Last bike came with 700mm bars and a 70mm stem. I changed to a 780mm bar and 50mm stem. My Strava times went down and I felt in more control at speed. Tree linedtrails got a bit more tight though.
Swapped bike and it has 760mm bars and a 35mm stem. Happy with the stem length but my hands feel more ‘straight’ on the bars which isn’t as comfortable over longer distance riding. Looks like the new bars have less sweep – so I’m going to try a bar with more Sweep and going back to 780mm length and see how that goes.
Incidentally the old bike had a 31.8mm stem clamp and the new one has 35mm so wonder if that’s made things stiffer and less comfortable?
Going to try a cheap handlebar with more sweep and see how that is. Per another thread Planet X seem to be pumping out their el guapo saloon bar out in 780mm with a 35mm bar clamp for £13 instead of £30 at the moment so going to give that a whirl (it was what was on my last bike in 780mm but with the 31.8mm clamp).