why be ya postin' tri images in a tt fit discussion?? just sayin

Hahaha...I don't differentiate the two. ;)

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well, clearly with this post and your upcoming podcast, you do...……….you just haven't owned it yet :)

ps when I clicked on link, it says 3/18 and not 3/17

There's your first mistake right there.

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Jim Manton / ERO Sports

Ask Dan when Kiley is coming back

Difference in angles?
Should the angles of the arms be different between TT or tri (Dan advises them to be vertical)

Mistake? How so? Please enlighten us so we can add it to the discussion.

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Are you referring to the upper arm aka humerus?

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Nope. Not going to happen. Dan has his reasons and Kiley is a big boy that can stick up for himself.

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If you click on that link it says 3/18, not 3/17.

Sorry about that. I had the 17th on the brain and the OP is the only place I didn't correct it. Thank you for pointing that out.

It will be on the 18th (Monday) at 7pm EST.

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😝

Maybe have Jordan share some thoughts. A pro long distance triathlete to an elite 4k pursuiter... those are pretty far ends of the spectrum.

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Yes, but all other angles are also intresting. Also, if there is a difference between TT and Tri fit: what is the difference then between a UCI fit and non-UCI TT fit that they most often see

Was hard enough to get 5 people to agree on a time, let alone getting a sixth to agree. But yeah, some more athletes to talk about what they would like or have found to be successful would be awesome.

As far as positions being different from a pursuiter to a LC athlete, I think we all agree that they are. I'm trying really hard to not inject my position nor my opinion into this discussion. I really want to give the group a chance to have a great conversation. I asked Eric to be a part of it, actually, Eric was the key because of what he is doing. I really think Eric is doing something different compared to what a Jim Manton is doing. That's not a negative or a positive, but it is a talking point and one a lot of folks seem to be interested in.

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Awesome. I thought that was what you meant but wanted to be sure.

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Time on bike, UCI rules, and what you have to do after the bike is done.

All fare points, but there are plenty of folks running positions for 12 hours and more. Sure they don't run off the bike, but I'm sure if we pulled a few hours out of their ride and backed off the intensity a touch they could probably knock something out. ;)

As far as the UCI, that's a great point. TT guys have to fit into a box that Triathlon guys don't have to. Yet we haven't seen the Pro Tri folks move to extremes. This is Dan's argument about orthodoxy. So, I think we can throw the UCI point out unless those constrained by it would like to move to positions that it prevents. Then I think we are onto something about orthodoxy and where it is and where it might be.

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Not one Cotton-Eyed Joe joke? Sad.

No, he does not. That's a common misconception people read into what he's written.

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Jim Manton / ERO Sports

The way most Pro TT'ers pedal a bike is very different than how a triathlete pedals a bike. Two very different positions. Then, of course, you have the UCI restrictions.

There are exceptions. I worked with EF Drapac this winter, so did Danny Martinez' position. He's has more of a "tri" position as far as fore-aft saddle and hip rotation, but otherwise is lower and much shorter on reach than a tri position. So far this year, it's working great for him. Brandon McNulty, too, has a very "ERO" tri position which has served him well. Mostly, though, a World Tour caliber athlete is going to have a very different saddle position than a triathlete but, contrary to popular belief, it has nothing to do with UCI regs.

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Jim Manton / ERO Sports

See...that's what I am looking for! Awesome post Jim. Thank you for the contribution.

On a side note, did you work Joe D? He's local to me and I've had the pleasure of riding/talking/racing with him and am curious how his morphology plays into his position.

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He's not "elite" until he can beat 56 y.o. Chris Carlson or 58 y.o. Kevin Metcalfe. Until then he's just a pretty fast masters 35-39 guy :).

As long as he stays in the elite field. I'm the only former triathlete allowed in Masters 35-39 ;)

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Kicking off in 20 minutes!

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Right away blaming UPS! WTF

Thanks for putting this on. I like listening to this. Enjoying it. I appreciate ya'll's time.

Ignore my dribble..........just thoughts I had listening to this......

