It been a work in progress that evolved through 2 professional fits and ending with myself becomming a professional fitter. I just can’t very effectively hold the goniometer up to my body, though I have tried many times and am fairly good at it. Just trying to nail seat height and reach, I feel I am very close on both. May look stretched out but if you really measure the angle it is close, and more importantly it’s comfy for long periods. Also I like the slight rearward tilt to the upper arms. Anyway enough about what I think, what do you think?
Feel free to critique my toes warmers, aero helmet inside, hairy legs, shirtless, whatever. And yes that is a computrainer multi-rider set-up and an Endless pool in the background. And yes I get paid to work and get faster there so nah nah nah.
Good video. I’m accustomed to seeing a position from the drive side, but no worries.
Firstly, it is much easier to make some worhtwhile commentary from a video than from a still, so thanks for posting an excellent video link.
Now, I can’t tell without seeing power numbers or something like a “Spin Scan” on a Computrainer but that is something I’d like to see in association with this position.
How does it look? Well, I’d wager your drag numbers would look pretty good since your torso is very horizontal and your aero helmet melds well with your back. You also have good reach and good structural support of the weight of your torso on your aerobars- a very common mistake. You got that absolutely right. Looks excellent.
On my left monitor I’ve freeze-framed your video with your left pedal at the lowest point of your pedal stroke, roughly before the 6:00 O’Clock. Your torso to femur angle looks to be a rather F.I.S.T. compliant 90 degrees. You’re pretty open it would seem. Nice aerobar configuration too. Have you considered experimenting with the new ideas surrounding bringing your hands *up *into a kind of Landis orientation? Your face is so low that looks feasible here.
In short, I like the structural elements of your position in terms of supporting your torso with your skeleton and having an open hip angle to facilitate pedalling and transitions. I do have my questions about your power output thorughout the pedal stroke. Something is leaving me with the impression that there is power left on the table between the 12 O’Clock and 2 O’Clock position of the pedal stroke.
Hey Tom, good coments and I really appreciate your insight. Now what do I think?.. Well you might be on to something I honestly don’t know. I suppose I should take another look at the Spinscan as it’s been awhile. It certainly looks like there is not much leverage coming over the top when you freeze frame the different positions. So we are talking about coming back a bit on the seat and/or just sitting back on it, correct? I actually have another video not yest posted of this same position just sitting back on the seat. Obviously it makes the cockpit too long but you may get a different feel for that 12-2 phase. So to test your theory, I would come back a bit on the seat, compensate for cockpit length and compensate for a tighter hip angle by coming up a bit in the front. Are we on the same page?
As it stands now bb to center of the rails on the Adamo is 80.5 (degrees of seat angle) but where I actually sit on it is in the ballpark of 83.5-84.5. Not sure if this make me an outlier or not. 15 cm of drop which is right in my range of expected armrest drop given Slowman’s formula.
I am going to post that other vid after dinner and maybe shoot you a PM if you’re not too busy.
So looked at it on spinscan a good bit last night and I didn’t see any differences when moving back and forth on the seat about an inch, that is at top dead center. My numbers are always 65-67 with a 50%-50% split. Average torque angle at about 101-103 both legs.
There might have actualy been better overall peaks when more forward and I sure didn’t pick up on the area under the curve increasing or shifting sooner in the pedal cycle when moving back.
So further spinscan analysis does show more power at 12 o’clock and a drop-off in the 1-2 range. Nothing major and I don’t feel it in my pedal stroke. Slid back on the seat 3cm and came up in the front 1.5cm with zero change to spinscan numbers or look of the graph.
Here’s what did change it… pushing 60 rpms. No matter what position or power, dropping my cadence helped me bring it over the top and through the 1:30 range better.
The effect was pretty large at 60, less pronounced at 70, and had reverted back to the original slight power/torque loss at 80rpms.
Would you fix this, should you fix this, how do you fix this?
I understand the spinscan spin. That’s why I haven’t hooked myself up to it in over a 2 years.
Power is power and it happens for me quite far forward.
No I would never consider tt’ing at 60 rpm, though some do. My point, if you can follow along a bit more closely, was to give Tom D. some insight into what I was seeing and what types of changes effected it what I was seeing.
To be honest I feel my position is comfortable, powerful, aerodynamic and within normal ranges for most measurements. I just wanted some guys like you and him to agree, but no Tom has to go pointing out where I might be losing power and making me all paranoid… Did you look at the videos?
it’s possible to determine whether this power loss is significant or not.
Just get a rotor q ring, put it in position 4, and see if your power goes up. That will minimise effort required at the 12-2 position and should show as an overall increase in power output. If you can’t detect it then there’s no need to change anything.
it’s possible to determine whether this power loss is significant or not.
Just get a rotor q ring, put it in position 4, and see if your power goes up. That will minimise effort required at the 12-2 position and should show as an overall increase in power output. If you can’t detect it then there’s no need to change anything.
Why not just leave the q ring on then?
Without knowing windtunnel data, I’d be inclined to think that going 1 cm higher in the front would not increase drag that much, but would open up your hip angle, especially when you are sitting a bit more further back in the seat like in video 2. I played and paused your video a bunch of times and it looks tight going over the top dead centre and I was left wondering if this will be sustainable over time on real world pavement with hills and wind (although you say 57 min for 40K, so you seem to be able to hold it fine). I guess the more relevant question is whether this is for TT’s, sprints and Olympic distance or do you have to race half or full Ironman on it. If the latter is the case, please not that very few pros are running such tight and low positions as they do have to spend more time in the position and also run.
Yes it is a Sprint/Olympic position though I may be doing the B2B relay in November. I would probably come up a bit to TT for 112. I think I am going to try a couple experiments. Coming up 1-2 cm and trying out the q-rings and seeing what happens. It is strange when I watch the video because I agree with what you and Tom D. are saying, I just feel good there and keep migrating back to this position. I would be inclined to raise a rider slightly up if they came to me for a fitting and looked like that.
So my question becomes, if all my angles are in range(are they?), seat height is proper, armrest drop fits in the formula(actually on the low side at 15cm for 77cm of seat height and 81 degrees of seat angle), where is the “solution”? Better yet, where is the problem? Too forward? Too low? Both?
To be honest I feel my position is comfortable, powerful, aerodynamic and within normal ranges for most measurements.
Read that again. Now do yourself a favor and stop looking for confusing/conflicting info from the bunch of “experts” that are trying to “help” you in this thread.
My knowledge only stems from 3 bike fits that I’ve had in the year that I’ve been cycling, but the second video looks like you have more pelvic rocking. Does it feel that way?
