Buying a road bike for a woman....Advice please.
Evil Laugh
Posts: 1,412
Hi
The girlfriend is wanting a road bike. She's currently riding around on an old mountain bike that is on it's last legs and riding with myself and our flatmate on Carbon Synapse and Bianchi Nirone bikes is becoming a chore for her. When she goes out with us we both hardly pedal to keep up with her.
We'd rather go the second hand route and try and get more for our money hopefully 105 groupset and if possible carbon frame. She wants something more comfort orientated and loves the ride on my Synapse.
My main question is how important is it to have a women's specific frame? It's very difficult to source women's bikes second hand and being 6 foot 1 cuts her options down even more as most bikes that come up are on small frames.
Can you effectively make a man's bike fit a woman with different stem length and angle, spacers and women's handle bars (narrower and different curve?)?? This would seem the easier route to go down in terms of the amount of choice second hand.
How would we work out frame and stem size so we could buy something?
For reference, my Cannondale is a 54cm frame, I'm 2 inches shorter than her at 5/11 and but she finds the reach a bit too long and the bars a little low and wide could this be remedied with different stem and bars or would she need a smaller frame?
Lastly what sort of bikes would people recommend with a more relaxed upright position/good quality, comfy ride? £600 second hand is the limit for now with frame being the most important aspect as everything else can be upgraded in time. Would also consider frame and build to get a good frame.
Apologies that this is so long winded there's just a lot to consider.
She has her eye on a Lemond Versailles on ebay but I fear at 55cm frame the top tube (56.5?) will be too long for her. The bike looks great though.
Cheers,
Elliott.
The girlfriend is wanting a road bike. She's currently riding around on an old mountain bike that is on it's last legs and riding with myself and our flatmate on Carbon Synapse and Bianchi Nirone bikes is becoming a chore for her. When she goes out with us we both hardly pedal to keep up with her.
We'd rather go the second hand route and try and get more for our money hopefully 105 groupset and if possible carbon frame. She wants something more comfort orientated and loves the ride on my Synapse.
My main question is how important is it to have a women's specific frame? It's very difficult to source women's bikes second hand and being 6 foot 1 cuts her options down even more as most bikes that come up are on small frames.
Can you effectively make a man's bike fit a woman with different stem length and angle, spacers and women's handle bars (narrower and different curve?)?? This would seem the easier route to go down in terms of the amount of choice second hand.
How would we work out frame and stem size so we could buy something?
For reference, my Cannondale is a 54cm frame, I'm 2 inches shorter than her at 5/11 and but she finds the reach a bit too long and the bars a little low and wide could this be remedied with different stem and bars or would she need a smaller frame?
Lastly what sort of bikes would people recommend with a more relaxed upright position/good quality, comfy ride? £600 second hand is the limit for now with frame being the most important aspect as everything else can be upgraded in time. Would also consider frame and build to get a good frame.
Apologies that this is so long winded there's just a lot to consider.
She has her eye on a Lemond Versailles on ebay but I fear at 55cm frame the top tube (56.5?) will be too long for her. The bike looks great though.
Cheers,
Elliott.
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Comments
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For a road bike fit is everything (well, almost everything!) so as long as the bike fits her it doesn't matter if it's labelled as WSD, compact, traditional or any other name that manufacturers use to confuse us.
It sounds like she knows what sort of size bike she's looking for but remember the key measurement is the top tube length. You can only adjust the reach by a few cm, by changing the stem, so it's important that the top tube is close to the right length. If she finds your bike too long then look for a bike with a shorter top tube. You can always put the seat higher on a smaller frame but it's much harder to make the reach shorter on a large frame, although of course you may end up with the bars too low if the frame is too small. It can be tricky to get it right if you're buying second hand so don't rush into buying something that isn't right.
Bars and stems can easily be changed so don't worry too much about them.0 -
Evil Laugh wrote:The girlfriend is wanting a road bike(...)When she goes out with us we both hardly pedal to keep up with her.
How I wish my girlfriend would get a road bike. My Mrs. currently has a Specialized Hardrock sport disk, with massive knobblies fitted
And she always wants to come riding with me! Worst thing is average speed drops to around 11mph, and I get told off if I ride ahead!
Right, that hardrock is going on ebay...this post has made me see how pointless that bike is for her!Road: Felt AR0, Di2
Touring/commute: Dolan Multricross
TT: PX Exocet Sold because it was like a sail in the wind (sh*t)0 -
Go into a LBS and try the bikes she likes, until she gets the 'right' fit. Then, remember the dimensions and start looking for a second hand deal!Start with a budget, finish with a mortgage!0
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She also needs to think about head tube height. If she is too low on the drops, it may play havoc with her genitals as all the pressure will be on the front of her pubis area.M.Rushton0
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x8swift9x wrote:
Right, that hardrock is going on ebay...this post has made me see how pointless that bike is for her!
eh - why can't she have 2 bikes?blog: bellevedere0 -
Get her narrower tyres eg 26 x 1" (and poss. a new bike!)M.Rushton0
