You see really closed hip angles in some of the women.




It's less common in the men, but this guy did pretty well today:



Dennis doesn't have a closed hip angle. His torso is angled up a bit, but he keeps his head tucked down most of the time.



Here is an older shot where his knee is as high as it goes. Not tight at all. He could run 190s and still be fine...;)

Have you been following @UKcyclingexpert on Twitter?!

No. Not at all.

Limb lengths, neck length, shoulder and hip width, flexibility, back arch... to name a few. Plus a couple hundred thousand miles of riding road bikes before they got serious about TT. Ingrained posture, pedal stroke, and power production.

Great head position, but torso angle is interesting. Wonder if going too flat reduces the amount of power you can put out?

Just quoted this to add that this guy (Victor Campenaerts) used to be a triathlete, and is a regular at the Belgian beermile championship each year due to this background. He's also part of a very local running club which includes the duathlon world champ of 2016 (Seppe Odeyn, also doing Ironman since a few years getting a few top-10s) and Pieter Heemeryck (who ended up 5th at 70.3 WC recently). I wanted to add it to the post about MTM but did not want to take away from the well deserved glory there.

Longer cranks provide the opportunity for more leverage = more power. My view on the shorter cranks phenomenon that has been embraced by our sport over the last 10 or so years is that it will die a quick death like Vibram footwear, racing in compression sleeves, extremely low positions on the bike, ceramic bearings ....... So much of what makes the Tri world an opportunity to make money off of people reaching for easy speed will be found out. The dude is the best TT-er in the world. Why not ask why he's the fastest ? Cheers from NZ, Scott

I guess Dumoulin and Martin need to listen to Dennis's experts or at least learn from his position not the other way around...

I love the internet for shits and giggles like this.

The world time trial champion Rohan Dennis destroys the field, rides brilliantly and looks amazingly comfortable and controlled doing so but screw that, his position is crap and he uses the wrong spec cranks...because we all know better!

I guess that one's obvious when you're Giro's test-bunny during the Aerohead's development

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ZONE3 - We Last Longer

Shane... Shane...

Super glad to have you actively participating on these boards Jim! You really bring a ton of valuable information to discussions!

Would you say that in general the women are riding proportionally longer cranks for their height/inseam/torso lengths? 170 cranks on a 165cm body vs 175 cranks on a 180cm body? I don't really see 175 cm cranks being long on a 180 cm body. To me, being 168cm and able to ride all crank lengths from 165mm up to 175mm comfortably in the aero position, 175m on a 180 cm body looks "short enough'

On the one hand, women are generally using equipment (from helmets down) that was designed for a (larger) man. Not always, but generally.

On the other hand, women can usually adopt a much longer (almost mini-superman) position within the UCI rules because those rules, although strict, were again created with a larger person in mind.

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My Blog - http://leegoocrap.blogspot.com

I just looked up some info about Emma Pooley. Simply because she's a recognizable face to me from GCN show, as it relates to the ladies photos above.

Most stuff online says she had a 10 mile TT of around 5.5w/kg output. She weighs about 105 lbs. So, let's call it 48 kg. 48 * 5.5 = 264 watts.

Even at 50 kg, that's 300 watts.

A lot less frontal area than a 70 kg dude, but still. I'd imagine that an entire 100 + watts over a TT would be a monstrous difference. I'm sure the world TT champion in men's can probably do 420's to 440 watts in a 10 miler or less.

That's a good reason to add some priority to power output.

Given the ladies are at that power level, I'd think the aero versus power output style to lean more towards the aero side of things.

Off topic as to Rohan Dennis - and also didn't want to ask in the MTM topic but several people riding a P5 which I thought was not UCI legal because of the 3:1 rule I thought. Is that rule gone? Just wondering if that makes my old P2 legal for time trials under USAC.

that's an extremely good joke.

What Cat are you in?

I'm a lowly Cat 5. I once emailed them about some equipment questions like wheels and bikes for lower level folks (does it have to have the UCI sticker, for example).

The short answer was that unless you've bought a modern tri-specific model with the obvious fairings, bento box fairings, seat storage fairings...... you're good.

Same on the "uci approved wheels". You're good with ebay wheels as long as you're not trying to run discs in a road race or something.

I got the impression from the answer that the scrutiny increases the higher you go.

In other words, don't show up on a P5X or Ventum, and you likely will be fine.

Cat 3

In the US, at nationals the last few years they don't jig and haven't called anyone riding a Shiv Tri or P5-6 (or Tri Speed Concept) So I wouldn't worry about road stuff. They usually send out an update before nats on what they're going to check each year. Anything below that is pretty much anything goes.

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My Blog - http://leegoocrap.blogspot.com

surely you jest, and this really isn't that big of a shocker. Kiriyenka winning it at Richmond; that's a shocker (though that isn't even that big of a shocker); ditto for the guys finishing on the podium in that race (I forgot who they are); I think a FDJ rider and someone else)

Dennis does well in anything up to medium mountains and has been a top 5 time trialist for the past five years. He's 2 standard deviations right of marginally talented at the WT level

P5-3 was always legal. The old P2 is illegal because of the seatpost only.

But no one will check unless you are at nationals or going for a record, and if I was the official checking bikes, I'd still give you a pass.

Yes, because that's what they're used to. And I doubt it's hurting anything in most cases. Emma Pooley rode short cranks for awhile (~150mm?). She won the 2010 World's TT on them, spinning like crazy.

IMO the place where short cranks feel annoying is climbs. I don't mind them in TTs, but climbing they always felt like I wasn't using my leg muscles effectively. In TTs I wasn't able to increase power or improve aero with them, so I went back to normal length.

If you have some restrictions that make turning normal cranks in your optimal aero position uncomfortable (or have knee or hip issues), then trying shorter is a good idea. Otherwise there probably isn't much if anything to gain.

You should post more! Love your videos...

So what you're really saying, is that as a former triathlete, there's a chance (good chance?) that he's developed that position with the help of this forum? Maybe?

I bet he has done a lot of testing to arrive at that position...