The relationship of bicycle maneuverability to handlebar configuration.

Since the handling characteristics of bicycles can affect their safety, the present experiment evaluated the maneuverability of three basic handlebar configurations: racing (drop), standard, and high rise. On the circle (figure 8) and slalom tasks, performance with both the high rise and standard handlebars was significantly better than the race. The high rise showed a slight performance edge on task requiring the greatest amount of maneuvering while the standard handlebars offered more control at slower speeds, and on tasks requiring stability in tracking.