We have all seen Jan on his tri bars with his arms pointing to the floor but what do you think of this guys position? There would be no problem with a large headtube with this setup! Maybe 650c will catch on now!!
Eric Wohlberg (Canada) rides to 25th place at the Worls TT Championships 2003
and whilst we are on the subject take a look at David Millerwrist and hand placement as he takes gold
and silvers
and bronzes …
Its not just Lance who is catching on
AndyA
Oh man…Andy did you take those pics? They totally rock. And I was there to see it all first hand. If it wasn’t you, hats off to the person who took them. Seems to me the David Millar has his hands pretty far apart (but then who am I to argue with the fastest time trialer on the planet and his hand position). Awesome pics…might need to make them wallpaper or something.
Geez. All of those guys look like they need to pedal bow-legged to keep from kneeing themselves in the chest, or chin even.
Hell no go to http://www.cyclingnews.com/worldsphotos03.php?id=photos/2003/worlds03/emtt/JDpeschel_ger before you get me in all sorts of copyright problems!
AndyA
Holy flexibility. Some of those positions look downright painful. What I was most suprised with whas the seat height of Wohlberg on his “Lemond”. His leg is fully extended and his toes down a bit on the bottom of that peadal stroke. The height of is bar extensions is unreal, they’re a hair above the top of the tire. Nice Nimbles too.
Wow, there are compelling aspects of each of these configurations. Each photo warrants discussion. Perhaps the single greatest take-away is that these athletes really have trained specifically (or you would presume they have) to pedal in these radical postures. That is interesting.
For all the bantering we do on here regarding aero this and lightweight that I have nver seen a single thread on “Conditioning for the Aero Posture”. Very interesting.
I wrote a typically convoluted editorial on our website called “Meet me Half Way” about adapting to riding positions that was somewaht lost in the typical Tomist analogies, but did not speak to anything so extreme. Those afflicted with chronic interest can critique said article here:
http://www.bikesportmichigan.com/editorials/0000049.shtml
Sorry fo the cut and paste. I’m on a sad old Netscape machine right now. Thanks for the photos AndyA. Very interesting.
I guess his bike was UCI legal which probably restricted his position and is the reason he looks so awkward, sure looks aero though, my tri bike is not so restricted and so first thing tomorrow I am going to tweak that aero stem and the worlds mine!!
Tom I will take a look at your article tomorrow as its in the wee hour here in the UK and my wife is two days overdue with our first so she probably wouldn’t understand!
AndyA
Well, going back to the discussion about Lance’s new aero position and how the folks at Trek needed to send Lance a P3 with Trek decals…Well, looking at the pics of Eric Wohlberg, that is what he got. A P3 with Lemond decals (i.e. Trek).
As for training for a given aero position, Tom, this is what the likes of Boardman and Obree did for their world hour records. Believe the same applied to Colby Pierce when he doing the same in the US. Of the former World Hour record holders, I’d say that Indurain had the lamest aero position, but then again, he was putting out huge power with his 195 cranks.
His (Wohlberg’s) leg is fully extended like that because he’s shoved himself back on the saddle in taking that corner. He’s weighting that side of the bike, as well. His saddle height will appear normal when he’s back in the pedaling position.
These photos have been around for a long time. They’ve been analyzed on this forum before.
I’ll say it again, as I have before. . .be VERY careful about drawing any conclusions about how a particular rider rides or is set up based on one or two photos. Photos can “lie” based on angles, distances, focal lengths, etc, as well as where that rider is on the bike and what they are doing at that particular moment. The photo you comment on is VERY misleading about his actual riding position. He is, indeed, VERY low, given how his front end is set up. Does it work? Well, he did finish 25th. . .Not higher. He’s very good, but likely could be faster given some solid third party work with his position vs power. Millar is quite flexible as well, but you don’t see him riding in such an extreme position.
Tom hits on one particular piece that we CAN take away from studying the TT specialists. . .They train for the event. They train for the aero position. They train to be able to get low and still put out decent power. Are they better off lower? I suspect less than 1/2 of them have empirical data to back up their low position vs slightly higher/more powerful. But they do train for it and make the most of it.
Wohlberg has a cast. Reminds me of the time I had a gore tex cast, and managed to swim an olympic tri. couldn’t bow out as I broke a thumb in a crash 2 days before. should have. I wonder how much drag that cast had?