A - or - a version of it: maintained flexibility sovne young age. You grow old and unflexible, you stay that way.

It has nothing to do with flexibility. Why does this continually come up?

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Jim Manton / ERO Sports

Go see Jim or another capable fitter with some background in aerodynamics. Although I'm young, I am about as inflexible as they come. At 6'4" I still manage a fairly long and low fit, but I got started down that path with a proper fit (from Jim actually) and have iterated from there.

Due to poor explanations from people outside of the hallowed grounds of Slowtwitch, equating "lowness" to flexibility to get into the position.

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Editor-in-Chief, Slowtwitch.com | Twitter

I think it's so pervasive because it's an easy explanation a poor fitter can give for why they can't position someone correctly. And with a lot of poor fitters, it's "common knowledge" getting passed to the customers.

If you constrain yourself to the existing equipment, not using a fitbike, and making no real modification to saddle, cranks, aerobar, or even stem, then the only thing left is the squishy meatbag doing the pedaling. Blame it for being inflexible, and demand your $300. The customers continue to pay. Why would any fitter bother doing real work with that kind of ROI?

Thank you for not being that kind of fitter (from what I've heard/read). -J

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Life is tough. But it's tougher when you're stupid. -John Wayne

Gosh, I guess I didn't do a thorough enough search. I haven't seen this continually come up. My apologies for raising your blood pressure.



Nothing, whatsoever? I call BS.

Option D for me. I have short legs. My bike appears to be long and low, but my position is not.

Also, (at least on a road bike) core strength and stability is a major factor in one's ability to hold an aggressive position.

For me personally getting long and low as long as I am flat is actually better for my back. I have a job with great demands on my back and have to habitually do back exercises and stay loose but even with all that said it's not very flexible. So for me I ride in a longer stretched out position with a saddle that really allows me to rotate my hips forward and keep my back very flat getting rid of that arched flexed position.

But that's just me and everybody's makeup is different.

You're reading emotion into my response a little too much. Flexibility has nothing to do with it, but you can keep thinking that all you want and limit yourself to a poor position if you'd like.

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Jim Manton / ERO Sports

I would say it doesn't have TOO much to do with flexibility.

If you can touch your toes, you don't have serious back issues or serious neck issues you can get long and low with a proper fit.

You can get rotated so you breath easier, you are faster, you don't need to have knees hitting elbows and you can support yourself with your skeletal system a bit more rather than 100% of your core.

The main limiter is being able to see down the road.

Sometimes you can get too low - but you should be able to get to a good long and low position with a proper fit.

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Dan Kennison

facebook: @triPremierBike
http://www.PremierBike.com
http://www.PositionOneSports.com

No. Not reading too much.

I'm asking for help. Clearly not "limiting [myself] to a poor position if [I'd] like."

And you are providing belittling, snarky responses (two of them).

But I get it. It makes you happy. Go on. Good luck in your business.

X1, in most cases we see that the neck is the limiting factor in getting low above core or flex. I have a drop of 16 cm, physically i could go lower but the neck / looking forward keeps going from lower. 10 to 15 years ago i was 2 - 3 cm lower without any issue. But that is gone due to the neck

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Owner at TRIPRO, The Netherlands

Thank you. Refreshing.

In your opinion, do you have to tilt down the saddle? I have my berries hanging off the front of my saddle, but it still hurts my taint if I'm too low. And this is with my seat slammed all the way forward. I've had a professional fit, but I still can't seem to achieve the coveted "low" position.

Edit: I think that has more to do with the seat. I run a level saddle. I do see some that have a slightly down angled seat. But you also don't want to fight the forward slide so I would look to solve that with the seat if possible. Split nose seats are what saved me.


HVP - One of the recurring issues with the discussion on fit has more to do with the type fitter you are subject to. Many of the bike manufacturers, over the past 5 or so years, have made shorter top tubes and taller bikes.

