Why no upside down road bars these days?

When did they hit peak trend? Mid-80’s?
Who was the first person to do this? And Why?

Why where they always seen outside the bookies??

I bet right now, somewhere in the UK there’s a bookies, and outside there’s a road bike with upside down road bars on.

Pics.

Barends on shyte mtbs are still popular with those at the betting shops

Sportive geometry and riser stems = the death of the upturned bar.

The ‘Upturned bar’ of course, I’d forgotten the correct description.

I saw someone with upside down riser bars the other day (lowers?).

I saw someone with upside down riser bars the other day (lowers?).

I run my On one OG bars as “lowers”, and its excellent!

There’s one locked up outside the betting shop / tramp pub combo in my town. I’ve never seen anyone riding it, but it does move.

See plenty of them in Manchester

I’m pretty sure I saw upturned bars in the 60s.

Sans bar tape of course for the best aesthetic effect.

Hadn’t seen this in ages, but saw it on the stoker end of a tandem on Friday. Makes a lot of sense there really

An old bloke rides past the shop with some every weekend. Quill stem all the way up too.

My lbs had an old Wester Ross touring bike in the other day that had what looked like up turned bars on it but cut off half way round the ‘drop’ with the brake levers at the top of the cut off – felt quite comfortable, like bar ends – looks like the bars were original to the bike, so early 1980s.

Glad to know there’s some still out there, I’ve not seen any for ages.
Electrical tape as bar tape FTW

Pfft. NOOoOOBZ!

Got some on the back of my cargo bike for the boy to hold onto, perfect for the job.

road bike BSOs have been replaced by mountain bike BSOs