Track bike, sizing down from 61 to 58 cm when 193 cm tall?

Aventon Cordoba 61 cm w 110 mm stem with the seat adjusted to my leg length, but like the 58 cm frame better. I’m 193 cm tall.

Would sizing down to 58 cm and slapping on a 120 mm stem be crazy here?

If the geometry is as per the website, it has a 75 degree seat angle and 74 degree head angle. The effective top tube isn’t that long at 56.4 cm. You might need an even longer stem, but I regularly ride 120 stems fine on 56 framed bikes. A bigger issue is likely to be bar height, although you have plenty of spacers there.

I know you like the colour, but a Dolan precursa in 58 (58 cm top tube) or 60 (61 cm top tube) would be a better fit for the same head and seat angles

Does that picture show your ideal bar height or just seat height? Dropping down a frame size will presumably lose another 10-20mm from headtube and you will end up with a LOT of spacers.

The only reason to size down would be to get the bars lower. On that 61 you could flip the stem and remove the wad of spacers – if that’s not enough then by all means get the 58, but it sounds like the 61 would ride better due to not using a broomstick for the stem. The suggestion above re. the Dolan might make sense too.

@kerley the bars are too high here, i would probably keep once spacer and slam the stem.

@tired Dolan with deep silver rims is indeed another way to go and would give me better breaking in the wet at the expense of some grams of wheel weight compared to basalt carbon rims.

I thought about running it fixed 48×14 with only a front brake and a basalt carbon front wheel plus carbon specific pads and ultegra calipers, but I’m starting to think that combo will be dicey in the wet: hard to get a lot of braking force through the rear so you’re nearly fully reliant on a wet carbon rim for (emergency) braking?

@philjunior does 10mm of extra stem length have that much to say? I’m going to test a 58 cm bike this weekend with the same stem length.

I thought about running it fixed 48×14

Good luck. It’s a massive gear to pedal! I ride 42×14 on fast (average 20-21 mph) club rides. I did a TT on 50×14 and could barely pedal into a headwind. My TT fixed is now geared down to 50×15 and that often feels like a chore.

One frame size down is no big deal. A longer stem for the same reach and stack (and a few more spacers) improves handling as there is more weight over the front wheel. On a 74 degree head angle, that’s no bad thing. You’ll increase the likelihood of toe overlap though.

You couldn’t PAY me to ride a single front brake on a carbon rim in the wet. Alloy is no issue (TT bike), but I like my teeth. In the wet (esp on damp slippery roads), I do like the rear wheel braking on my road bike for more sensitive speed modulation, but it is not as big an issue as one might think. Forget skid stops, in a big gear I use pedal pressure to modulate speed in a group, and that is about it.

Look at stack and reach, frame size is meaningless. And yeah 48×14 is a big gear for general riding.

@Tired It would be about 90.7 gear inches, but do most of my current cycling at 93.7 so I should be fine here in flatland. In headwinds you just have to get out of the saddle. Helps that I’m 200 lb and lean, got some powah – just prefer grinding to spinning, and love sprinting 🙂

Duly noted about the wet, but did you run basalt rims? People say they make a big difference.

Helps that I’m 200 lb and lean

You’re 133% me 🙂

Top tip – if you want to swap gears, go for Miche track cogs, the mounting is very easy (unless you go 13T). I use mine to swap between 1/8 and 3/32 sprockets, as well as number of teeth. All you need is a lockring tool. It’s been a revelation. The Dura Ace sprockets are feeling a little unloved and consigned to my indoor wheels.

For rims, I have Giant carbon rims and a vintage set of ZIP 440’s. I haven’t died, but my goto wheels are HED JET6/9 for racing and CXP33s/Open Pros for training. Alloy is hugely better, but carbon is OK. Front only brake is a TriRig (umop will like that) and on alloy it’s very good. I haven’t tested it on carbon. It has salmon pads.

Interestingly the 59 cm Cinelli vigorelli XL has a shorter effective top tube than than the 58 cm cordoba..

It has brakes, so must be a road bike, not a track bike 😂

Cheap catalogue frame has wierd geometry shocker.

Just about every choice your making is aesthetic rather than actually ridability so like the last thread I say go for it.

It’ll look great in photos.