Many of those shops that sell the bikes send a salesman or mechanic to a Fit School to learn how to fit (and generate revenue from those fits). If the shop only sells short and tall bikes the fitter may fit to what he/she can sell.

That is contrary to what unaffiliated fitters do.

This is not always the case. There are many good fitters in shops that sell bikes.

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Dan Kennison

facebook: @triPremierBike
http://www.PremierBike.com
http://www.PositionOneSports.com

-I ride steep, with saddle very far forward. I'd like to say my saddle allows a lot of forward pelvic rotation, but it's probably not the best saddle for that (Bontrager Hilo XXX) and I think I have a some to gain with a better saddle and more forward hip rotation. Most people do, My problem is every time I try new saddles I hate them.

-I ride shortish cranks, at 165mm. My fit progression went from 172.5 to 170 to 165 to 162.5 and now back to 165, which I find ideal. This is such an important variable I think, but most disregard it because it's a pain in the ass and expensive as shit to figure out.

-I train in that position sufficiently, and I consciously practice neck/head turtle all the time. If you haven't ridden your TT bike in 2-3 weeks, your neck should probably hurt post ride, or at least mine does.

-I am naturally flexible. While it's really fashionable to say that flexibility doesn't matter -- and I'm not a fitter, so what do I know? -- but I think there's a fundamental difference between "can you touch your toes?" and "can you touch your toes 80-100 times per minute while actively engaging and stressing your hip flexors. There has to be a difference between those two questions. That said, I agree that in the fit studio almost anyone who can touch their toes can pedal in a long and low position for several minutes without issue.

-I am fine producing significantly less power in exchange for being significantly more aero. Back when my fit was as below, in 2012, I did 70.3 bike legs with average power of at or above 250 watts (at 145 lbs). But on a flat course and a windless day, I could only go 24.2-24.4 miles per hour. I've obviously made other equipment changes since then, but now I can go well over 1mph faster on 30 less watts. I can now only average 220W in a 70.3, or as much as 230W on a very hilly course like Syracuse, but I'll never see 250W again -- not in my current position.

I'm still experimenting myself before getting around to having a proper fit. But it seems to me you can be 'hanging off the front' but still have the pelvis in a similar position to a road bike. Or you can have the pelvis rotated forward more which is what I think you want.

The former is really just sliding forward and leaning lower. The later is rotating the whole position (all contact points) around and forward.

As I say I'm just reading stuff and experimenting so take that for what it's worth. I'd love it if someone could link a decent description of what it should feel like and what adjustments to play with.

I was just talking to a friend about this who was talking to his friend, who qualified for Kona at IMSR. He said before IMSR 70.3 he lowered his front end a quarter inch and he was not able to run worth beans off the bike since his back hurt so much.

So when I hear that anyone can get super low, well, that is another reason I have held of paying someone to fit me. Some of just for various reasons even with a perfect fit just cannot get that low, and that is okay.

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Dave Campbell | Facebook | @DaveECampbell | h2ofun@h2ofun.net

Boom Nutrition code 19F4Y3 $5 off 24 pack box | Bionic Runner | PowerCranks | Velotron | Spruzzamist

Lions don't lose sleep worrying about the sheep

I've never been able to touch my toes, currently about about 6inches away and I get pretty low and comfortably stay there for halfs.

I think there is more to it than taking out spacers. If all we know about a friend of a friends fit is that the stem was lower then it isn't really conclusive evidence that the bit fit industry is flawed.

To echo with what has been said already, flexibility has very, very little to do with one's ability to ride in an "aggressive" position. It is possible that some with neck and shoulder flexibility issues can be limited by how low they can go, I've yet to see a single instance where lower body flexibility had any limiting role on the position I wanted the rider to adopt.

But sure enough and no matter how many times I say it, I still have people assure me on a weekly basis their flexibility is going to keep them from riding in an orthodox position. In terms of pet peeves, it's right up there with the "my coach (or fitter) and I are working towards a better position" when some rider shows up with a 35 degree back angle and 8 cm of spacers and I ask them why they are set up that way.

