Originally Posted by
Al Criner
On modern bikes with STI you ride on the hoods more, the ramp of the bars is not so important. In the old days you didn't ride on the hoods. Plus with the modern racing position the bars are low to begin with so a deep drop is unnecessary. If you look at old bars from the 60s, 70s or 80s the drop is huge on a lot of them.
The next logical progression, to me anyway, would be pursuit bars or bullhorns with bar end shifters. I have a touring bike set up that way and it's way more comfy and aero than any drop bar setup I've seen. Unfortunately you have to engineer your own brake lever + shifter combos so its a bit of a pain.
I've never used the drops much on modern bars because, as tunnelrat81 mentioned above, my wrists hit the bends. And with the compact styles, the drops are often too short to get a decent grip. I ride a lot of the old bars from the 60-80s and understand the issue with the hoods and getting a flat transition. But it seems to me that at the minimum manufacturers could offer slightly longer reaches in the larger sizes. Just a few centimeters would make a huge difference.