It’ll be a pig to ride.

Tried the 61 cm one and definitely felt at home, but could be more aggressive. It can definitely look right AND work right too

With a top tube that short, I’m not surprised.

a Dolan precursa in 58 (58 cm top tube) or 60 (61 cm top tube) would be a better fit

*cof* 😉

What @trail_rat said

It’ll look great in photos.

It’ll be a pig to ride.

Have you had a bike fit? 193cm is tall and you need to get it right

Top tip – if you want to swap gears, go for Miche track cogs, the mounting is very easy (unless you go 13T). I use mine to swap between 1/8 and 3/32 sprockets, as well as number of teeth. All you need is a lockring tool. It’s been a revelation. The Dura Ace sprockets are feeling a little unloved and consigned to my indoor wheels.

Another option is a Halo Fix G hub. I have used them for 5+ years and they are great. They have a fixed spline the same dimensions as a cassette body so you just slide on a single speed cog. The big benefit is that you can get chainline perfect with a side benefit of no chance of cog slipping if you don’t run brakes.

It has brakes, so must be a road bike, not a track bike

Correct. As you know a dedicated track bike has no need for brakes so has no drillings for them. A bike made for track or road will have brake drillings.

a dedicated track bike has no need for brakes so has no drillings for them. A bike made for track or road will have brake drillings.

So are you saying we need to say “a bike made for track or road” (or “a road bike but with really steep angles and a fixed gear”) just because a handful of purists don’t like the idea that a bike with caliper drillings can be called a “track bike” even if it’s identical in all other respects to the purist’s idea of a track bike? 🙂 Do we also have to say “a bike made for road or CX” to describe a CX bike with bottle bosses?

I mean, there’s a ruddy great photo of a bike with two brakes right at top of the page; I think most of us can understand what the OP’s talking about.

a dedicated track bike has no need for brakes so has no drillings for them.

That’s pretty recent. You’d be pretty hard-pressed to find a steel fork that wasn’t drilled. There was a time when people cycled to the track rather than throw their carbon bling into the Audi 😉

I don’t care what you call them but a dedicated track bike will not have brake drillings, that is all.
Call all the others single speed if you like. I didn’t bring it up by the way, was just replying to someone who was clearly having a dig.

No more will be said on it as it is not what the thread is about.

Just want a light, aggressive and somewhat aero 1 gear road bike.. I could build one that weighs 6 kg with 50 mm basalt brake track carbon wheels for about £1000 new – a lot of speed for your buck.

Ideally I’d get one with disc brakes, but that eliminates the track frame option. Planet x has a disc brake aero bike for the same price (without the aero wheels), but,,

Just want a light, aggressive and somewhat aero 1 gear road bike.. I could build one that weighs 6 kg with 50 mm basalt brake track carbon wheels for about £1000 new – a lot of speed for your buck.

It depends how aero you want to go. On track, I’m happy to run low bars as I don’t have to ride it to work if I get a bad back, and won’t ever ride it for that long.

I would be even less bothered about a low front end (the only benefit you’ll get from it) from a smaller frame if you’re using it on the road. You’ll almost certainly get the front end down low enough on either. I don’t know what the geo is, is the 58 really only 1cm shorter than the 61? It would seem to me that it would want to be ~3cm longer, meaning a 3cm longer stem The 61cm is 22mm longer, so you’d need a 20mm longer stem, assuming the stock stem on the 61 is the correct length. A long stem’s not the end of the world, but 120mm is getting towards the outer reaches of what’s sensible, and you might find after a few weeks you want something longer still.

I could build one that weighs 6 kg with 50 mm basalt brake track carbon wheels for about £1000 new – a lot of speed for your buck.

If you are riding on very flat roads with a very high gear the 6kg will not be that relevant. As you say you ride a big gear and ride very fast it is all about aero so get the most aero frame, wheels, bars etc,.

Good point about weight, guess you’ll gain a lill acceleration but not that much at 90 kg body-weight.

Good point about weight, guess you’ll gain a lill acceleration but not that much at 90 kg body-weight.

Yep, you really won’t notice a KG or 2 when it makes a difference between 96 and 98 kg overall given your use case of high geared flat riding. If I am honest I probably don’t really notice it and I am the polar opposite weighing 70kg and running a 61inch and love climbing.
Just increased the weight of my bike this week by 1.2 kg by swapping to a steel frame and fork so will see if I notice that in a minute once the light is up.