To answer your question, I've found body composition plays a significant role - leaner athletes can get lower (not just low body fat, but leaner builds). Hip angle plays a role - a closed hip angle due to saddle fore-aft, crank length, or the relative length of the tibia compared to the femur can affect hip angle.

The biggest limiter, that I deal with, is one's ability to deal with shoulder and neck pressure. Most commonly, a rider might feel unsustainable shoulder discomfort due to posture, partially due to muscle mass, and partially due to shoulder inflexibility. But more often, I see an inadequate armpad position due to the adjustment limitations of a rider's aerobars.

I commonly address shoulder discomfort issues by

• making sure a rider can structurally support themselves,
• widening the armpads,
• angling the extensions upward,
• rotating the armpads to support a wider shoulders but a closer hand position
• encouraging better head and neck posture

Shoulders and the muscles that connect to them are very complicated and pull in a variety of directions to provide you with the range of motion you enjoy, and there's no silver bullet that solves every shoulder discomfort issue and there's some trial and error involved in making adjustments. But the 5 things I listed are how I address 98% of the problems I'm fortunate enough to fix.

And I have some riders that, due to bad posture or whatever, simply can't relax their shoulders and just melt into the aerobars. No matter what I do, their shoulders and triceps are flexed no matter how hard they try not to. So that tension builds and turns into pain even though their position is spot on.

Some aerobars don't offer the adjustments I mentioned, so having the right equipment can help tremendously if the aerobars are limiting what would work best for the rider. I tend to prefer the Profile Design options over other aerobars specifically because of the ease- and range-of-adjustment. Maybe that other bar a rider is ready to spend $1K on will shave a few watts, but if it prevents them from sustaining a nice aero position, it will end up just making them slower.

There's no single formula or solution for everyone, but that's what I've done with some success over the years.

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Trent Nix
Owned and operated Tri Shop
F.I.S.T. Advanced Certified Fitter | Retul Master Certified Fitter (back when those were things)

A couple of additional notes - you mentioned saddle discomfort as you move to a lower position, and I definitely see that from time to time. First thing is to try and find a saddle that doesn't hurt when you are in that position. Some adaptation to deal with the different saddle pressure is also usually required.

I tend to be very conservative with lowering the nose of a saddle - it tends to create a situation where the rider slides forward, constantly needing to push themselves back using their arms and shoulders. So while saddle comfort might improve, it might create shoulder fatigue that makes the position unsustainable.

if I do lower the nose of the saddle a bit (or if the rider tends to slide forward for whatever reason), I try to angle the extensions and armpads up so that it creates friction to push back with without requiring the rider to do any work. If you have a fixed, integrated base bar, you can kind of cheat to get the same result by getting extensions with a more pronounced rise, such as a Zipp EVO or similar.

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Trent Nix
Owned and operated Tri Shop
F.I.S.T. Advanced Certified Fitter | Retul Master Certified Fitter (back when those were things)

Same, haha. I love seeing, "it isn't about flexibility....if you can touch your toes, then you can get an aggressive fit..." What if you can't, haha?

I actually think I have done pretty well without really working at it. Neck is my limiting factor. Probably followed by crank length. To get lower would require effort conditioning my neck for sure. I'm not flexible, but that hasnt seemed to been a huge issue.

I think you can ride aggressively if you touch your knees. To heck with touching your toes - it just simply isn't limiting if the saddle height is good and the rider's hips are sufficiently open.

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Trent Nix
Owned and operated Tri Shop
F.I.S.T. Advanced Certified Fitter | Retul Master Certified Fitter (back when those were things)

C'mon man...FFS! Between you and Jim there is one guy getting extra snarky and thin-skinned in this exchange. It isn't Jim.

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Aaron Bales
Lansing Triathlon Team