Originally Posted by lawlessbeanr

I'm a complete noob to road biking and made a rather quick purchase of an entry level road bike from Amazon the other day. (Wish I had researched more)

Issue #1 : I'm 5'8" - 5'9" and with that alone I went ahead and bout a 54cm frame. When straddling, the frame does barely touche my balls...but I can stand flatfooted and bounce a little bit as long as I rest my balls on the frame.... From my understanding, there should be a small gap of space between your balls and the frame. This honestly isn't a huge deal for me but then again I'm new to road cycling and don't know any better.

Issue #2 : When I'm riding, my hands naturally go to the "ramps" or the "shoulders" of the handlebars. I do not feel comfortable going ALL the way to the hoods (with my fingers on the breaks) because I feel way too outstretched. So instead, I hold this part:



I basically only feel comfortable going all the way to the hoods when I'm going downhill so I can break if needed, otherwise I avoid it because I feel outstretched.

With me not being comfortable on the hoods, feeling outstretched and whatnot, could that be an indication that my bike is too big for me? My seat is pretty much all the way forward, maybe I can move it a few more cm. Should I play with the handlebar postion a little more and see if that helps?