@Bez
In the topic it starts with track bike. But FYI:
The real main difference between a track bike and a fixie or singlespeed road bike is bottom bracket height (and traditionally a corresponding longer head tube).
Because of the steep banking (especially on indoor and other 250m tracks) bottom bracket heights are higher on track bikes. If you take a non-track-specific fixed road bike onto a track you will clip the pedals on the floor. If you have 175mm cranks on top of this you will not get round the banking without coming a cropper unless you’re going fairly quickly, especially on the inside line next to the cote d’azur.
I’m old enough and tall enough that when clipless pedals came in I was able to switch from 165mm to 170mm cranks because they had that bit more clearance.
If you’re never going to use it on a track, as OP possibly is or isn’t (because @TiRed many people do still ride miles with front or both brakes and take them off at a track), then you don’t need a track specific bike and will have a bit more stability (and shorter head tube) with a lower centre of gravity due to lower BB.
That is all.

The real main difference between a track bike and a fixie or singlespeed road bike is bottom bracket height (and traditionally a corresponding longer head tube).

A lot of frames made for fixed gear and single speed road use keep their high BB. The Aventon pictured at the start of this thread definitely does as you can see it just from the picture and the angle of the chain stay. In fact the only frame I have used in the last 20 years that had a road height BB was a Surly Steamroller which does feel a bit more stable than most other frames I have ridden.
Pedal strike on the road can still be a problem and 175 cranks with a road bike height BB could get you into trouble.

Low bars do not always mean a low position, especially if you are locked into the drops. The reason why modern road bikes have a comparatively large saddle to bar drop is to facilitate a tri bar style position on the brake lever hoods, bending the elbows allowing the head to be tucked in and thusly resulting in an almost time trial position. On a track bike or a fixed wheel bike ( I cannot allow the word fixie) with no brake levers, a less severe drop allows the rider to bend the elbows and tuck more easily. Look at all the track greats from the past, bars almost level with the saddle but they still had flat backs. I’ve got a 58cm Vitus track bike and it’s tiny, I’m 1.88 and I wish I bought a 60…

58 cm cordoba in all her glory, seatpost at min insertion..

Moi

A tad small when on the drops, otherwise A ok, a 59 or 60 would be ideal.

@pullfaces good point about road frames and bb size, the big difference for me is horizontal dropouts, but if going the SS route you could use a chain tensioner or other tech to convert to SS.

Maybe I should go full aero SS instead, aero frames don’t save too much, maybe 1.2 km/h at 250W, but aero carbon wheels save 2.2 km/h https://road.cc/content/blog/175749-buying-watts-how-much-difference-does-aero-bike-make

So, how much speed can I get for £1000 used (no recumbents or electric motors please)

No, not suggesting to use a disc wheel, but look how cheap second hand carbon is!

Ultimate budget pick, used planet x aero disc with 50 mm carbon wheels. Throw in a used aero helmet on top.

Aero frames are worth very little. Position is what matters. Ray Booty rode the first sub four hour 100 on 88” fixed with conventional drop bars.

The traditional track drop bars have a drop of 17cm! That’s how you get seriously aero on normal frames. I have a set and the position is just too intense for normal riding. A few minutes on the track is ok. My road fixed (paddy wagon) has A higher BB. All of my fixed bikes have 165 or 170 mm cranks. I’ve never had a pedal strike.

The Dolan Pre Cursa and Paddy wagon have the same head angle and seat angle (73 each), but the Dolan is a 54 and has a longer stem and lower front. It also has TT bars. The Dolan Seta and steel Poyner have a 74 degree head angle. The Poyner is twitchy as hell and only really suited to track. The Seta is still a nice ride and a 56.

For road riding, I do prefer the steel framed 73 degree parallel geometry. It handles the same as my other bikes.

Edit. That second photo says get a bigger bike.

Worth about 1.3 km/h at 250w according to the article, i guess how little that is depends on your perspective. Could be fun to try to get something as fast as possible on a budget, clearly it would be a used bike with aero wheels, just not a lot of used track bikes out there compared to road bikes.