I’ve recently bought a Zwift Ride and am having trouble finding a comfortable position with the handlebars and hoods, like I have with my racing bike. I’ve tried a few things:
-Thicker bar tape to make the bar more comfortable
-Raising the bars and shortening the reach, relative to my road bike, which has been professionally fitted. I rationalize this by the fact that aerodynamics matter less indoors, but acknowledge this may not help.
Have others found a way to improve their ride comfort?
Another thing that affects hand pressure and other aspects of comfort related to reach is pelvic rotation. That is affected by various factors such as design of the saddle, saddle height, crank arm length (and of course the relationship between saddle and where your hands go). It’s easier to control those differences if the saddle and crank arm length are identical between the two bikes. The differences related to brake lever ergonomics are just something you have to work around but most of the rest should be controllable.
When I set up my Ride - I transferred my measurements from my road bike so the saddle nose <> handlebar centerline matched. The levers felt too far away because the “reach” of the lever hoods on the Ride are in fact longer than my Shimano levers.
If you spend more time on the lever hoods than the handlebar tops or “shoulders” you might try moving the bars rearward ~1-2 cm and see if that makes it more comfortable.
I got my Ride on Wednesday and first ride was on Thursday. I also found the handlebars a bit uncomfortable but I already new that before ordering so I ordered a TREK Aero Road Handlebar 39/42 to match the bars geometry of the handlebars in my Domane SL7 Gen 4 and Madone SL7 Gen 8. Got the Aero Road handlebar on Thursday afternoon and swapped it immediately, tested it and got comfort back again. Now it feels like riding my road bikes. I would strongly recommend to get the same bar geometry handlebar and put it in your Ride. It will make a HUGE difference!
The ergonomics, or lack there-of, of the brake hoods is what is keeping me from purchasing a Ride. I had hoped the v2 version would’ve removed the sharp edges and the plastic feel of the levers, but I see no change has been made. Since I spend ~90% of my rides with my hands on the hoods, ergonomics really matter. Shimano and SRAM have figured-out very comfortable hood designs for real-life bikes, but the Ride levers look more like toy levers not made for hours on the bike.
