Maybe a bit of a silly question, but anyway…

Friend of mine is wanting to get a new bike through Cycle2Work, think it will be mainly for road use but she wants a mountain bike (think it might get some cyclepath shredding etc), so she’s asked me for some advice.

Think she can get through Wheelies, Evans, and Halfords, and has a budget of around £600.

So question is as title really, do we need to limit ourselves to ladies bike? She is of fairly “standard” female proportions (ie not particularly short/tall/large/small), or will a small mens bike be fine?

What are the main differences normally- frame geom, fork stiffness, saddle?

Ta, Duane.

No. Its perfectly possible to get a ‘male’ frame to fit a ‘girl’ with some thought expended on bar width, stem length, crank length, setapost setback and suitable saddle. Additionally, ‘girls’ come in all shapes, sizes and limb lengths, just like ‘blokes’.

Next topic.

All my bikes apart from my hybrid are mens bikes, but I’ve had to change the saddle on all of them and I put a shorter stem on my two road bikes because my reach didn’t quite match up to the length of my legs.

women tend to have longer legs and shorter torsos plus a smaller shoulder width so womens specific bikes have shorter top tube, narrower bars etc

That said a male bike can be sorted to fit a women fine

Women get Cat Aids (the bad type) if they ride men’s bikes – fact

Its not essential no – however it can help – a womans saddle, thinner grips, levers intended for smaller hands, narrower bars etc.

If bought from a bike shop then they should swap the saddle, cut the bars down and change the stem (if they are any use). Did this for my GF.

It would probably matter even less if it was a mountainbike for road use as you can fine tune the size with a few components changes and alterations as the frames are generally compact.

It depends on relative proportion of her leg length to height. There is no way that my ex could have gotten a “mens” bike to fit here as she had very long legs relative to her height, she was far more comfortable on a womens bike than on a mans. That said the same may not be true for all women so whilst it may not always be the case that a woman needs WSD, it would be foolish to rule it out.

Generally speaking most women (not all) have longer legs and shorter torsos and the wsd geometries should take this into account. Likewise women tend to have narrower shoulders and smaller hands hence look at narrower bars and grips with a smaller diameter. I am not sure what you mean by “fairly standard female proportions” but I would suggest that your friend go and try some bikes out and buy the one she most likes and feels comfortable on. I only have one wsd road bike – all the others are generic bike frames which I have poured hours over making sure the geometry is right for me.

women can ride bikes?

What about reduced top tube hight to allow for pretty frocks and peticoats ?? 😆

Having ridden both men’s bike and womens, it is all down to the set up.
My SC Juliana was fantastic, however my Turner Flux is turning out to be the best bike I’ve ever ridden.

She needs to get out and demo a few.

As above. Only thing to add is that women’s specific bikes tend to have lighter springs in the forks to accommodate their daintiness.
That, or air forks so they can be run at a lower pressure.

Depends how much she weighs as to whether that’s an issue or not. A friend I used to ride regularly with is pretty petite – god knows what she weighs – but she used to run her air Reba’s with very little pressure in or they were way too firm.

My 2p.. Sometimes, maybe.

women tend to have longer legs and shorter torsos

Untrue, suprisingly. It may be more to do with perceptions from idealised body proportions as anthropometric data doesn’t back it up (US Army and Belgian national studies among others I looked up bear this out)

plus a smaller shoulder width so womens specific bikes have shorter top tube, narrower bars etc

True. They also have shorter arms on average.

Leg-to-height proportions are the same on average for men and women. Men vary as much in proportion for a given height than men and women do between them at a given height.
Average inside leg to height ratios work out as near-as the same ratio for either gender, however women can have different ability to flex in the pelvis area and different c of g to men, again on average, that creates as much need for position difference as the leg-length myth.

A lot of women are better fitted on a ‘mens’ model with a saddle / stem change and some shorter men would fit a WSD bike well too. It’s a lot easier to sell a women a standard bike than to sell a man a WSD bike though.

Of course it is entirely feasible that some men may be more suited to a WSD.

I have broad shoulders and very long arms, which is slightly unusual for a girlie, so I need wide bars. All my bikes are men’s.

We’re all different. 🙂

Yes, we need a nice new Nicolai Helius AM and WE NEED IT NOW!!!!!

Rachel

ps. I’d settle for an AC with a Rohloff.. 🙂

Don’t womens bikes have special mounts for a chocolate dispenser and handbag holder 😀

I was looking at a SC superlight a few years ago, and I am a bit ummm short, anyway I rode a SC Juliana and found it fit me perfectly, better than the small superlight (I am male by the way, although my knockers would put most birds to shame). I would have bought it but I went in a different direction instead, anyway my point being is that it shouldn’t be women specific, it should be short person friendly…

cinnamon_girl – Member
Of course it is entirely feasible that some men may be more suited to a WSD.

My other half has a Spesh Myka Sport and I really like riding it. Only been round the garden and on the odd potter on it though. It seems to fit me really well.
She won’t let me take it further afield for a proper try…. 🙂

Of course it is entirely feasible that some men may be more suited to a WSD.

When I demoed a Lapierre Zesty, one of the chaps from Hotlines said that he fit on the women specific one better than the standard one, and that he was quite grateful the paintjob just had a single, small flower on the frame rather than being a full on swirly girlfest.

it shouldn’t be women specific, it should be short person friendly…

spot on. not as marketable though )

All the biking girls I know all ride men’s bikes, with a number of them having moved from ladies specific to the men’s ones.

It’s all a big con.

I have broad shoulders and very long arms, which is slightly unusual for a girlie, so I need wide bars. All my bikes are men’s.

Same here.
I have small hands though and am not strong, so I love everything to be as light in weight as possible.

My gf has a wsd hardtail, and a mens full sus, with a wsd saddle. Still need to do something about the bars…

I have big hands so bars and levers are fine on mens bike. I’m bigger than my OH in most respects (height, hands, feet, weight…) so if he can get away with mens bikes then so can I 😉

We actually have exactly the same hardtail in the same size, but my seat is higher with a ladies saddle. And the last time we went bike shoe shopping I bought a pair of mens shoes while the pair he bought were ladies!

I’d consider buying a ladies bike though – if it fitted fine and came with a ladies saddle as standard it might work out as a better option than buying an almost identical mens version and swopping the saddle immediately.

Ladies bikes come in pink and pale blue. As far as I can work out, that’s the biggest difference.

They should call it Woman-Specific Decals.