Mark my words. The Schlect brothers will not ride the same without Jens and Stuey, once they retire. Those would be great teammates.

He discovered that having a seat position much closer to the bottom bracket can be a good thing....against the conventional wisdom of most Pro cyclists.
Works for him...for others it doesn't.

Closer to the bb....mmmm....do you mean lower? I'm a little slow on the uptake:/

No....he is approaching the UCI limit of 5cm behind BB on a TT bike.

Oh okay. Shit I ride 11cm of setback on my roadie. Wow.

If Jens does it, it's right.

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customerjon @gmail.com is where information happens.

I opened this thread expecting to see this:



Hey ... how'd he get away with that front for at Masters Natz?

Frankie A one time used the telestrator to show how flat Jens back was in attack mode and that he could stay like that four hours. Then went to further speculate that he thought while in the army they shaved his vertebrae so he could do so. (Not accusing him without proof, so don't ban me....It's a joke).

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Who Dares...Wins!

haha probably true

Are we talking road or tt right now? Are you saying that he is approaching the tt limit while on his road bike?? If you are talking about his tt bike, how many UCI constrained riders AREN'T approaching that limit? It's a silly rule anyway, and if it wasn't in place, most would be riding further forward.

And that huge frame (probably at least 60cm) still looks too small! Jens in the land of huge stems, huge frames, and custom 46cm wide bars. He's a big guy, but with the engine and testicular fortitude to back it all up.

It's a good thing Jens Voigt and Chuck Norris haven't met... the world might explode. =0)
http://www.jensvoigtfacts.com/

Jens is my hero.

Do most of the big boys ride their road bikes near/at the 5cm limit? Hmmm, had no idea. I never went by any set formula, but let balance and weight distribution be my guide and when it was all said and done 11cm of setback was where I ended up....I can ride it all day that way and that is what is most important to me. Just went to the Romin and it's actually more like 12cm now, but I'm sitting in the same place 'in space' I was on my Alias.

Are any of the roadie publications doing data grabs on pro's road setups? Would be interesting to see the setback, drop and whatnot.

Here is an interesting link that details Andy's Madone....115 setback. This could be fun to look at imma gonna dig into this BikeRadar site:

http://www.bikeradar.com/...-madone-69-ssl-28915

After looking at some of the different pro setups it **seems** they all ride what would ordinarily be thought of as a frame a bit too small for the average recreational cyclist.....perhaps in an effort to get shorter head tubes? Lot of 6"+ guys riding 56cm frames with 140+ length stems and HUGE drop. I'm 6'1" and ride a 58cm tt and 125mm stem and it's perfect with no spacers, but damn if I dropped to a 56 it would put me with about 12cm of drop and on a 140ish stem....ouch on the drop.

I can't speak for the pros here, but I'll toss in my two cents based on what I see local elite racers doing and how my own fits have turned out.

I am 6' and ride a 58 cm frame with a 120mm stem and 7-8 cm of BB setback. When I first started riding I constantly crammed my saddle forward as much as possible. My fitter demonstrated to me that for people with long arms (like myself) you can get that low, flat back position by stretching out, rather than going down. My saddle moved back and my bars moved out, but not down. Before I left my last fit session, he told me the next step to getting lower was to swap for a longer stem (rather than removing spacers), and maybe even raise the bars by 5mm or so. Very long stems (130-150mm) are not uncommon. Is it right or wrong? I don't know, but it seems to work for people. I, for one, am much much more comfortable with a slightly lower seat slid all the way back.

You'll see this (small frame/massive stem) on other tall folk in the pro peloton... Ivan Basso being one.

No, they don't. I am simply trying to determine the context of JPatterson's remarks. This thread began as a discussion of JV's road position and then JPatterson brough up the tt set back rule, and mentioned JV was comfortable pushing the 5cm limit. Kinda lost me there. Just trying to get straight on the details.

A lot ride their TT bikes close to that limit. A lot more probably should.

That's the "other" Jens...and, are you talking about the aero-or-die front end? Where does it say that you can't run that?

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http://bikeblather.blogspot.com/

I think he was referring to the semi-Praying Landis position. His hands look pretty high in that angle.

He is big, but that's actually a 58 cm frame.

"having a seat position much closer to the bottom bracket can be a good thing....against the conventional wisdom of most Pro cyclists."

i think it depends on what terrain your position is calibrated for. most riders ride "on the rivet" or, at least, somewhat further forward on the saddle, when riding hard and alone (or in front) on the flats. but that position is counter to how the same riders position themselves for seated climbing. this hearkens back to generations-old thinking behind road v crit geometries. if jens was to ride as a GC contender i wonder whether he might set his position up not to favor long breakaways on flat/rolling terrain.

the 5cm rule is a joke and everybody in every peloton knows it. probably half the road race bikes in the women's peloton are illegal, just, they don't roll those bikes up to a jig pre-race.

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

Tom,

I was referring to the Time Bandit fork. I thought that was illegal from day one (but very fast).

Obviously tough to tell from this angle and with his butt in the way, but the saddle tip looks to be quite close to the BB.

Picture's not quite level, though. Also, that's a few years back -- when they didn't mind so much if you took a saw to the nose.

that's an adamo

I believe that pic was from before the year that the Masters Nats said that the equipment had to comply with UCI requirements...

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http://bikeblather.blogspot.com/