With one-piece bar and stem combos the rage in Europe, and catching on in the US, Ritchey Logic offer their new MonoCurve system, which is available for sale, now.
“First of all bar, stems and posts are our core category — we’re super passionate about handlebars and stems,” Sean Coffey, Ritchey Logic’s marketing director told BikeRadar. “With the new design of the C260 stem and a far greater market acceptance of, and advancements within the carbon bar world, we finally felt like we could bring our sizing, our fit story, and our carbon technology into a product like this and feel good about it.”
Keeping with its intended ‘high performance’ purpose the MonoCurve system is based from an 86° stem — with C260 adapted curved steerer tube slot, said to relieve clamping stress — for an aggressive, low, position.
“A lot of these integrated systems are seeing a lot more mileage under top pros,” said Coffey. “It’s a cool set up; you can get to a level of stiffness and weight that is pretty difficult to match with a separate bar-stem combination.”
The EvoCurve portion of the bar offers a 4° back sweep, slightly oval ‘hand filling’ dimensional shape. Moving down the bar towards the drop Ritchey uses a Logic II style ergonomic curve for MonoCurve with progressive reach (as you go wider in size, the reach gets longer), and smooth curve through the 128mm drop, which remains constant.
Ritchey incorporate a few of their trademark 'fit' features into the new bar with EvoCurve and Logic II
The system features full carbon construction with a uni-directional carbon finish.
Ritchey claim the 42cm/120mm combo weighs 353g, however, the MonoCurve is available in 8 different dimensional combinations worldwide:
- 40cm handlebar with 90, 100, and 110mm stem lengths
- 42cm handlebar with 110, 120, and 130mm stem lengths
- 44cm handlebar with 120 and 130mm stem lengths
The MonoCurve is available now and costs: US$599.95, £425, €479.50. High yes, but not outrageous, says Coffey. “With prices climbing on world class race bikes, a bar that offers this kind of performance at this kind of price is now much more acceptable,” he said.