Carbonfiberboy 

I'd just let you go. Go kill yourself. I'll hold a steady pace and gradually bring you back. If a group takes off, I'd accelerate and sit on the back. The more attackers wear themselves out on the flat, the sooner I'll be able to attack on a climb. It's that cube rule. On the bars is close to the same effort as drafting. I have a lot of experience and wouldn't do it if it didn't work.
You haven't been there, done that.

What it is, is racer boys look down on folks like me who use aero bars to be more competitive, maybe because I was 10-15 years older than most of them. That's OK. They're already gone, I'm still leading rides. Frankly, I don't care.

Carbonfiberboy 

You could always try them for a year and then form your own opinions. I don't have much patience.

Branko D

Yes.

​​​​​Aerobars haven't been allowed in mass start racing for thirty plus years now. They are not allowed in any (including things like granfondos which do not care about the other UCI rules) ​​​mass start events around my corner of Europe and with good reason; focusing the weight and speed of a rider at speed in a pole stuck out in front of the bike an inch in diameter is just not a healthy idea.
​​​​
In draft legal triathlon ITU bars which are joined by a bridge and do not protrude further from the brifters.
​​​​Draft legal triathlons where I am, the rules are observed and you will not start with non-compliant aerobars.
​​​​​
TT bikes are sexy and awesome (less versatile and practical, but sexy) but I wouldn't bring it to a group ride to be able to "keep up" or whatnot.

burnthesheep

Still not a competitive ride.

A group ride where you have the luxury to get in and out of clipons ain’t that competitive of a ride.

I think you’re confusing weeknight worlds rides with group rides that chase segments and drop and regroup.

Weeknight worlds, it ain’t happening. I think there’s some inflation value to the competitive nature of this ride.

spelger

people with aero bars, i swear, not an honest one in the lot.

urbanknight

Funny you should mention that. Ultra distance racers quite often favor aero bars on a regular road bike.

I wouldn't recommend changing the fit of your other hand positions unless they too feel stretched out. However, seeing as you already have a 100mm stem in your parts bin, it wouldn't hurt to throw it on for a few rides and see how it feels. I have gone as short as 90 and as long as 120 and honestly find little to no difference in handling or response.

urbanknight

By the way, if you want an aero bar with a shorter feel, the good ol' Spinacci bars will do the trick. They can easily be found for sale even though they're out of production.
https://cinelli.it/en/prodotti/spinaci-2/

Carbonfiberboy 

Back when I led the largest recreational fast group in the area, our rides did not match any of those descriptions. That was before Strava even existed. We had a good-sized club for a rider pool, 10,000 members back then, largest club in the country. The racers trained with their teams or their racer buddies. The local crit champ rode with us sometimes but on his fixed bike to make it more even. We rode his legs off in about 30 miles so he'd cut it short. Sometimes he'd complain about the pace being too fast. He was a 2 back then.

The way we did it, we tried to teach riders to ride fast and safely. I'd run the paceline and holler at miscreants. Yes, I yelled at people. We didn't regroup. Off the back was gone, see you in the beerpub, maybe. The front group would gradually get smaller as selections were made here and there. The idea was to keep the pace high and use other riders to help you do so. The after ride joke was how many riders did you come in with? My record was 3. We'd start with maybe 25, DOW.

I always won the finishing sprint until we attracted a younger racer wannabe who became. Then another guy showed up who could beat me on the hill sprints. Eventually i quit the fast group and started riding tandem with my wife in a slower group, aged out of the competition. I don't know how you do it but that's what we did here. There was one other fast group in town and we'd compete for riders by each trying to post a better route. These routes were 40-50 in winter and 60-100 in summer with a 50'/mile standard gain, but sometimes up to 100'.

We had a system for it: We'd post a route with the club and maybe 70 people would show up. We'd lead them up a nearby hill to see who could stay with whom, then divide them into 3 groups, each with their own leader and off we'd go. I started with this ride series in my mid-50s. It was tremendous fun. If we liked a rider, we'd make a personal invitation to come back and put them on the list. We'd post a ride with the club when we thought we needed a new infusion.

rsbob 

I used to lead a fair percentage of the original CATS rides for Cascade. We had a core group of about 25 with 10 showing for a typical ride. When we dropped people, we would regroup at critical turns and if someone had a mechanical, others would pitch in for a quick repair. We were not fast but ran pacelines at a more moderate 20-22 since we were there to enjoy cycling together. A few would show to ride and would either be too slow or too fast and we wished them well. We all became fast friends with lots of parties and get togethers and two weddings. I spent a fair amount of time on a custom racing tandem in Celeste green or on my Bianchi. We did Ramrod and STP in one day with our group which was a blast. 5 hour centuries was the norm.

ericcox

I gave in and added aerobars to my gravel rig last summer after seeing lots of people at events - including people at the pointy end of races - with them. They do help a lot - I certainly won't ride them in a paceline or on particularly crappy gravel, but they are fantastic for, as you say, long events, for smooth sections of gravel, and for the short pavement sections.

They do add comfort, but they also are much faster. I run a shorter stem on my gravel bikes with a slightly shorter reach than my road bike to accommodate the aerobars.

