Originally Posted by
tjc4golf
Bars are personal. Drop bars give you more hand positions but are narrower / less stable (though that's changing a little bit with gravel bikes) which isn't great for beginners such as the gf.
Not just bars, but bike, riding preference and most everything else are ..... personal choices.
But while you say wider bars make you more stable, I'd say that stability they add is exactly the sort of thing that might be causing a pain in the neck and upper shoulders. Spreading your arms more at the base makes you more rigid at the shoulders and you body absorbs all the jolts of the road transmitted though the arms right in that shoulder/neck apex made rigid by the wider spread hands.
Narrower bars might seem a little more unstable at first by some, but your body is able to better spread the force of those jolts over a larger area where they can be absorbed better.
Also, brakes and gears are optimized for the drops meaning brakes and gears aren't as accessible in other positions which makes them less safe than flat bars which isn't great for beginners such as the gf. Also, 1x is still more rare and expensive in road / drop configurations. All of this is debatable / my opinions.
That's a stretch in my opinion.... but as you said, it's an opinion.
A properly fitted drop bar bike has people riding more on the hoods and in the forward part of the drops. Both of which give excellent access to brakes and shifting. While the horizontal part of the bar is still available, I find myself using it less and less since switching to STI's instead of shifting on the down tube.
Regardless, no matter where my hands are they find the brakes quite quickly.
I will agree with some others that the frame looks small. More appropriate for off road use if it was set up for that. But I've seen some pro tour riders on frames that looked tiny too. If you have the year and model of that frame, you might check what the manufacturer recommended for sizing.
If you GF doesn't like the bike, she won't like the bike. Let her pick out the bike she likes. Would you like someone to pick a bike for you? If she happens to pick a bike that might not be quite the bike for the riding style you like...... well that is something you'll have to come to terms with.