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With the lack of cars I've dusted off my road bike and been getting some miles in. Love the speed and how it climbs, but it ravages the body more than my MTB or gravel bike.
I've had a bike fit, changed saddle, stem and height, but still numb hands and backache persist. So feel it's time to sell and get another.
Don't hold the bars so tight.
It takes time to adapt to a different position.
ravages the body
OK princess.... 🙂
Lucky you. My body's not been ravaged since I got married.
Yep, a Singular Puffin fat bike, just couldn't get on with it. Everything on paper was spot on, I just always preferred riding my Mukluk
I also get lower back pain from my road bikes. Less so my gravel bike due to it’s quite upright position.
Yeah, I’ve just sold my road bike because it gave me no enjoyment what so ever. It should have been great but just wasnt.
I don't think I could ride a proper road bike. Just stick some fast tyres on the gravel bike
Sounds like your bike fitter needs to up their game. My road bike definitely makes you feel every bump in the road but actually over time it’s no more fatiguing than my mtb or gravel bikes.
Bought a Surly Pugsley once, gave it 3 months. Meh. No love was felt.
Bike goes like a dream, it's the positioning I just cannot get right.
Yes unfortunately it was my shand stoater rohloff with full dream build birthday bike for life, I swapped alsorts had a couple of fits but had to let it go, turns out it wasnt the bike it was me I had an underlying hip issue agh.....
Dialled Alpine, really wanted to love it and had similar hardcore hardtails leading up to it but it felt just too twitchy and sharp steering. Geometry change when you got through the travel on the forks was scary.
I think it happens. Don’t beat yourself up. Try something different, borrow a bike etc and work out what you do or don’t like. Go again.
Oh yes, a Kaffenback. The most dead and dull inspiring ride I’ve ever felt on a bike. I knew it was time to sell it when I caught the bus to work rather than cycle that monstrosity in.
I’ve had a bike fit
You can go to two different bike fitters and get two different results. I went to a second bike fitter to get ‘saddle mapping’ done, the first thing he said was asked why my bike was set up in such an aggressive position - but it’s perfect for me.
Just have to find what’s comfortable for you. Could be that you need different bar tape, or simply raise the bars a little.
I can't do road bikes, I'm just not the right shape. And yeah, it's not so much a case of giving up on a bike as just thinking, why ride this thing if I don't like it? Happened to my poor Scandal, I had some really good times on that bike then I rode a Soul and I never had a good ride on the Scandal again, knowing what a hardtail could actually be like.
And there was my ellsworth but the less said about that disaster the better
Ever given up on a bike?
Yup... Probably 80% of the bikes I've ever owned I haven't gelled with particularly. I make no bones about the fact I'm a real princess when it comes to a bike needing to be "just right", most bikes get a handful of rides and a maybe a setup or even a minor spec change to see if they can be improved, but if I really don't get on with it, no point in hanging onto it indefinitely... As the poster says... "Life is too short to ride shit bikes" 🤷🏻♂️
When I find one I gel with though... I tend to hang onto them for a long time, and even when I could/should upgrade them, have a hard time doing so!
It's not giving up if you are doing it right, it's a conscious uncoupling.
Yeah Cannondale Jekyll that was a PSA from here a few years ago, crap geometry, crap shock, cracked frame after a few months, crap BB30, crap Sram drivetrain, crap Cannondale engineering. Hated it that much it pretty much brought about my retirement from riding mtb’s!
Sore back? Try lowering the saddle or tilting it slightly forward.
Sore hands? Try raising bars or moving them further away. Or rolling the bars back.
Sore back? Try lowering the saddle or tilting it slightly forward.
A bit of shooting into a barrel with a blindfold on there.
conscious uncoupling.
Coldplay 😂😂
Yeah 5 road bikes, they're all rubbish 🙂
Cotic bfe, just wasn't the bike for me, too dead too dull feeling.
I had an early Mojo, total disappointment, oversized steel lost all of its positive attributes.
Yep, Giant Anthems!
I’ve owned two. First was a 26” that I bought new and just never found it fun to ride, so sold it a few months later.
Then 5 years on, decided it was new bike time, went through the “what XC full suss” question, to which the stock answer is “an Anthem”, so bought a 29” version, and hated that too!! I love the way they look, but just don’t enjoy riding the. - they just seem very numb to me.
Must. Not. Buy. Another. Anthem. Ever.
Original Kona coiler for me, felt like they'd taken a fairly decent xc bike and just lifted it by 2" to give more travel. Same angles, and a silly high BB. Only thing it was good at was very rocky, tricky climbs.
Yes a few but wait for Ton, he’s struggled with a number. I loved road bikes in my teens and twenty’s but now for roads I would rather take out my rigid mtb with road tyres than my ti road bike with drops. Roads just too much on going relentless tarmac, trail bikes on single track Please!
If I were to be going for a bike fit, it would be for one of two reasons - speed or comfort.
Sounds like your road bike may have been fitted for speed.
I've never had a bike fit, but for comfort small adjustments until you get it spot on is key. You do need to acclimatise to a road bike a bit too. Or just replicate your gravel bike position but that's probably a bit pointless.
Having said that, maybe the aggressive position isn't for you, the gravel bike might be better for what you want. I've acclimatised to drops a lot since extending the commute (Well, fully de-acclimatising now!) and to the position from doing some racing at the velodrome, but I wouldn't ever have only a bike with that position, some days my aero ambitions write cheques that my spine can't cash.
I did have a bike that I just couldn't get on with. In the end, my brother bought it and ran it for a good couple of years until it cracked, by which point he was fully back into MTBing, so it was all good! It was a pity, as I really wanted to like the bike, but just couldn't get on with it. One problem was the forks needed sorting, and I put it down to the forks not being good.