I do occasionally use the gravel bike on a road group ride before work during the week (I commute on the gravel bike). The group doesn't mind if I sit on the front on the bars. They also know I'm not going to be on them in a paceline.

spelger

do you really think they are much faster? i don't do gravel but on my road bike i actually think the bars are slower compared to the drops. i know i can get much much lower when in the drops but i can stay on the bars for much longer, maybe that is the compensation?

ericcox

While not scientific, it seems I can hold more speed at the same power on similar roads on aerobars than I can on the drops or hoods. I've worked to set up a position I can maintain with a flat(ish) back. My arms are definitely in a more aero position on the aero bars than they are in the drops.

spelger

your right about arm position, on the bars they are right in front of your core. My one dimensional thought didn't take that into consideration. I've only had the bars for a bit over a year now, really like them.

VegasJen

What are "clip on" bars? I have seen a couple people mention that, but I've never seen a bar that just clips on. Of the two sets I have on my bikes, they clamp on to the regular bars, but they're bolted down. I don't know how you could have some that just clip on.

Anyway, I have just started calling them "ergo" bars. As stated in my post above, I use them to reduce muscle fatigue in my arms. I would prefer the elbow pads to be a little further out than most bars allow for, but like I said, I'm not using them to reduce aerodynamic drag (at <20mph pace, how much aerodynamic drag to I really have anyway?). Ultimately, I do think they make me faster, but as a result of less fatigue. Not any "aero" advantage.

urbanknight

They are the same. Perhaps "clip" is a misnomer because they do indeed "clamp" onto the handlebar.

The tricky thing with that is "ergo" or "anatomic" bar refers to a drop bar with a straight section where the hands normally grip in the drops (as opposed to a uniformly curved drop section), so you're likely to confuse others using that term to describe your aero bars/clip-ons/tri-bars.

VegasJen

Well, the one thing I'm learning about the biking community is y'all have a lot of confusing terms. "Clipless" pedals you clip into, seats are "saddles", clamps are clips, plus a whole bunch more I still haven't figured out.

urbanknight

Just don't call us bikers

Carbonfiberboy 

Every sport has it's own vocabulary which one must learn. Cycling is quite ordinary, try sailing for vocabulary where some words and pronunciations go back to the Napoleonic Wars. "Clipless" refers to substituting clipless pedals for flat pedals with toe clips. Horses have saddles not seats. Bikes were developed back when everyone rode horses. Clip-on aerobars I think just refers to easy on and off, not being part of the bike's structure. About "bikers". Bikers ride motorcycles. There are two categories of bike riders, "people on bicycles" and "cyclists." We are the latter and quite snobbish about it, some of us.

Eric F 

Yep. The "competitive" rides in my area are populated by racers, ex-racers, and other fast folks. The smaller rides are 30-40 people. The big rides get 100+, even when the weather is mediocre. You show up with areobars, and you'll be getting a lot of sideways glances. You get on those areobars, and you will be asked to remove yourself from the group.

A steady tempo paceline group is not a "competitive" ride.

adamrice 

Don't even get us started on tire-size notation.

Back to the question of fitting aerobars: WIth most aerobars, the armrests are like Swiss cheese when you peel off the padding (which should be attached with velcro); this gives you dozens of ways to attach them to the brackets, to move your elbows fore/aft/in/out. You should also be able to slide the extensions fore/aft, and also rotate them (unless it's a U-shaped extension). Finally, risers can make a big difference. I put 30-mm risers on my bars. Before I did that, I could hold the aero position for 10 minutes. After, indefinitely.

79pmooney

And long before all this clipless stuff there were toeclips (that don't clip at all).

Trakhak

One more point about "clip-on"/"clamp-on" aero bars: the term was indeed originally "clamp-on," but the frequent use of "clipless" (to refer to pedals that did not require toe clips) resulted in people mispronouncing "clamp" as "clip."

Actually, two more points. "Clamp-on" came into use to distinguish add-on aero bars from the original Scott aero bars, which were formed as one complete handlebar, as below:

Symox

I talk quite a bit about aero bars for a bikepacking setup. I’m a big fan mainly for multiple hand positions and ability to lash stuff onto them. I went with Profile Designs 50a bars

urbanknight

I actually saw a local ad recently by someone who claimed he was selling his 700c wheelset to get a 29er wheelset.

Zuzus pedals

Gaining 20 seconds per mile is probably due to more than aerobars unless you're incredibly strong relative to most people in the aero position. Maybe I'm just not as good as a lot of people when I go to aerobars, but I generally go 3% to 4% faster on them than I do in the drops when I'm riding at a steady effort. For example, if I'm going 20 mph in the drops and switch to the aerobars, my speed goes up to about 20.7 mph. At 24 mph in the drops, I'll get on the aerobars and the speed will shoot up to 24.8 mph. I improved my PR from 29.1 mph to 30.7 mph (a full 5.5%) on a 1-mile (-0.97% grade) Strava segment in similar wind conditions by using aerobars, and I'm sure some of that improvement was due to my aero position, but I also might have just had a better effort that time. From the hoods to the aerobars is of course a bigger difference - for me, that's about a 7% increase in speed. Maybe I haven't got the ideal configuration with the aerobars, but I've got them where I want them comfort-wise, and it feels like my power is best in that position. YMMV of course, but if your speed boost on aerobars is typical, I'm thinking about half of that speed improvement was attributable to something other than the bars - maybe warmer (less dense) air, more tailwind or just a much better effort.