I’m hoping all the knowlegable folks here can help me out. We’ve seen a lot of “cyber-positioning” here in the last month and I feel like I’m definitely getting a feel for what a good FIST fit looks like. But what does one do on a road bike for tri racing? It would be impossible to get the same angles without modifications like a forward seatpost that would compromise handling. So how do all the ITU guys do it?
I’m riding a Trek 2300 with Profile AirStrykes. I was playing around with my positon last night (no pic though) and here’s what I did
took out all the spacers and flipped the stem - still don’t look or feel that low in the front but finally have a drop from the saddle to the elbow pads for the first time.
pushed in my aerobar extensions so that the middle of my forearms rest on the pads - any further I’d be riding on my wrists which doesn’t sound too comfy. Eveny so, my elbow angle is quite a lot higher than 90 degrees, probably more like 120.
slid my saddle as far up on the rails as it will go. That seemed to make things a little more comfortable.
Any thoughts on all of this? Other things I should do? I should mention that when time and money allow, I’m going to go see either Rich Ducar or the folks at Mission Bay for a real fit, but am hoping to adjust my position as best I can in the meantime.
If I can get a digital camera I’ll post my pic. I have shorty bars (Jammer SL’s) so it might not be exactly the same. I also like to ride in the ‘Euro-Racing position’ where you are positioned as if you were holding on to your aerobars, but actually holding on to the hoods (breaks). Sort of like this:
Now pretend the arms are over the top-bar and holding a Jammer SL, and that’s my aerobar position. It took some time getting used to but it’s pretty aero. I did a lot of backstretching to get used to it.
Moving the seat as far forward as you can was the most important thing for me, although I tend to slide back in the seat when going into the above picture’s position, and sliding foward when in the aerobars.
In my opinion, think road bike fit first. Once you have this dialed in, you can really go two ways- ITU draft legal or multisport.
In ITU DL racing, the aero bars cannot extend past the brake levers. I have a set of cut down streamliners, but you can also use the jammer GTs or the new XXS syntace bars. I put these on the bike with no changes to the road position at all. Your elbows will not be on the pads, more like the wrists, and you will not have a low back by any stretch - I think the key here is to be narrow and powerful, since you typically would be in this position when you are off the front or trying to catch another group in an olympic distance race.
A multisport position is doable as well, but again, I think you need to start with the road fit first. For me, once I had the road fit dialed in, I measured the saddle height and the distance from the saddle tip to the stem clamp and wrote these numbers down. I lowered the stack height by 1cm, then moved the seat forward and adjusted the hight as appropriate so the cockpit length and saddle height were the same as they were in the road position. I was slightly more forward and a bit lower in the front. Then I put on some Syntace C2’s (medium, but should have used small) and that position worked out really well. Because the aero bars are longer, they are not ITU legal, but they’re comfortable and I can log 70-100 mile rides in this position with no discomfort, but I am certainly not as aero as I am on my tri bike. Unlike many road bikes, mine was designed with a slightly longer front-center so it handles well with the extra weight on the front end that comes with aero bars. You may find that being too forward on the Trek makes the handling a bit sketchy - especially on descents, or it may work perfectly, I have no idea.
