Women's Road Bike £700

[Usget]

Another "what bike" thread, sorry.

My friend is getting into her cycling and wants to take advantage of our C2W scheme, which opens this week. She's tried a few bikes out and, while I've suggested getting a small unisex road bike and swapping the saddle for one designed to accommodate lady bits, she much prefers the fit of designated girly bikes.

She has tried out the Specialized Dolce Equipped and the Trek Lexa S, both 2013 models - however, for £700 both seem to have a fairly miserly spec (the Specialized comes with Shimano 2300s for goodness' sake!) Indeed, this seems to be a bit of a theme for women's bikes - the spec is slightly lower, pound for pound, than blokes' bikes... why is this?

I suggested the Boardman Road Comp Fi, which comes in at £799 but at least has SRAM Apex (I think). Does anyone have any other suggestions at around the £700 mark?

[Gizmoish]

Scott do womens' fit as well I think.

Do you know whether your C2W scheme is one of the ones that restricts you to a given chain (Evans, Halfords) or one of the wider ones?

[Usget]

Cheers for the response - I think they give you vouchers which are vendor agnostic being tied to any one retailer. Certainly one of my other colleague used his at Paul's Cycles last year, so she should have a bit of choice. There's a Giant Avail 3 2012 at Paul's for £550 which is good money, but it's XS or S only.

Scott do the Contessa Speedster, I'll suggest it to her, they all seem to have triples though...

[otolith]

Our LBS was offering my wife a Giant Avail 2 for £700.

http://www.giant-bicycles.com/en-gb/bikes/model/20...

She went for an Avail 1 in the end.

[Gizmoish]

Usget said:

Scott do the Contessa Speedster, I'll suggest it to her, they all seem to have triples though...

Triples aren't a problem for the female cyclist.

Not only do they imply a range of easier gears which help their delicate and graceful frames to scale the highest hill, womenfolk tend to have wider hips, so the extra Q-factor involved in having an extra cog at the front isn't a hindrance.

/misogyny

[Magic919]

I'd have a look at Giant as they are genuinely women's specific fit. Some of the brands just seem to change the colour scheme and not the geometry.

[DaiMichael]

My wife cycles a lot and is on her 4th bike (current one is custom frame so doesn't really count). The opinion from the couple of trusted lbs we have bought from that also stock womens bikes is that there is no real difference other than the saddle and the added flowers/girl colours (which my wife hates).

At the end of the day we (men & women) are pretty much the same (and we are all very different in the same sex) except for the hips which the saddle will fix. Everything like reach/leg length can be fixed with frame geo to suit style, seat adjustment, stem length and bar width which any shop should be able to swap about to get a good fit.

One final thing to note is that brake/gear shifters need to be adjusted so the smaller hands can reach, I know SRAM (Force, not used anything else) & Shimano (105 upward, haven't used below this) can do this, I don't do Italian so I'm unsure about them. Again any good shop should be able to adjust these to fit.

I think the main thing is to get a well fitted bike over a man/women frame thing, comfort is always key!

[otolith]

DaiMichael said:

the added flowers/girl colours (which my wife hates).

So does mine - unless it comes with a shopping basket and a sit up and beg posture, who the hell wants flowers stencilled on their bike?

[Vladimir]

Cannondale Synapse women's version is £699.

[Crippo]

DaiMichael said:

The opinion from the couple of trusted lbs we have bought from that also stock womens bikes is that there is no real difference other than the saddle and the added flowers/girl colours (which my wife hates).

At the end of the day we (men & women) are pretty much the same (and we are all very different in the same sex) except for the hips which the saddle will fix. Everything like reach/leg length can be fixed with frame geo to suit style, seat adjustment, stem length and bar width which any shop should be able to swap about to get a good fit.

Thats correct and not all at the same time. The geometry fixes on different brands are sometimes more than extra small frame size and regulation shorter top tube. Some brands tweek teh geometry like steeper seat angles and slacker head angles too. Narrower bars and stems and wider saddles etc can be changed thats truew but it all adds to the cost and its better to get it right from the off.

You mentioend elsewhere that getting eth fit correct is teh most important thing and you a bang on right there. Soem Women do not get on with ladies geometry and som emen actually prefer it.

[Crippo]

Sorry ...my typing is utterly atrocious.