- [Man] So, ever since I've been involved with mountain biking I've seen handlebars
evolve a lot. From sort of mid-to-late 90s when I was riding, people tended to ride
very narrow bars right up to now, where people tend to ride, I can't even
comprehend how wide their bars are. I do have a vivid memory of growing up,
of seeing Neil racing in the late 90s, going extremely fast with narrow bars.
Would you like to talk about that?
- [Neil] Yeah, it's funny. I look at old photos now, and I cringe.
They must have been probably, you know, smaller than 700 mil, but I used to ride a
BMX a lot, and I sort of used really narrow bars for that. So I thought it
was cool to use them on the downhill bike.
- Okay, wide bars. What are the pros of using wide bars? Well,
I think the biggest thing for me is you have that nice, big, wide bar, and it
makes the bike feel really planted, really stable. You've got a lot more leverage in
the corners, and you really feel like you are in control of that,
and it's confidence-inspiring.
- Yeah. A big thing I notice, if I go too wide with my bars, which actually I've got
a new bike. It's come with 780 mil on there and that's much wider than I
normally use. I feel that riding in the woods where I normally ride, I'm getting
really close to those trees and having to slow down to get through them. So yeah,
definitely smacking your hands on trees is a big disadvantage,
but also it feels a bit sluggish, not quite as nimble in the woods.
So, personally I run 740's, and that's still relatively wide, but I'm not up
there with the big, downhill 800 mil-wide bars.
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So, why use narrow bars? It's fair to say narrow bars suit a longer stem because
it's bringing your weight further forward with a longer stem. If you're then running
wide bars, it's really bringing you chest down and forward. So longer stem,
narrower bars, definitely better for cross-country. Also, going back to
something you see with road guys, when they're climbing they bring their hands
right on the tops, really close to the stem, and it can open your chest up a
little bit better for breathing on climbing.
- They're all valid points, Neil, but I just want to talk about some of the cons
of running narrow bars, you know, especially at higher speeds,
you know, like I get up to. The bike might feel a little bit twitchy underneath you,
perhaps haven't got quite the control that you would have with a wider set.
In the turns, you haven't got that same leverage and that same sort of
confidence-inspiring, sort of getting the weight through the bike to get that grip.
It just doesn't do it for me.
- No, and it is definitely something we're even seeing with the cross-country guys
and girls, they are starting to go a bit wider with their bars.
So, how do you choose the right bars for you?
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So, doing a press-up this is my natural position, hands slightly wider than my
shoulders. Feels really nice and strong, nice and stable as well.
If I try and go out too wide, okay, it's going to be much harder work,
definitely pretty tiring. But also, going back to the middle feels pretty strong
now, I could do a press-up. Again, that's quite hard work compared to my comfortable
position but also, obviously, I'm less stable. So, trying to find that
comfortable position, hands slightly wider than shoulders, nice and strong.
So, it's fair to say that the narrower bars suit a longer stem for cross-country,
where you're going to need to keep some weight on the front tire to stop that
front wheel from wheeling on the really steep climbs.
- And also, there's similar issues with the wider bar. If you have,
say, a longer stem, something like 70 mils, and you put a wider bar on,
you're going to have this effect of, like you're driving a big London bus or
something. So, the steering would be even slower with that long stem.
So if you are looking to run a wider bar, we tend to mate it with a shorter stem,
therefore you have that nimble steering but then the stability when you're up to
speed.
- Yeah, so, It's fair to say that, you know, the bar set-up really comes
down to the trails you ride and what you like to ride.
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So the other thing to talk about the handlebars is
rise and sweep. We've got two sets of downhill bars here.
Sweep is that measurement of how far the way you grip on the bar actually comes
back and also up. There's two measurements to sweep, back and up.
You see on these bars, this part of the bar's much higher off the table than these
so there's more sweep-back on these bars. Tends to be more of a personal preference
thing I think, although you tend to find downhill bars have more sweep than
cross-country bars.
- Yeah. I think that's a fair point and, as you say, I think there'd be
certain...you could give me a set of bars, and I'd be like, "Oh,
that's horrible," and you would be, "Oh no, I really like that." I think it's just
the way your shoulders are set and how it kind of fits to your body.
Rise, on the other hand, so, rise is what we're looking at here,
is if this was zero, and then it's how much rise up to here. So in this case,
it is 20 mils from here to the top of there. So, there's all different rises
that you can get. Downhill bikes, as a rule, tend to have a bigger rise,
and then a cross-country would have zero-rise handlebars.
- All right. So, there's handlebars explained. I run 740s.
- I'm running 750.
- And just let us know in the comments what bars you use, and if you want us to
cover anything else, give us a comment and we'll try and cover that stuff as well.
- And don't forget to watch more videos here on GMBN. Check out my video of
suspension forks explained up here.
- Or click down here for Si riding technical climbs, showing you how
to do that.
- I might watch that, actually. I'm not very good at technical climbs.
- No. That's what I've heard, yeah. Don't forget you can click on us if you want to
subscribe to GMBN.
- Click on me, I'm better looking than Neil. Don't click on him.