Joined: Aug 2009
Posts: 2,786
Likes: 749
From: Winslow, AR
Bikes: '83 univega gran turismo x2, '85 schwinn super le tour,'89 miyata triple cross, '91 GT tequesta, '90 yokota grizzly peak, '94 GT backwoods, '95'ish scott tampico, '98 bonty privateer, '93 mongoose crossway 625, '98 parkpre ariel, 2k'ish giant fcr3
i'll just echo what others have said....
try a taller stem, first. i found a schwinn super le tour for $5 i couldn't pass on....because dang...it's $5. i thought it was a 56cm, but turns out it's 57cm and i'm only a hair over 5'6. i really wanted it to work for me as a drop bar sports tourer and tried a few different set ups in hopes. to the point, simply raising the handlebars up to saddle level made a surprisingly big difference in reach.
yeah, i'm only 5'6, but long legged and have not quite a full handful of seatpost showing. the original SR quill wouldn't quite come up high enough so i swapped it out with a 90mm velo orange 17* positive rise cromo stem. it's sharp looking without looking quite as odd (to me) as an actual dirt drop. anyway, the original SR road champion bars still made for too much reach, so i swapped in some nitto m151 compact bars with 75mm reach. perfect
if i'd had or could swing the cost for a technomic i would have gone that route, though. the traditional "7" shape and all