After a few weeks of dialing my new bike in, last weekend I felt it was time to test it on a long ride. Saturday I rode 108 miles and felt fine so I went out on it again Sunday and put in 114 miles. On my old bike after a 100 miles I wouldn’t actually be sore from the saddle but I’d find myself standing up more to relieve the pressure. I didn’t realize it until after Sunday’s ride, but on my new bike I was just as comfortable on the saddle after 100 miles as I was at the beginning. I have the same model of Flite Gel Saddle and saddle pad as my old bike but without all the miles to break the saddle in.
One thing that I changed with my new bike was the aero bars. For the last 5 years I’ve been using the Profile Design AirStryke Aero Bar. I’ve never felt very comfortable in them. The two sides are connected and the angle of the connecting piece made it feel like I was rotating my wrists in. Also the armrest cups always felt too flexible to the point of feeling like my arms were going to roll off the edge. They also had three screw holes to adjust the width of the armrests. It felt like I needed to be halfway in between two of the holes. The thing I liked about them was the fact that the armrests fold up giving full access to the tops of the bars. The downside was that the hinges always rattled. Joe Gross wrote an article on how to stop the rattling but I never tried it. The springs would eventually break and I was about 100 miles into the Race Across Oregon when a spring broke. I had to ride over 400 miles with lots of climbing where the armrest rested on the back of my hand when I used the top of the bar. It didn’t take long of that to create a sore. Over time the pins that are part of the hinge would also work loose.
At this point I don’t want to change anything that works but I figured since I was having trouble staying in the aero bars because I wasn’t comfortable, I didn’t have much to lose in trying something new. I went with the Syntace C2 Clip aero bar because they have a 1 inch lifter to allow access to the top of the bar and be more comfortable for long distances because of not being so bent over. I have my handle bars lower than I think most ultra riders do. I couldn’t get it quite as low on my new bike with a -6 degree stem but the top of them is still a little over 1.5 inches lower than the saddle. Maybe if I got a -10 degree stem, I’d end up the same as on my old bike. It turned out because they use an adapter for 31.8 bars that I couldn’t use the lifter but the adapter raises the armrests just enough I can still get to the top of the bar. Now I’m going to put a the Syntace C2 Clip aero bar on my old bike and since it has 25.8 bars I’ll use the lifter kit on it. Another advantage of the Syntace bar is it’s 174 grams lighter. I don’t stress over a few grams but 174 is a fairly big difference.
The good news is I found myself dropping into the aero bars any time I wasn’t on steeper climbs. Even on moderate climbs I was comfortable and felt I could get good power which I couldn’t on my old aero bars. On Monday my back muscles were a little sore. It wasn’t a bad sore but was because I was pulling harder on the bars since I felt good in the position. Now I have about 6 weeks to strengthen my back muscles.
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