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@Skülly
It can be good to not have something on your back, especially in the summer - I think you will find that more when things warm up. Also in on longer rides I have enjoyed this aspect - less sweat.
But the down-sides of saddle bags are there. I agree about the extra weight on the back making the whole crank-winding at lights a bit of a pain, and the extra weight there doesn't make trackstanding very easy so that's not the solution (for me at least). I have used my Carradice on my geared bike with a lot less hassle because of this.
Also I would say the downside of the weight being quite high up on the bike, is that when getting on and off the bike or wheeling it, the centre of gravity being so far from the headset means your bike can tip over whilst your holding onto the bars quite easily. Again, my geared bike has more mass lower down around the axles, so this seems much less of problem than on my spindly-framed Claud Butler conversion.
Soon I will be building a tourer with panniers, and I'd like to try the saddle bag on there too for some seriously loaded touring sometime, with lowriders and barbags and all that jazz.
But today I rode in to work with my new Grobag on my back.
I like all kinds of luggage. Horses for courses innit.