A long time ago -- roughly a lifetime, give or take -- I used to participate in some really long mountain bike races. In order to prepare for these I had to put in a lot of hours in the saddle. 15 hours was an easy recovery week -- like right after a big event -- but 20 was much more common, and 30 happened with regularity in the build up to the racing season.
Over the course of a decade+ of living this ascetic lifestyle, my hands, wrists, elbows, shoulders, and neck took a beating.
Some of the beating came because I did the en vogue thing and rode with a long, low position, putting lots of weight on my hands. The theory as I understood it was that you were more aerodynamic and thus getting "free time" relative to sitting more upright. On the race clock that might have been true. On the life clock, nothing is free.
I ruined my hands, wrists, shoulders, and neck putting in all those hours in that position.
Undoing the damage is simply not possible. But I'm constantly looking for ways to make my riding position more comfortable. I first experimented with swept (more than 12*) bars in about 2001, and have experimented with them more or less constantly since then.
These days finding bars with sweep is pretty easy. I default to the ProTaper 20/20 carbons, especially now that they're available in 780mm width. They're damn near perfect: plenty of sweep to put my wrists and elbows into a more neutral position, a similar amount of rise to any normal bar, and with the right amount of forward sweep such that your current stem doesn't need to be changed. If they have a downside it's cost, although they aren't out of the realm of what other high end bars go for.
I built myself two new bikes this year, and installed 20/20's on both. I've also got 'em on my fatbike and snowbike. They just sort of feel like coming home, and since they went to 780mm I haven't wanted for anything else.
And then, as happens, I learned about the Passchier bamboo bars. I mostly paddle whitewater with a wood shaft because it transmits noticeably less shock to my wrists. Seemed likely that a wood bar would have similar attributes, and since the overall dimensions were so similar to the 20/20's it would be easy to swap a set on and find out.
I ordered this set from Passchier, they shipped them from NZ within a day or two and I had them installed on the bike less than 2 weeks later. They are absolutely gorgeous, if you're into earth tones and wood grains. Which I emphatically am.
The position they put me in is very, very close to the 20/20's -- the 'boo bars are a bit narrower and have a bit less rise.
Read the ad copy on their website and you keep picking up references to the comfort and natural flex inherent in the material. I couldn't help but to wonder if it would be noticeable, which is what pushed me over the edge into ordering this set to answer the question.
And the answer is: Boy howdy! There is a heaping helping of flex in these bars! I've experimented with literally dozens of carbon bars and a similar number of custom titanium bars over the past ~20 years. I have never, not ever, not once felt bars that have anywhere near this level of flex.
I mean WOW do they flex.
Ponder that for a moment and then the question becomes: Is that amount of flex a good thing?
That remains the question right now -- I don't yet have an answer. I've only ridden them a handful of times thus far, and while the flex is subtly noticeable when riding, I think it's in the process of fading into the background noise. I'm gonna ride them a few more weeks before deciding whether they'll continue to live on this hardtail, or if they might do better on my snowbike.
I have no idea what the weight is, and simply don't care in any direction. It's not a meaningful consideration.
Edit: A year+ later I'm still riding -- and enjoying -- them. I've mostly stopped noticing the flex when riding. It is a novelty that is easy to see (
https://vimeo.com/586493632) -- and that shocks people -- when standing over the bike in the shop or a parking lot. On the trail they've become more or less invisible.
If you have any doubt about whether these are "for you", they probably aren't.
You sort of have to want a lot of flex to consider them. That's emphatically why I bought 'em.
Don't hesitate with questions.
