I liked the bike however just as background admittedly my views might be skewed by a lack of experience of many different bikes.
To explain despite the fact that I've been cycling on a regular basis for about 25 years, and I'm also a daily commuter these days, I'm not in the habit of changing bikes much. When I was younger I had two Raleigh MTBs, a Mustang followed by an Apex which was my daily bike up until about 5 years ago when I bought a secondhand
Trek 7.1FX hybrid which is the bike that I commute on daily now. In this time I've always done a lot of road miles and I appreciate that the MTBs were not the best tools for the job but when I was younger that didn't stop me from getting plenty of road miles in and plus I could use it off road whenever I wanted.
Anyway back to the subject of the Genesis Day One Alfine and now that I'm older (& hopefully wiser) I'm saving up to get something more suited to my daily year round all weather commuting which these days is the majority of my riding because having two young kids I don't get any spare time to ride just for fun.
I want a steel framed IGH bike hence why the Day One Alfine appeals. However having always ridden derailleur geared bikes I wanted to give a hub geared bike a try over my commute. I test rode the blue 2014 Day One Alfine 8 and I really liked it over my 20 mile round trip commute. I'm in the East of England and so compared to many other parts of the country my commute is pretty much flat as a pancake apart from a few undulations. Therefore I didn't really have any need for the lowest/easiest (if I've got this the right way around) 3 or 4 gears but I was comfortable on the flat with the other gears. On the downhill I was spinning out but I guess this could be address by a rear sprocket with less teeth if required but on my commute this didn't bother me as I just freewheeled for a little bit if spinning out on the downhill. After all it's just a commute and not a race. Anyway the gear ratio and whether it suits you will no doubt be affected by the terrain and hills of where you live and how much weight you carry when commuting. However for me I found the IGH experience a good one. On the Alfine 8 it had a bar end shifter which I got on well with but I guess the shifting on the Di2 version of the bike that you're getting will be different.
To me the ride was a comfortable one and for me personally I'm not too worried about the bikes weight because for me on my commute the bikes other features and suitability for my commuting all year around in all weathers is more important to me than saving a bit of weight here and there.
Anyway in summary I liked it but feel free to take my opinion with a pinch of salt because I'm a long way away from a test rider with experience of many different types of bike.
Hope that you enjoy your Day One Alfine!
John
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