Quote Originally Posted by Catrin View Post
My LHT has a mixed drivetrain: 11-34 rear cassette, and a Shimano road crank. My Gunnar has the same rear cassette but it also has a SRAM mountain crank that provides a different gear ratio. Really the only thing that is similar between the two drivetrains is the rear cassette. Everything else is different from the shifters on back.

I am a sold SRAM woman now
Crank, do you mean the thing that holds the pedals to the bike? I measured the two bikes cranks. Old bike is 7.5 inches and new bike is 8 inches. Plus the pedals themselves are enormous on the new bike compared to the old bike. Both of those things probably give greater leverage.

Zoom, Since the bike is overall significantly lighter , I imagine the wheels to be lighter also. The wheel size is much different in width and diameter. My old bike has narrow tires (for me) 1.25 inch and they are 700cc. The new bike has 2.25 inch tires and they are 26 inch. Also the frame is quite different even though they are both low entry design frames. The new bike has the tube that holds the seat going up at a lesser angle and the tube running up to the handle bars is much higher and steeper. For example when I come off the seat at a stop and straddle the bike the handle bars on my new bike are up higher around the top of my rib cage right under my boobs. On my old bike the handle bars came up mid to lower rib cage. Overall the bike appears smaller but it is higher in the front.

I am really enjoying all the comments from those who know more that I do about geometry of bikes because it is causing me too look at the differences between the two and pay more attention to the smaller details and gain a better understanding of the impact of differences.

So thank you because your comments are enlightening.