Recently put platform pedals on my commuter bike for the winter, idea is if the bike goes down on ice or slush I don’t neccesarily go with it. I noticed that when I ride with these my right foot tends to inch out on the pedal until the edge of the pedal is under the ball of my foot.
Now to explain something. I have fairly advanced scoliosis (curved spine) and it throws a lot of thing out of alignment on my body. My shoulders are not close to same height and the reach of my arms is 2-3 inches longer on my right side than the left, consequently my handlebar and aerobar set up is a bit odd to say the least.
I do know that my right leg turns slightly out ward from the hip, I believe this is what my leg is trying to do. Question is should I try to (if it can be done) fit the bike to my body? or ignore this and assume that my pedal stroke is more efficient set up traditionally. Any thoughts for a twisted man.
Any good fitters in your area? They might be able to help.
I think your question really requires an answer from something/someone other than people on the internet, as this could have consequences on your knees, etc.
All that said, if you “force” a traditional position, does it feel OK? Are you able to accomodate this with the float in your non-platform pedals? If so, then maybe it’s OK. If not, then you’ve answered your own question.
Guess I was trying to figure out if it was worth a trip to the fitter or not. I had 0 problems with the fit on my bike this year, I will have to wait until it is nicer out to see if I am turning my foot out on the tri bike. Baby is not getting wet.
I set a woman up on a tri bike that had a surgical Harrington rod due to her scoliois. She had been set up by a well known pro shop but they didn’t understand the significance of her condition so the normal rules that they used has to be thrown out the window.
The first thing that we had to deal with is that her torso was a few inches shorter than normal due to the S curve. Also with the Harrington rod she had no flexibility at all between her upper thoracic and uper lumbar spine, but she had an incredible amount of hip flexibility, I assume as an adaption mechanism to her spine.
Basically she needs an effective shorter top tube and a higher in the front position than the pro fitter had her set on. Even with the Harrington rod she’s a regular on her AG podium in the local sprint tris. Quite a remarkable achievement.
Bike fitting is trying to mate a machine with a certain degree of adjustibility with a human body that has a certain degree of adaptibility. With condition like yours there is going to have to be a compromise. You can adjust the bike as best as possible but your body will likely have to make adaptation that other people without your scoliosis wouldn’t have to think about.
Some bike fitters may not understand your problem and how to adapt it to a proper fitting unless they have a lot of knowlege about anatomy and human biomechanics. I don’t know where you live but if it’s anywhere near Toronto, Fiona from Endurosport is a former physiotherapist and I’d suspect that she might be a good peson to deal with bike fitting. I also think Paul Levine in NYC would be quite clued in and could help you out.
If you live anywhere in Eastern Ontario drop me a private message. I’m not a pro bike fitter so don’t charge anything but as I’m a chiropractor with a reasonable bit of bike fitting experience for local AG’ers I could try and help you out.