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Old 04-17-06 | 04:52 PM
  #64  
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halfspeed
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From: SE Minnesota

Bikes: are better than yours.

Originally Posted by banzai_f16
Ok. So drop bars come in a variety of flavors, sizes, and colors. I'll break it down into my own four categories. This isn't "official", but it's how I break it down to friends, so while there may be technical disagreement, I think this is fairly concise.
The four are: Ergo, Traditional, Flat-top, and Oddball.

Ergo: That's what's on the Sequoia. If you look closely, you'll notice that it's not a continuous curve, but rather has "steps" in it, with some straight portions. Those portions are the ergo bends for your hands. Some people love them, others don't, and others are just retro-grouches. I use a slightly older version of the Specialized Body Geometry bar on my bike, and I like them. Ergo bars are pretty much the most common anymore.

Traditional: Find a picture of some older handlebars an you'll see that the drop is deeper, with a continuous curve to it, and sometimes a shallower "reach" (that's front to back). There are people who swear by these. Wife had these briefly on her bike, but replaced them with Ritchey Biomax ergos. Said the larger curve cramped her hands.

Flat-top: If you look at the pic of the Sequoia again, you'll notice that the tops slant downwards a bit, until they hit the "brifter" hoods? The Flat-top bar, (I think made only by Bontrager and Easton) is designed to be purely horizontal to the hoods, then a sharper vertex with shallower drops.

I run a Body Geometry Ergo bar, with the tops angled only slightly down (not as steep as the ones in the pic. See how the ends are parallel with the top tube? Mine point just hight of my rear hub). I thought for a while that I needed flat-tops, but once I got this dialed in, I became quite happy with it.

Odd-balls: Midges (really really short flared drops), Randonneurs (wide and deep flared drops), Track (don't even consider it.)

Hope that answers the question.
I hope you can test-ride both that and the Sirrus Sport extensively. When testing the Sequoia, see that the handlebars are adjusted to an angle you'll like for the test...or else you'll get a false impression.

Here's my setup:
Lots of different bars will mix and match things like shallow drops, flares, ergo bends, shallow or deep ramps. I don't think your categories are very illuminating. For example, Ritchey Biomax have probably more in common with Nitto Randonneurs than they do with another "ergo" bar like the Ritchey Pro.

Bars are hard to buy because bike shop stock is often limited and they don't commonly have enough specs listed. What I'd really like to know before choosing bars is not only the width, drop, clamp and "ergoness", but also flare, rise, ramp and reach.
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