"But I don't think people should be blamed for thinking it's ugly not having seen it"
i don't blame anybody! i think everyone has the right both to have an opinion and to voice the opinion. i'm simply saying that when i go to a road show, and i fit somebody, and derive bike solutions for him or her, and we walk around the shop and talk about bikes, the folks i talk to are never reticent to share their opinions about how a bike strikes them. nobody is shy about saying, "i just don't like the way that bike looks."
in my experience, people online are more likely to comment negatively on something they don't like, even if they have no intention of buying it (and wouldn't be in the market even if they loved the looks of the product).
in my experience - when i'm talking to people in shops - it's, "wow, i love the orange on the new QR PR6," or, "I liked cervelo's P2 colorway last year more than this year," and i just don't find the opinions in person that i find online.
this is even more the case with the andean. everybody in person loves the andean.
but that doesn't mean there's anything wrong with voicing a negative opinion online. keep 'em coming!
"Oh, and because it's really really expensive."
i only partway buy that argument. does
this bike offend you, because of its price? or
this one? or the "race build", which is $500 less than the similarly equipped P5X but would you rather have the HED wheels on the P5X or the profile design wheels?
the "problem" with the P5X is that cervelo did what a lot of bike companies do, which is to build a new halo bike in one build (or two), they're premium bikes, and they cost a lot of money
because they are premium builds.
pick your favorite superbike. put di2 dura ace on it throughout. put an enve aerobar on it. put enve wheels on it. get as close as you can on the rest of the spec. tell me what you find a bike like that costs.
Dan Empfield
aka Slowman