Ritchey Beacon WCS Dirt Drop Handlebar

True Facts: When the Ritchey Beacon first hit the mean streets of Poultney, I was not sold.  When the Beacon tried to make eye contact, I pretended to be looking at an imaginary squirrel.  I’ve come around though, and spec this style bar on at least 50% of our builds.  Why?  Short reach, shallow drop, lots of flare, off road rated.  Shortest and shallowest legit dirt drop I know of.  The return portion of the bar, IE the part that sort of flattens out and then has the bar end plug stuck in it, is flat and lovely to hold.  The tops are flattened a bit and wide, ultra comfortable with some Fizik gel.  

There’s nothing not to like, and the things I used to not like were just in my head.  

Get this bar if you have any of the following symptoms: Under 5’10” tall / Small hands / Short torso / T rex arms / Bad flexibility / Like Tom Ritchey’s mustache

Avoid if:

You have big hands / weigh more than 170 lbs / Are hyper flexible, fingers on toes or beyond when not even stretch just hanging and drooping.

If any of these avoidance things hit, get a Spank Flare bar, which has a deeper drop, and it’s a bit stiffer.

The WCS designation simply means Water Closet(s) and is British for bathroom(s).  WCS bars are Ritchey’s lightest bars.  Get these if you are trying to build a relatively light bike and are ok with spending a bit more.  They’re just as strong as the Comp bars (Comp is short for composting toilet) but achieve their lightnesses through stronger more spendy aluminum.  I'm guessing it's 7000 series, which can be drawn thinner and still maintain its strengthitude.  Like John Waters’ mustache is just as strong as Charles Bronson’s, they just achieve said strength in a different way.

30 degree flare, roughly 65mm usable reach, shortest drop out there that I know of.  Oversized top section, which is semi flat, very comfortable.  

Long returns, under the brifters makes for a comfortable cruising spot.

Measurement taken center to center where the hoods are.  The flared drops are wider.