Thanks for sharing your wisdom! Growing up on Gazelle 3 speeds, my first time on a road bike was revelation in terms of steering and handling. I love to ride many kinds of road bikes and comparing the handling with each other, slowly trying to find out what I like best. When I find that goldilocks geo, I probably move on to MTB's and start the process anew .

By the way, sorry if this is a dumb question, but why don't they just build bikes with a shallow headtube and a non-raked fork? that seems to be easier to manufacture (hence cheaper). Thus far, I've only seen one (modern CX) bike like that, why is this style not more common? tradition? Aestethics?