Cervelo instead of a WSD bike?

[HarlieGirl]

I'm curious if there are short women (I'm 5 ft 2) who ride a Cervelo R3 and how you find the fit. As I'm sure most of you know, its hard to test ride small or women's specific bikes. I'm currently riding a 47 Madone 5.1 and find that I'm reaching a bit. Any insight would be helpful!

[Triskeliongirl]

I ride a 48cm cervelo RS and it fits me better than wsd, because I have long femurs so I need the slack sta. All the wsd bikes have too steep a sta for my body. So while I am a little taller than you, I have to sit further back due to my long femurs so I also have reach problems. The cervelo fits me like a glove. I have a friend your size that rides the R3 (48cm). Major differences are that the RS takes 650 c wheels and has no tco, wheras the R3 takes 700 c wheels and does have tco. But both bikes handle beautifully and climb really well.

Have you also considered modifying the reach on the bike you have, by installing a shorter stem and/or shorter reach bars? The bontrager fit VR is one of the shortest available as is the salsa poco.

[wildeny]

I'm at the same height but I ride a WSD bike -- Fuji Finest RC XS (44 cm; effective tt 51.0 cm). I haven't change anything yet, but have bought a 38-cm handlebar (originally 40cm). So far, I feel it's all right -- especially the saddle . On the other hand, I never try other size so I don't know what suits me best. (I'm thinking about trying the bike fitting service)

BTW, only the information of height isn't enough for choosing a suitable frame size.

[ruffianxc]

Can you minimize your reach on your bike by changing the stem to a shorter stem or moving the saddle around.

I just switched from a men's to a WSD(Madone 5.1 WSD) and love it. Never going back. My old bike was not a cervelo though.

I'm 5'3'' for what that is worth.

[Cataboo]

Moving your saddle around to adjust the reach is a bad idea - the saddle should be set based on the length of the femur - moving the saddle forward just to be closer to the handlebars may cause knee problems, etc.

[ruffianxc]

I was just seeing if she looked into moving it at all. I've seen people who never had a bike fitting with the saddle way too far back and a long reach. She didn't include a lot of info so I guess I wanted to know if she looked into optimizing the fit of her own bike. I guess if you have it ideally for your legs you wouldn't want to move it forward. But having someone fit you for your own bike is probably cheaper than buying a new one.


Did you say your madone was a WSD by the way?