For the record, though, I’ve never ridden anything other that 175s (and I have longer legs than most riders my height). Cannondale doesn’t make their SI crank in a 180 for my road bike, and I can’t afford 180s for my TT bike (yet). If you feel comfortable on 180s, get them. If you can’t afford them, 175s won’t hold you back.

Remember, crank length is a touchy subject. Fellow tall guy Lennard Zinn is all in favor of them, yet he did a study last year and found that crank length had no effect on power output. The study wasn’t rigorously controlled, but it suggests that crank length may only affect comfort. I felt much better when Hanseen put me on the longer cranks, but I’m not sure if I would have been much faster.

Also, with 180s you’ll lose some cornering clearance. You’ll have to decide if that matters.

I’d like to ride 180s; hoewever, I just ordered a new bike last night and it’s a Cannondale, so I’ll be on 175s for at least one more season.

As a fellow tall guy what would be your honest recommendation for a Cat 5 guy hoping to eventually, but not too rapidly, move up to Cat 4 then 3?

I’ll fork out the huge bucks in a couple of years perhaps when I buy the next dream bike.

That said, I keep hearing that Rival cranks are available in 180s (most recently here: http://velonews.com/article/74382/technical-qa-with-lennard-zinn—big-bikes-have-special). Jacques Maynes had them on his TT bike that was featured in VN last year, and I’ve seen Zirbel on Rival as well. You may want to look into that, because your only other options for long cranks are not cheap.

Or, you could probably score 9-speed DA cranks pretty cheap, and they’d work fine.

I was kinda dismayed at the $400 (at best) price from Backcountry. I’m not interested in spending that much money — I know, I know, I’ve already spent way more than that — for new cranks.

http://cgi.ebay.com/2008-Shimano-Dura-Ace-FC-7800-Crankset-175-BB_W0QQitemZ160226525017QQihZ006QQcategoryZ56195QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem