Why flat rather than drop bars?
 

Why do mountain bikers usually choose flat bars rather than drop bars?

^^ interesting, highly opinionated link. not true for me, but if it works for that guy... great!

drop bars, for me, lack the leverage to steer and maneuver a MTB efficiently. I have seen guys ride CX bikes with drop bars on singletrack. I have never seen a MTB with drop bars other than that link above.

I love drop bars on my road and CX bikes because I don't need a ton of steering inputs and I use the drops to get lower and more aerodynamic, which matters a lot at 20mph on the road and very little at 10mph in the woods.

Without reading the linked article, my sense is this: Flat bars are generally wider than drops, and having that wider "stance" on the bars gives increased authority in terms of balance and leverage. I could do a little force diagram to illustrate what I mean, but I'm too lazy.

Yes, exactly!

This thread was eerily prophetic btw. I went riding singletrack right after I posted and saw a guy on a CAADX cyclocross bike riding the trail. He's a badass. I would not care to take my CX bike there again. :lol:

For me the Flatbars and even bar ends allow me a better posture for climbing and descending. I like to see from a more upright position. When climbing there are times I lift the bar up towards my chest for a bit more bite on the back tire. Just me, nothing professional. I have a nice set of Thomson drops on the "other" bike.

Flat bars? Who uses those? I use HiRise. So do my peeps.

Yeah I have risers on all of my bikes. I can't even imagine riding drops on the trail. Just sounds unreasonably awkward. I guess the guy in that article is using some kind of weird drops that are wider and angled differently than you'd find on a road bike, but I dunno...I like my risers. They're wide enough to give me leverage, sit me more upright than my road bike does, put me in a good position for just about any kind of trail riding I can think of, let me move around how I want, etc.