robncircus

Here's my story -
God did not bless me with long legs. At a whopping 5'4 on a good day I am failrly small in the cycling world. I have ridden track bikes (real ones - not the mass produced ones) for the past 5 years and i'm ready for a roady. A while back I have a Scattante but i didn't particularly care for the fit (probably due to the geometry on a track being so different). Anyway, i'm in need of a bike sized around 47-50 and under $1k. I'd prefer no Sora - Tiagra or 105 will do me fine. I'm looking at Jamis and Fuji but was hoping someone could make some other reccomendations. I find it's tough to find shops that carry smaller bikes so I'll likely have to order one and want to make sure i get something i'm gonna like.
all suggestions are appreciated.
Rob

slacker_express

I ride a 50 cm bike and know the problem of finding enough bikes to try. One suggestion I would have is to forget about price for a bit and just try to find some smaller bikes to test ride and see if you can come up with one or more that are close on geometry. That might get you some notion of which bike makers to focus on and to see if they sell models in your price range. This may also lead you to other bikes that you haven't tried but that have close geometries.

Of course another option is to go through a fitting and then target bikes that match up with the fit data.

Your location says Boston, so I would suggest (if you haven't already) taking a ride over to Wheelworks in Belmont. They didn't have much under 50 cm, but I was able to try quite a few bikes there. They were very accommodating and have a large number of bikes - and I rode bikes for *hours* there. They even built one up for me (in stock but not yet built) that I went back to try. I was under no obligation to buy it, but in the end I did.

56/12 and 22/28

Giant OCR 3.

powers2b

There's a 52cm Specialized Allez on ebay right now.
That's all I got.

JBD

Unless the ocr 3 is the only one that comes in small/extrasmall, the op would probably prefer an ocr 2 or ocr 1 which I believe come in Tiagara and 105 respectively-----although the 105 equiped ocr 1 might be slightly over budget ($1100 msrp?)

56/12 and 22/28

Stretch your budget to $1600 USD and get a Giant OCR Composite 3.

rpc180

REI stocks Cannondale R700s. I'd try them in the unisex 48 or the feminine 50cm (geometery almost exactly the same, like .1cm off in the chainstay is the difference). The 50cm sports some other small rider accomodations like narrower handlebars and ultegra grade reach adjust brifters instead of the 105's on the unisex r700.

998

Look around for a Tarmac Comp, 49cm. You might find a year old one in a bike shop that they'll discount pretty good. Top tube reach is bearable as well if you have a short torso.

the beef

5'4" shouldn't be a difficult height to find bikes for. You'd likely fit a 48 cm - 52 cm depending on different measurements, and almost all road bikes go down to something in that range in terms of sizing.

Kenal0

If you can go to 1099 then you can get look at a Flyte SRS-3 with 105 components. Double or triple same price. WWW.Flyte1.com
Kenal0

DrPete 

+1. My fiancee got the 50cm frame and loves it.

DrPete

AnthonyG

At 5'1" I don't fit on 700c wheeled bikes but at 5'4" you should be OK on the small frame sizes from most manufacturers. One of the big problems you are going to face is that in order to make there XS and S frames seem smaller than they are they are built with STEEP seat tube angles so that the top tube length looks short on paper but this pushes the rider too far forward with too much weight on your hands/shoulders so they are uncomfortable to ride. A seat tube angle of 75º is usualy too steep so look for a frame with a seat tube angle of no more than 74º.

See, https://sheldonbrown.com/frame-sizing.html

Also if your short legged you need to look out for cranks that are too long. At your height with short legs I reccomend that you wan't cranks no longer than 165 mm. I ride 140 mm cranks as a comparison at 5'1" and my inseam is 67 cm.

Regards, Anthony

b1ker

I am a short clydesdale - 5'3" @ 230# (down from 310) - I just bought a FUJI 44cm - it fits like a glove...

kleng

+1 any Giant compact frame