Stridsland - Anchor Bar

Words by Matias Stridsland:

If I could run 1 bar for the rest of my life, this would be it! (slightly biased). It’s wide, it’s made of steel, and it’s got all the right swoops dips and bends (IMO). Run it on your retro mtb, modern mtb, ATB, gravel bike, hybrid, klunker, bikepacking rig, whatever. But for the sake of STRIDSLAND’s future, let’s say no DH bikes please ;)

The days of adding a kilo of motorcycle handlebar with one too many knurled clamp sections to your rockhopper are over. Now you can add 750g of highly engineered bicycle handlebar to your rig instead. Often dubbed a moto bar, klunker bar, or as I like to say MTBMX bar, these will make any bike more stable, comfortable and playful.

Let me tell you a bit about the angles. First off, the “roll” (or the angle at which the bar is positioned when you clamp your stem tight) is designed to approximately match the headtube angle of your bike, for aesthetics mainly, but also reach. Between 65° and 75°, lies the number 70°, which happens to be in the proximity of the headtube angle on many bikes in this genre, including the Beachcomber. When the bar is mounted with the initial rise section at 70° when viewed directly from the side, the grip area features 5° of upsweep and 20° backweep. This is the absolute sweet spot for me.

Picture this. Stick your fists out in front of you like you’re holding a 60cm flat bar at the end of a 130mm stem on a stock 90’s mtb. Or even better, move them in so you’re practically touching the stem with your index fingers cuz your fixie from 2003 only has enough room for half an Oury grip on each side of the handlebar. In there, back sweep doesn’t make much sense.

Now bring your hands out like you just copped a STRIDSLAND Anchor bar at full-blown 850mm, then bring them down to the imaginary front end of your bike. That’s the stuff. Now if you were holding a stick in each hand, they’re scientifically proven to be in the vicinity of 20° backsweep and 5° upsweep, just like the Anchor Bar. The fact that it’s got all that width, combined with all that sweep, means you’ve got all that control and all that comfort, all at the same time.

(Bonus round, this time keep your hands at 850mm wide and bend your elbows out so the imaginary sticks point directly at each other in a straight line. Then lean forward as if your bike was way too small, now you’re a fixie skidder from 2018 <3)