I personally wish I would have listened to the wisdom of the group when I joined this forum in '08. I would have saved a lot of time and money...
I originally had 46cm Noodles on my Hilsen, but found the drops unusable at the time as they felt 'way too low' and the 46cm was wide enough that my forearms hit the tops when I was in the drops - that was weird. I was also coming from years of flat bar mtb riding, and hadn't ridden in drops since the 80s. I then went down the long slow spiral of "cockpit madness" trying porteur bars (liked, but numbed hands over 50 miles), albatross (weird curve angle for my wrists), moustache (nope - too few positions). After several years of experimentation, when I started doing longer rides (100, 200km), going to Nitto 115 (plain old drops) I had the revelation that a narrow drop works really well. I ended up finally on 42cm Noodles (nirvana), but, on the recent Oregon Outback I tried 44cm Noodles on my Hunqa to get more leverage and, while they kept my hands happy like my narrower noodles, they didn't give me quite the leverage to feel in control on some of the fast gravel descents with a good load in low-riders. Perhaps 46 or 48 Noodles - yes back to the beginning? I also realize that most of the time, my aero position is putting my hands on the flats close to the stem, bending my elbows, and dropping my body down. I almost never use the drops, but they are nice when I'm doing a fast descent into the wind on gravel or road. They also allow me to stretch my back out a bit more. The following is a summary of some things I've learned: 1. Drops give you the more positions for your back and hand pressure relief, as well as allowing control and aero positions when you are riding into the wind 2. Narrow bars work well with "easier steering bikes" a-la low trail like my Toussaint, or when used with higher trail bikes on the groomed road with light loads 3. Gravel and higher trail requests more leverage (wider bars) for confidence, of which the Albastache is more ideal for me due to the brake position in the front (where hands are when descending fast), and the good wrist angle I get in the curves compared to the Albatross 4. I wasn't super comfortable in drops until started riding longer distances, and improving core strength helped a lot - pilates is good, easy, and doesn't require a gym membership or equipment 5. All this is my opinion only - you may have the opposite experience... Brian Hanson Seattle, WA -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
