erm. If you're ever in the DC area, I have 3 bikes you can ride to see how they fit!

But definitely, it's getting started from high gears or going up a hill that I really feel it in my knees on 170's... I do have patellofemoral syndrome or whatever in my right knee - so it has a tendency to track wrong because the muscles on the inside of my thigh aren't as strong as the muscles on my outer thigh, so they pull my knee cap off track. On 165 cranks... I don't feel my knees till maybe 40 or more miles? Depending on how hilly it is... If I'm on 170's... I feel my knees fairly instantly.

And yes, I need to do my knee exercises more often.