Original Kona coiler for me, felt like they’d taken a fairly decent xc bike and just lifted it by 2″ to give more travel. Same angles, and a silly high BB. Only thing it was good at was very rocky, tricky climbs.
I had one, but it had 30mm longer forks, which didn't help the BB height at all, but the handling descending over rocky things that might cause pedal strikes was great!
Only once, not given up exactly, but I had a OnOne 456 years ago, I was between sizes so bought the smaller one (18") and used it for quite a while but always had a niggle about it. Then they had them on sale (of course they did, this is On-One remember...) so I bought the 20" just to see and moved all the bits over. It was immediately obvious I should have bought that one in the first place...
I rode a Giant NRS for a few years. It was fairly quick, but never nice to ride. I played around with forks, bars, stems, etc., but I never liked it. Replaced it with a 26" Anthem, much nicer to ride.
A Pace RC305. I thought I wanted a hardtail, I thought I wanted a "Pace"
Turns out I wanted neither. It felt totally dead.
How much do you ride the roadie normally and what kind of shape are you in? Personally I do find that proper, racy, road bikes do require more commitment to physical conditioning than other bikes. Even swapping from my winter bike to my summer one, which is just a hair longer and lower, I end up with the odd ache, but worth it for the feel of the thing until I acclimatise.
A week or 2 of being lazy in the winter due to bad weather or doing other stuff, and my lower back will give me some gyp - ride more, stretch more, look after myself better and it goes away again. I've been riding the summer roadie a lot (within NCNGNF!) over the past few weeks and it just feels better and better as I spend more time on it and get stronger.
For me - bad back = tight hamstrings/glutes and a collapsed pelvis (too much desk time), numb hands would suggest you're supporting yourself too much with your arms, rather than your core. Sure in both cases you can tinker with the bike (or change the whole thing), but its cheaper to tinker with yourself... (arf!) If you've had a bike fit, that suggests the bike shouldn't be too far away from right - its not rocket science or black magic afterall.
Yep. Genesis Vagabond
Loved the concept.
Loved the paint.
Couldn't gel with it. It wasnt 'steel' enough to justify the heft. It wasnt ergonomic enough to justify the handling, and it wasnt fast enough to justify the overall comprimise.
Went back to my CAADX which is a lot faster and more comfortable despite being aluminium, sharper angles and less tha half the tyre volume.
Really fancy another propper gravel bike but just think Id miss the CAADX.
Revolution hybrid something.
Right size for me, just was way too short with wheels of lead, tyres of plastic doom levels of grip, handlebars of scaffold pipe flex/comfort and a saddle that you could feel the mounting points through your butt.
The only good bit was the Shimano Nexus hub - and even that was iffy to ok with you.
By the time I priced up replacing everything, it was cheaper to sell and buy a another cheap bike.
Amazingly I stuck at it for nearly three months of commuting 16 miles a day.
Original Kona coiler for me, felt like they’d taken a fairly decent xc bike and just lifted it by 2″ to give more travel. Same angles, and a silly high BB. Only thing it was good at was very rocky, tricky climbs.
Me too actually, except mine was the 2nd or 3rd gen delux version. I just never fully got on with it.
More recently , a Cannondale Scalpel. It was fast for racing which is what I got it for, but was just not much fun to ride and fest very flat and wooden, so it had to go. Sold it after less than a year.
Sort of.
Bought a Kona Paddy Waggon fixie as a commuter bike. Figured it'd be maintenance free, great in teh city and make the morning commute a bit more engaging.
The problem was that my commute is 14 miles and has 900ft of climbing in it. After 2 months of trying I realised that it was the wrong tool for the job and it took all the fun out of the ride.
However, with a few tweaks to the spec, it's actually proved a great bike for short little trips and also for canal towpath rides.
1992 Marin team issue Raced it, rode it, it murdered me. The ridged downtube and all round oversized tange prestige tubing was brutal even with a 50mm Rockshox mag 21!
Still suffering white knuckle.
Here's something that doesn't get mentioned so often, have you tried a wider pedal stance width on your road bike? I'm the same as you, can ride a racey mtb all day long but my road bike hurts within hours- still ride it though. I tend not to ride my road bike in winter and when it comes to rolling it out again I find the stance width (Q factor) makes my hips and lower back ache until it gets used to it. You can alter the cleats a bit to gain a few mil, use pedal washers on some pedals, or some pedals come with different axle lengths - a slightly wider stance can sometimes help people with bowed legs get more comfortable. As for hands, raise the bars 5mm+, make sure your saddle position is correct for/aft - you should be able to ride along hovering your hands above the bars supported by your core, if you can't do this and fall forward you could try moving the saddle rearward (counter-intuitive but can shift weight balance back to the saddle a bit) + run lower pressure in your front tyre- I go as low as 80psi on a 25c, used to be 110psi all-round back when hands/wrists weren't knackered. Or buy a Roubaix/Domane/Synapse.
If your back is sore and your hand are numb is does sound like you are pitched (falling) forward into a too aggressive position for your body condition.
Try saddle a bit more forward to support you more and get a higher rise stem before you give up on the bike.
I bought a Saracen Kili Cromo in 2010 to replace my On One Inbred, basically I wanted a 853 tubed Inbred as the 4130 tubes seemed a bit dead. Unfortunately I couldn't find one. On paper the Saracen had similar geometry but had the tubeset I wanted plus it looked gorgeous.
When I rode the Saracen it lacked the Inbred's bomb-proof feel but also lacked any steel "feel". I guess the CEN regulations had something to do with that. Fast forward to 2019 and I got a Pace RC627. It does feel bomb-proof but also lacks that mythical steel zing. I do love it though, but I think that has something to do with expectations and recent geometry changes.
Never given up on a bike but I've given up whilst on a bike a few times 🙂