A few things are catching my eye about bike fit, to include some interesting articles and videos.
The one thing that I’m really seeing a lot of but to which I have not given due diligence is what you might think of first on the bicycle: balance. Balance on the bike is crucial, but I’m not talking about little-kids-with-the-training-wheels-off-falling-over balance; I’m talking about body position.
This article gives an interesting method for this measurement (as well as a lot of other fascinating information): with your bike on a trainer, take your hands off the handlebars and place them behind your hips and see what happens to your upper body position. Do you pitch forward (and thus the reason you do this on a trainer)? Does it pull you backwards as you try to pedal? There are so many factors involved, but I found upper-body weight – to include the belly – possibly of importance. The goal, as he points out in the article, is to have a “largely unweighted upper body.” Part of this means that the muscles required to breathe can be prioritized by your brain for that function rather than for maintaining a consistent posture, and thus you can cycle more efficiently.
But my main concern has always been with pressure points, flexibility, and associated muscle pain. I have long seen the writing on the wall: if my current trajectory continues, pains in my neck, arms, hands, and feet will become so extreme that within a few years I may no longer be able to cycle (and so I’m giving recumbents serious consideration). Part of it is age I’m sure, but a great deal of it is the fit of the bike. This is why I adjusted my handlebar height and seat position some months back – to alleviate pressure on those contact points and associated muscles. And it’s worked to some extent.
But I still haven’t given enough attention to body position, especially to the point of having that “largely unweighted upper body.”
So next up (and since we’re going to have rain here for the rest of the week anyway) will be to put my bike on the trainer and experiment with it – especially with the article’s “point of balance” test. I’ll read more on everything from seat height and position to cleat position and shims. Maybe even film myself riding and see if I can spot any obvious anomalies. But the bottom line is to get the best setup I can, and only then can I blame it on something beyond my control.
As intriguing as I find the idea of a recumbent trike to toddle around on in my old (and retired) age, there’s still a lot to be said for seeing the country upright. And I’ve got to try everything I can before moving on…
Shorter stem, zero degrees offset seatpost, bar with a shorter reach, these should be considered also.
We’ve all been convinced we need to be positioned like a pro roadie, through advertising, which affects what we get at bike shops by virtue of inventory somewhat controlled by the big bike companies. I’m “evolving” my position on all three of my bikes, little by little.
I had a pro fit/measurement session on my primary CX bike, and the result was not comfortable. My support mechanic for DK200 2014 helped me fix it the night before the race. The bike felt great all 200 miles, all the way to the podium, for 3rd in singlespeed.
Paradigms, traditions, industry pressure, all need to be mostly ignored, try comfort as the key to fit.
An unweighted upper body relies a lot on flexibility, core strength, and upper body weight. There’s no way I could be positioned like a roadie with those factors considered! But come to think of it, I really don’t do enough for my core…or my upper body weight! Let’s throw flexibility in there too. The point is, if i let go and put my hands back, an unweighted upper body would leave me fairly well balanced and would allow a lighter touch on the handlebars, which of course in turn means less pressure and stress on those places that give me the most trouble. I think I’ll get there, or at least make some improvements, if I actually pay better attention to my setup. You might recall that even switching my seat caused problems with my knees a few weeks back because the switch involved changes in the height and forward-positioning, even though the changes were very slight.
Picture our seated bike position as a triangle- head at the top of the 2 lines, one descending to our hands and the other to our seat. If you can close that angle and get your hands closer to your seat, (and still pedal), would you be more comfortable? Would the legs work better out front or below?
I’ll tweak it along the way.