After a frustrating week with all sorts of mishaps with my Giant propel advanced 2020 but with lots of upgrades (like SRAM AXS force/red mix, instead of 11 spd ultegra mechanical, carbon handle bar). I bought an 2022 model year tcr advanced pro( TCR Advanced Pro Disc 0 AXS (2022) | Fiets | Giant Bicycles Nederland but for e3810) but I am starting to have doubts. I am generally content with the propel, except that the road buzz causes me to have carpal tunnel like symptoms (ie numb thumb, index and middle finger on the palm side) during rides and I am really uncomfortable descending. Wouldn’t a Defy be a better option?
Can you not solve the road buzz through lower pressures and / or wider tyres?
I’m already at the max width, 320tpi tyres and at about the minimum pressure
Just to double check, what is the minimum pressure you are using?
Also do you think this could be related to bike fit?
Do you think you ride on particularly poor roads?
3.6 bars but really I am not to bothered about that but I am about my cornering and descending anxiety
I bought that frame 2 years ago and I can honestly say it is the best carbon bike I have ever ridden on the road.
I am an avowed aero geek and I just don’t worry about it with this bike, it rides that well.
Highly recommended.
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I bought two of them a couple of years ago, one to train on and one to race, I just sold them both within the last couple of weeks. One was a pro, the other was just a non-pro. The difference being 1 1/8 vs 1 1/4 steer tubes, but same carbon frame.
The biggest selling point to me is the compliance and comfortable ride. Big 4-5 hour rides felt awesome. Zero road buzz. Throw some 30-32 GP5000’s on there tubeless and you’ll love it.
My issue was when I was cornering, it just didn’t feel very confidence inspiring, almost like the front end would flex (definitely more pronounced on the non-pro model), which was not fun when leaning over at 30+ mph. Whether or not it was actual flex I don’t know, but it sometimes felt like the front and rear were a bit disconnected. If the pro model handled 7/10, the non-pro model felt like 5/10. You may be totally fine on it, but it always felt a bit sketchier than I expected it to based on how so many on youtube rave about it.
Also, if you care about aerodynamics, it tests very poorly in the Tour Magazin tests, right at the bottom for the Non-SL model. 240w to be exact. Compared to a Tarmac SL8 @ 208w or a Caynon Aeroad CFR @ just over 200w. 30-40 watts is a lot to leave on the table at 45 km/hr. It is for sure the slowest bike I’ve ridden in a straight line in some time.
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My cornering and descending are already very weak. I need a confidence inspiring bike…
I think cornering and handling needs context. I have a titanium winter bike with 32mm tyres on that descends and handles beautifully when I’m not in a particular rush. Planted, smooth, inspires lots of confidence. Great bike for all day riding. But if pushing the pace on my own or in a fast group ride it feels sluggish and that it’s understeering. Doesn’t like being really pushed through the turns and much less enjoyable when I try to do that. By contrast my race bike isn’t as relaxing through the corners if I’m just cruising, but feels much more responsive and accurate if I’m pushing the pace. I have the exact same position on both bikes, but the race bike is lighter, stiffer, shorter wheelbase, shorter front centre and a steeper head angle.
So the opinions of people as to how well a bike handles are going to be hugely influenced by what kind of riding they’re doing on it and what their skill level is. The bike handling you want for a technical crit race may not be the bike handling you want for long mountain descents.
Cornering could be due to tyre/wheel combo.
I have a set of 28mm Vittoria Corsa Pros that feel super sketchy when leaning on my 19mm internal and 25mm external wheelset, whereas on my 25mm tyres the bike corners completely differently (I can lean into corners much more).
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That could be a reason. My front internal width is 17mm and rear 19mm and I run 32mm tyres.
FWIW, I ran 28 & 30mm tires (Pirelli P Zero Race & GP5000) on both bikes, with 19mm & 23mm internal widths. The best handling was tubeless 30mm on 23mm internal width rims. Overall grip was fine, but at higher speeds the front end felt like it was a little disconnected on corners. It wasn’t that I couldn’t corner or race it just fine, it just took more mental effort to keep it pointed exactly where I wanted it, which I didn’t appreciate. I do agree that skill level plays a big part of the subjective qualities a bike has. I’m not a pro by any means, but I race Cat 1 MTB and Cat 2 road, and do a bit of motocross, so I definitely understand bike handling. Again, it’s subjective, but it was not the most fun bike to race on a long road course or criterium for me.
If you have access to a mate with some narrow tyres or wider wheels, give it a test to see if that’s the cause.
I can ride the 28mms and I only lose minimal time on the descents because of it, but there really is no feeling like railing a corner on the 25mms haha. I actually have some wider wheels on order (hopefully my conjecture is right that it’s the internal width).
I can’t help much with your problem but the TCR is a great bike. I didn’t see much difference with the Defy, and I’ve loved riding the TCR. Hard cornering and breaking no problem on hookless 32s.
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This speaks to me as I’m in a similar situation with my bike. On descents that are less than 8% I’m fine but when things get real I get nervous and tense which is not great for bike handling let alone descending. All those who mentioned wheels/tires aren’t wrong, but there’s only so much that can do. I went from 17mm internals on a 25c (26mm measure) flo45s to 21mm 28c (29mm measured) FFWDs and thanks to the width and the rim shape (cross winds) I descend a little better. But a few mm on the front and rear tire is barely going to effect the wheelbase.
I’m going to say that though the TCR is a fine bike for many, we may be suited by a less racey geometry. One man’s nimble is another man’s twitchy and my current road bike has very similar geo and for me it’s twitchy. The first bike I got when I got serious was a 2017 specialized diverge which upon looking has an endurance/all-road geo and I felt like a badass descender on it. Granted, it’s not an aero frame and had shallow wheels and tough tires while wearing baggier jerseys so it didn’t achieve high speeds very quickly when the road turned down. But with a wheelbase of 990mm and a BB drop of 77 I’m sure that contributed to feeling much more planted. My current bike is 976mm wheelbase with a 71mm BB drop and it feels like I’m riding “on” the bike where as I think I’d feel a bit better riding “in” the bike not to mention being more “reactive”. And by no means does an “endurance” geo mean a bike won’t be capable. I don’t know if you’re a Giant fan and thus want to keep buying that brand but a Cannondale supersix is aero and has a very similar geo to the defy. It also has quite the racing pedigree having just been ridden to an Olympic gold medal in the women’s race and a couple years ago crossed the line first and a very hilly classica san sebastian. I currently have my eye on either a supersix or for something in between my current ride and that an Enve melee might have that sweet spot of stability and lively handling for me.
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Giant are hard to beat when it comes value for money especially new but when a deal comes along things could change
Well those are actually two pretty different bikes geometry wise. The Defy has less reach, more stack height, and much longer wheelbase, generally more upright, with a longer chain stay and longer front center. The latest supersix geometry fits somewhere between a TCR and Defy, but decidedly closer to the TCR if you had to pick one to compare it to.
At least from these geo sheets i grabbed from the manufacturer websites they don’t seem all that different. And perhaps we’re looking at different sizes as I tend to look at smalls/52s and mediums/54s so i don’t tend to notice how the sizing scales in the upper sizes. But using medium/54 as a base and screen shots coming from the supersix evo 3 and defy advanced pro 0 the stack is 555 on the supersix and 558 on the defy with reach at 384 and 380 respectively. These can be reconciled with handlebar/stem/spacer adjustments without effecting the handling noticeably. And sure, the 2 makers scale the sizing different but for that same size medium you get a wheelbase on the supersix of 1010 versus the defy being shorter at 998 with the divergence there going for the shallower BB on the supersix at 72 and defy at 75(size small is much closer aligned). But despite the 1 cm difference in chainstay length they have different head angles and thus front centers (giant doesn’t measure theirs but a guess) which would handle different but both strike me as rather calm compared to a TCR that has by far a shorter wheelbase by 2 cm, higher BB and shorter chain stays than either of these ignoring stack and reach because we’re talking handling not fit. We don’t know what size the OP rides but across the board and by cannondale’s admission they use a far more relaxed geo than the more traditional “race” bike geo used by many other manufacturers use like Giant for their TCR.
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Agreed on the value prospect on Giant. I’m prone to suggesting their bikes to people for that very reason.
Oh wow, I was only looking up the geo on geometrygeeks, and didn’t go verify that the data was in fact correct. Thanks for posting that. Yes, they do look very similar. Fork rake and wheel base are probably the most different, but still not too much.