People with Drops but no Hoods

or, you could stick some blu-tack in the dummy lever, that kills the buzz.
man.

or, you could stick some blu-tack in the dummy lever, that kills the buzz.
man.

Fuck, I thought I'd invented that technique.

maybe you did, maybe you did.

Maybe I did. Maybe I invented blu-tack as well.

I am a serial bar changer.

maybe it's the dodgy hands, I'm always trying to find the holy grail

yep, over a year later and I'm still changing bars.

well I haven't changed the deda 215s which I use with hoods, great for the road. lots of time on the drops in the wind, up onto the tops for sitting back. can't abide risers any more, need my droppage.

now track, well there's a funny one. OS deep drop road bars for training, comfy on the drops (and the tops for warm-up) just trying Pro-Lite's track bar, a bit like the deda pista bar but with a longer grip on the drop, seem a bit flexy though! and there's nothing to grab on the top before they taper off which feels weedy, something between these and the dedas would be about right.

Never use hoods, although I am told I have them.

Maybe I did. Maybe I invented blu-tack as well.

I was the first to smoke it though.

Apols for old skool thread necromancy but would like some advice. I've always had risers / flat bars and I've been noticing that I'm giving myself wrist pain from trying to arrange myself in an aerodynamic position that doesn't really exist on them. From this I surmise that it's probably time to try out some drops.

I am diminutive so it's been bloody difficult to find bikes in my midget 49" frame size that I can try various drop styles on. Evans can order in anything for me but at 50 quid a pop plus a 24hr wait time for delivery I don't really want to keep going "want to try that one... now want to try that one..." ad infinitum until I find something that fits so I can try the position out etc, hence appealing to you guys for some guidance.

I had a go on a Fuji Feather and it was fucking terrifying. The bars seemed very narrow and difficult to manoeuvre around corners / pedestrians / white vans / broken bottles / etc etc, and even the tops slant downwards in an alarming fashion that made me feel quite vulnerable on the road.

I gather two things from this - 1. that the angle of the drops on that Feather really is quite steep and since I'm not accustomed to drops the transition would be too much, too soon; and 2. that hoods would make for a much easier ride in commute situations while still allowing me drop down and pretend I'm Eddy Merckx's fat cousin.

Are these conclusions accurate? Would hoods help? Is it just a transition thing? I don't want to write off the idea of drops entirely because they were good fun to use, just unnerving anywhere other than dead straight roads devoid of traffic - but at the same time I don't want to be going round the gyratory at E&C in the 9am rush hour on something I'm not in full control of.

You could just try road drops rather than track drops.

Track drops aren't really designed with hood riding in mind, on the track your best position is in the drops all the time and you'd only use the tops when slowing post-race or just moving around rather than when racing.

Road drops on the other hand generally give a top position, a hoods position, a front vertical drop position and a flat drop position.

They may not look as cool on a fixed, but they do offer multiple positions and with a narrow pair which aren't ergo they won't look totally out of place (not as much as ergo drops would).

What are flipped North Road bars like? Anyone got them?

Also I've got a spare set of drop bars but they've got some deep gouges on them (about 1.5mm deep) - I'm scared that they'll break. Because they're halfway down the drops I was thinking about chopping and flipping them into bullhorns. Shame because they're nice 3ttt bars. Advice anyone?

So that would be something like this, or the bars that come with the aluminium 2011 Langster, right? http://www.evanscycles.com/products/trek/2nd-district-single-speed-road-bike-ec020771 (not the ones on the steel langster, those bars look the same as the ones on the Feather)

The stock fuji drop bars are crap. Apart from the ones on the track 1.0 which look a bit different.

bothwell - have a look at cinelli criteriums

sort of halfway house between road and track bars, you can get them grooved for cabling or ungrooved

Yeah. Exactly that kind thing.

Nicely, thanks both - will get a dwarf-sized OTP ordered in for testing purposes first to make sure it's reasonably comfortable then think about replacements. Cheers!