At some point to learn more I plan to bring the $250 Felt DA project to an ISO group ride near Eric and see how other folks are setup.

As a person on a strict budget, so far the two things that have made a huge difference as a beginner (on an actual TT bike) has been the snubnose saddle (Mistica) and getting my pelvic angle open a bit more. I pretty much put the bike at the UCI extremes to start with.

I could never get close in power on the roadie with clip ons (Propel), and the power has been great on the Felt DA. Now I can. I'm closing quick on the power I can do on a road bike.

Your orthodoxy comment is exactly what I did in golf. I picked a golfer my similar height and torso/arm/leg proportions and a swing in a "plane" close to mine.......and emulated it. It worked really really well in that sport.

Question, out of curiosity:
-Anyone in TT still use pedal/cleat shims to get the knees together over the top tube (Obree style) to reduce some area? I remember the super narrow BB and no top tube being a thing in that era.

Other comment:
Anyone have databases of known pros? Golf has done this since I was in high school (1998). It would be interesting to fiddle with, I did video golf instruction stuff for years on myself and it made a huge difference having a successful pro to emulate that had similar levers (arms/torso/legs). In that sport, it fast tracked a generation of youth golfers who otherwise couldn't afford years of one on one lessons or couldn't get to a golf course with an instructor. If you had internet and patience, you could work out a lot.

I'm really surprised tri/TT fit isn't closer to that yet.

Comment:
-In a TT constrained setup, I definitely do the Contador TT bike shuffle. Straight up LMFAO song "every day I'm shufflin". I don't mind it much as it's very difficult to get in that perfect balance point of using all the let muscles to the point of total failure at the line without shuffling fore-aft a bit. I even find I do this on a climb, sit back some, sit forward some. It's weird. Being able to improve my setup to almost shove my elbows into the pads would be great for shoving out power and the "saddle shuffle"

Local TT novice,

Kind regards,

Stan

You're welcome, it's always fun to do/sit on panels as I learn a lot.

My wheelhouse isn't fitting as much as it is tweaking your fit in the tunnel to reduce drag/allow you to go faster on less watts/kJ expended. I think shims are more of a tool for fitting to correct an issue vs shimming the shoes just to force the knees in. Eric, Dan and Luis can talk about this to a greater degree.

I know I've talked with someone a few years ago about doing some sort of video project with everyone we've tested in the tunnel to capture their final coordinates. We've not done it for a few reasons. 1. tunnel time is expensive at just over $10 per minute 2. we're always on a tight time budget in the tunnel. I build in windows of time in each day to catch up if something goes sideways. It's pretty rare when we've got an entire day where we don't have to wrench on someone's bike to make sure we can quickly change things.

I think another aspect may be that in order to hit a golf ball straight your club head has to be squared up. Otherwise you hit a slice, hook, fade or draw. the window is much smaller for variation whereas on the bike you can get a wider range of (more) optimal positions. (pad y/X, stack/reach, different rise extensions etc)

All that allows for more options for optimal aerodynamics/fitting. In golf if my clubhead is facing right what would have been an awesome shot carrying over the bunker and dropping the ball 5ft from the cup is now in the rough.

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Brian Stover USAT LII
Accelerate3 Coaching
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Dan, Eric, Dessert Dude And of course Luis.
I thought it was well done! I was a little surprised by certain positions that some of you took and did not take when discussing things which like in many aspects of life we tend to find out we're closer in our opinions than we are further apart and having these roundtable discussions allows us to discover that.

One question I do have four the fitters in this discussion. When discussing Louis's fit and the fact that his coordinates stayed roughly the same but he brought his stack up several centimeters doesn't this in fact shorten his reach. Now he is using the zero degree rise stem and pedestal to make his stack adjustments but doesn't this still change the hypotenuse of a triangle?

Looking forward to watching this on the trainer shortly. Cheers all.

