Bar Measurements Explained.. (Long Read)

My comment from another thread..

Bar height. Basically you want to hit your sweet spot. Comfortable with close to absolute no extra height. At first when you try out big bars they seem SUPER comfy and just PERFECT. But, the bigger the bars, the slower your progression is almost certain to come to (to an extent, super small bars will hinder with progression just aswell.) This applies to most people, some people are affected less (few not at all) and some peoples sweet spots are higher than others. I want to say majority of riders will find their sweet spot inbetween 8.25-9.25" bar rise. 
Im 6'1" I just recently got 8.5s and didn't really like them. I have super achey bones so it killed my back and tempered with my progression more than just going bigger would have. I snagged a set of 9ers and played around with my spacers and found my sweet spot. My back pain is very very minimum but my progression isnt badly effected by them, in fact its sped up noticeably since my mid-line back aches have gone away. When I ride 9.5-10" bars i dont really procede with my riding, infact I begin to lose tricks because its alot more work to keep every trick in my trick list. 

Bar width is important aswell. I personally wouldnt suggest anything over 28.5", 28 is my favorite though im pretty broad shouldered.
Recommended bar width is AS CLOSE TO YOUR SHOULDER WIDTH AS COMFORTABLY POSSIBLE. This is because when your hands are inline with your shoulders, you are pulling directly up when you hop, therefore you can hop much higher. When your hands are angled AWAY from your shoulders, you are now pulling both up and INWARDS when you pull up, therefore you have a fraction of your force actually acting AGAINST you pulling up. Pulling inwards also makes you more susceptible to your hands sliding on your grips. It also holds your wrists at a weird angle when you land which can easily cause pain- this is actually the reasoning behind upsweep, to assist your wrist angle when holding past your shoulder width (ill cover this later.)
The BEST way to figure out what width you need is too see where your hand lays on your grip. If you hold the inner edge of your grip, you are naturally wanting to hold closer in, so narrower bars are something you naturally want without necessarily realizing. If you hold outter grip, then you naturally want wider bars. When you hold center grip naturally without forcing it, thats when you are on your personal perfect width.

Back to what I was saying about upsweep. If you are holding your bars directly or extremely close to directly in line with your shoulders, you will want 1-1.5degree upsweep to hold your wrist at the correct angle on the bar. If you hold just slightly out of line, 2-3degree will ensure that your still holding correctly. If you ride humongo bars and hold way past your shoulder width, 3.5-5degree will keep everything right.
Examples for improper upsweeps would be..
Holding shoulder width with 4degree upsweep, this will cause you to be putting all your weight on your outter palm towards your pinky. 
Holding 2inches past shoulder width with 1degree upsweep, this causes all your force to go down onto your inner palm towards your thumb.
A proper set up would be holding .75" past shoulder width with 2.5degree upsweep. This will ensure your hands are flat on the bar and all force will be distributed equally amongst your whole palm which will eat most of an impact before it reaches your wrist.

I believe backsweep is strictly a personal preference so I wont go into detail about it.
Normal backsweeps are generally 9-13degrees, anything less is generally considered flatland I believe.


I DO NOT RECOMMEND RUNNING ANY PART THAT IS OUT OF YOUR COMFORT ZONE. MY STATEMENTS ARE SOLELY TO ASSIST ANYONE WHO IS UNSURE OF WHAT THEY PREFER. EVERYONE HAS THEIR OWN PREFERENCES AND MAY PREFER SOMETHING OUTSIDE OF WHAT I HAVE RECOMMENDED. MY WORD IS NOT LAW NOR DO I INTEND IT TO BE.