Women specific cycle clothing

Bendix your bike dungeon is beginning to resemble fiddy's!

Bendix your bike dungeon is beginning to resemble fiddy's!

I'll be (reluctantly) selling the Pinarello.

Get a custom-built Roberts.

oh, you mean the Life thing for £995? Hm. It's all a bit retrocool, I think I'd rather have something with bits of carbon on it for racing.

edit: I am aware this post makes me look slightly idiotic but I don't care.

Fair enough.

Two Wheels Good in Stoke Newington have alot of women specific clothing, not sure what it's like, did ask once about a waterproof to be told 'its all womens clothing here'

A (female) mate of mine has the Ladies Trek equivalent of that Spec Ruby (in pink, unfortunately) and she loves it. Its seen her up & down many a dale, so perhaps worth considering (depending on what colours they do now)?

I also love icebraker, but I also meant to say that Ground Effect in NZ do cheap Merino stuff for women/girls/ladies/females/the farier s*x etc
http://www.groundeffect.co.nz/products-WOM.htm

but seeing as I've never ridden a ws bike thought I'd see if anyone has any recommendations for ones suitable for racing on, up to £1000.

So, you need to decide how important to you it is to get a WS bike. Opinions on the importance of a WS bike vary, so my conclusion was that it's down to personal preference/dimensions. A women's frame will be shorter in the top tube to compensate for our spider like bodies. It'll probably be more expensive than the equivalent men's bike.

You can race on anything. Until you start riding it, you almost won't know what you want. Bit of a catch 22 but you can always upgrade parts. The lower-end road bikes tend to have more relaxed, all-day riding geometry and as you spend more you get a more aggressive ride.

My first road bike has done me proud, I bought it for £300 from BC classifieds - it's not light, it's not carbon, it's bottom of the range groupset and I think it's too big for me. But hey, I can still ride the thing. Before you buy there's so many options. Do your research then just commit. The Spesh Ruby has got really good reviews...

So, you need to decide how important to you it is to get a WS bike. Opinions on the importance of a WS bike vary, so my conclusion was that it's down to personal preference/dimensions. A women's frame will be shorter in the top tube to compensate for our spider like bodies. It'll probably be more expensive than the equivalent men's bike.

You can race on anything. Until you start riding it, you almost won't know what you want. Bit of a catch 22 but you can always upgrade parts. The lower-end road bikes tend to have more relaxed, all-day riding geometry and as you spend more you get a more aggressive ride.

My first road bike has done me proud, I bought it for £300 from BC classifieds - it's not light, it's not carbon, it's bottom of the range groupset and I think it's too big for me. But hey, I can still ride the thing. Before you buy there's so many options. Do your research then just commit. The Spesh Ruby has got really good reviews...

I think I need to go have a play in a bike shop. My not very good rationale for going ws was that if I don't get a ws bike I'll probably have to change the bars, levers and stem but then thinking about it I can do that anyway on the cycle to work scheme... it doesn't have to be entirely off the peg. (but I do have to do it through CTW as I can't afford a new bike otherwise).

But the shorter top tube does make a big difference for me.

But there are probably road frames that have a close to ws top tube length anyway like my Soma.

hmmmmmmmmm.

bike shop playtime.

thanks for the advice.

I don't know anything about the Womens Specific Stuff as I've no experience of being a woman, but have spent a lot of time trying to get bikes to fit me and my advice if you are not the stock shape size for most bikes be very careful. If you have a bike that you think is close at the moment I would really recomend getting a bike fitting, then you can take the data from this and make sure the frame/bike suits you properly. I bought a new bike then went for a fitting and ended up replacing the stem, bars, seatpost and cranks. I wish I'd got the fitting done on my old bike and then got something that is right straight away, it would of saved me loads on money.

have a look in condor. they will fit you to the bike and you will be able to get the correct bars and stem plus they will be able to swap out the levers for the shimano ones with reach adjustment (if you have small hands) or you may find campag or sram levers suit you better so you can pick and choose. you will not be left with bits to sell or buy after getting the bike.

Condor would be good but it's too pricey.

I think I am basically stock for ws geometry but I need to play with some tape measures as well as bike shops.

Condor would be good but it's too pricey.

the condor italiaRL (short top tube womens specific model) is £200 over budget but you get fitted and get to choose sram/campag/shimano and the bars/stem/crank length will be correct.
you could easily spend that and more correcting an OTP bike that doesn't fit properly, i wouldn't dismiss them.

Rapha would be good but it's too pricey.

Really?

It's the cycle to work scheme, I can't go over £1000 because it's against the law*... much as I'd love a Condor to go with my flash new Rapha/Condor skinsuit... ain't gonna happen anytime soon.

*without a licence costing £750 approx that there's no way the charity I work for is going to pay for

You can top-up the voucher with cash when you go in to redeem it.

No need to limit yourself to £1,000.

reaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaally?

I didn't know that.

hm, I might have to go pay Condor a visit.

Yeah I got a bike for £1150 and just had to pay the £150 myself and the rest went through my job

this changes EVERYTHING.

What have I done?

I'm going to get one of those Rapha Condor ones and pretend I'm on the team. Yeah!

so much for trying out women specific road bikes... I can't find a single bike shop in London (that does cyclescheme) that even has any of the standard versions of the bikes I'm considering in a 52cm in stock, let alone the women specific version.

I'm going to spend 2 grand on a carbon recumbent instead.

also, what happened to Condor? Their bikes got kind of ugly.

It's a bad time of year to be buying a bike, sadly. Most shops are waiting for 2010 models to arrive in stock and are trying to sell off their 2009 models as quickly as they can.

Doesn't that make it a good time? I'm after an 09 model on sale.

I just missed the last wsd Madone 5.2 in my size with 500 quid off :(

It does make it a good time if you can find one in your size. Trek's UK office should be able to help you track one down in your size.