There's equal fit coords for golf, or more. Remember, you also have 13 similar items in your bag you have to cut/modify/customize to a player versus just one. Each club has to have the "lie" and shaft length custom cut. You also have to cut it just right to keep the "flex" how you want it in each shaft. And the putter, oh gosh that's a can of worms.

In HS I played golf against Webb Simpson a couple times, dude who won the US Open. He kicked our butts. I wasn't a slouch. Even so, I was a very inconsistent player. Due to limited money for lessons or video time back then (before laptops being so cheap and common) I missed something that could have meant the difference to me playing in college. I'd relate this to a bike rider not being able to have time/money for aero tunnel or track testing.

Short story, I religiously started grabbing film on my work laptop (having one out of college) at the range after work in the evenings and fixed the problem after watching a few dozen pro players in a database.

To someone doing about 280w in a TT, like me, finding 15w by comparing a video of me on a trainer to a video of a similar sized/flexibility rider could be awesome.

I say all that golf stuff to say emulation by having a video or pics of known body dimension folks can get a "nobody" like myself probably pretty close on the bike pretty quick with a really low budget.

I've no idea the % of riders who try video. I've posted once here, and need to again since I made changes based on feedback here. If I do, I promise to use a nicer camera.

Cool discussion. I heard the bi-saddle mentioned a couple of times. Anyone had any experience with it? The saddle battle is real :)

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What's your CdA?

I have not had any experience with that saddle but I agree it took me forever to find one that really did the trick. Late last year someone recommended the PN 3.0 to me and it was one of those aha moments.

It would be nearly impossible to to say, x will get you y. You can take two people who are the same height/weight/flexibility and put them in the same position and 9 times out 10 they will have a different CdA. This is why a helmet, kit, socks and even hydration location will vary from one person to the next. Yes there are some "best practices" but in general one never knows unless they take time to either field test, or spend the money and time to go to the wind tunnel.

Time trial positions are also different than tri positions in that TT riders generally don't have to consider hydration solutions and are general at or well above 40kph. At that speed yaw angles are generally quite low <5. If you run a BTA, a high hands position may or may not work due to drag created by the bottle. There are lots of considerations involved and no single solution for all athletes.

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Heath Dotson
HD Coaching:Website |Twitter: 140 Characters or Less|Facebook:Follow us on Facebook

Couple of things on this. One is that narrower Q might not get you narrow knees. I ride very knees in, but it is a function of how I ride. In fact, sometimes I hit the top tube with my knees and that isn't a whole lot of fun. Once upon a time I was very into the narrow Q, well as narrow as I could get it. I ran C'dales Hollowgram cranks (~141mm), ti-spindle Speedplay (53mm vs 56mm), and pushed my cleats all the way out. That was the best way I have found to create a serious ITB issue. ;)
I went to an ortho as well as my fitter and the former told me nothing was wrong yet and to rest. The latter asked what the hell was wrong with me trying to run a narrower Q. Once Josh (fitter) got me setup on the bike he quickly saw I had issues and just moving my cleats back to center made a world of difference on my knee tracking, not to mention narrowing their position in relation to the top tube. Now, we also made a saddle change and moved me back and down (all road bike) to have my new seat position work with my fit....anyhow, point is that going narrow in your feet might help reduce your CdA or it might make it worse. It also, might lead to some injuries, but then this was all related to a road bike so maybe we should dismiss it. ;)


To Haycraft's annoyance we talked a bit about during Monday's live why this is a bad idea in terms of TTs. The Pro TT guys are constrained and we don't know if their best position is the one they are currently riding. So, if you mimic them it might be fast and it might not be. Not to mention they ride some silly speeds, which us mere mortals can only dream of achieving. Brain suggested that these high speeds might influence their positions due to the yaws they see.

In terms of Tri, well, that pendulum might be swing with the noseless/snub-nose saddles. They allow for a pelvic rotation that just lets you put the power out and the more those saddle proliferate the more we might see positions like mine, Eric's, Lucy Brash's, etc. become more commonplace and shift what a good position looks like. Therefore, looking like today's tri pros might be a good play, shoot, it can't hurt; but, the times they might be a changing.

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