes with a Ridley 4ZA Excalibur monocoque full carbon fiber fork and a proprietary FSA integrated headset. It has a 5-year warranty from manufacturing defect.

Excalibur/SRAM Rival Complete Bike Price:  $1899.00  (Was $3200.00)

2007 Ridley Excalibur/SRAM Rival Complete Bike Geometry

Size	Seat Tube c-c	Seat Tube c-t	Actual Top Tube	Effective Top Tube	Head Tube	Seat Angle	Head Tube Angle
XS	44.0	48.0	51.0	52.5	13.0	74.0	72.0
S	47.0	51.0	53.0	54.5	14.5	73.5	73.0
M	50.0	54.0	55.0	56.5	17.5	73.0	73.5
L	53.0	57.0	57.0	58.5	20.5	72.5	73.5
XL	56.0	60.0	58.5	60.0	23.0	72.5	74.0