BICYCLES

I've got a friend who is into Randonneuring. I don't really "get it", but he loves it! Just like those ultra-marathoners, this guy can ride 200 miles (miles... not km!) a day and not really think about it.

 

Randonneuring.. don't those guys ride 24hrs+ without sleeping? When I started college I would be up all night and then go running in the morning. It was nuts and horrible on the body. I can't imagine doing that now as I approach 30.

 

The Beret Project: Gustaf Håkansson, aka Steel Grandpa

Thats to a neat blog on Gustaf Håkansson, aka Steel Grandpa. Thought you guys might enjoy it.

 

The Pinarello carried my arse up another 6'000 ft (1'825m) today. Three mountains, 50 miles (80 km), and a whole lot of fun.
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Just saw this thread. Here is my Trek Boone. I am shopping for wheels and other upgrades tomorrow morning as a matter of fact!. Also I recently bought the Cycelops Phantom 5. It will help to train hard enough to keep up with all of you. It bluetooth syncs with Virtual Training. https://www.cycleops.com/virtualtraining/overview. It is amazing and I'm already making huge gains. I can do video routes from all over the world, spin classes, pre-designed workouts, race other users, etc, etc. I think there are literally thousands of different routes/workouts to pick from. I usually design my personal workouts at work and "rode" at night.

It records and gives me instantaneous, HR, KJ, cadence, speed, rpm, power, ftp, gear selection, incline, etc etc. It really is incredible.
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You have to shave your legs for the miles and vertical feet to count.

You should switch to a zero setback seat post. It's better to have your saddle balanced on the rails.

 

Ok. Why? You mentioned "balanced." Is it all about balance? I've read desirable weight balance nearly always requires a setback seat post. Also, I thought moving the seat forward puts more weight on the riders hands.

Also I thought the saddle is set back not only for comfort, but also allows one to tolerate more saddle to handlebar drop. FYI, I'm 6'3" with long legs. Also I have had a hip replacement and back surgery. This post is good timing because one of the things I'm doing tomorrow is a 3 hour fitting. Hopefully you will read this and wont mind answering before I go in.

Thanks so much for your help!

e

 

Saddle position comes first, the type of seat post is a function of the saddle position, not the other way around as you suggest.

Look at where your saddle is on the rails. Assuming that is the right position and you were properly fit, the saddle clamp is very far back on the rails. When you are riding hard, you're on the very front edge of the saddle. This is also known as riding "on the rivet." That saddle is a lever. If you hit a bump when you're riding like that, the saddle clamp can slip, pointing the nose down.

Your body has no idea what kind of seat post you have. If the saddle is in the right place, what difference does it make if it's a set back post or not? What does matter is to try to leave the saddle at that optimal position and find a post that can be centered or close to centered on the rails without moving the saddle.

i was leading overall at the Tre Giorni di Pordenone on second day when my carbon saddle clamp snapped off on a bump while I was on a solo breakaway. I was on the very edge of the saddle and hit a bump and it just went crack and snapped off. Things like that can and do happen, albeit rarely. However, no reason to tempt fate.

Fwiw, I use zero setback posts and my saddle is in the middle of the rails. That's just how my saddle position lines up but it was a very effective position for me in my pro career.

 

Thanks. I'm very grateful.

 

Should <> Will.

I'll spend my way out of the aero liability unshaven legs. Hence, my new Rovals wheels.

I expect absolutely zero noticeable improvement, but I like the sound of ceramic bearings.
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Daniel, I have Reynolds wheels on my Trek Emonda sl and always wonder about the benefits of these. Do you recommend the upgrade? Thanks

 

You know, I will use a saddle for 3 or 4 years and have no issues and then all of a sudden, it's totally uncomfortable. Then I have to experiment with new ones and when I find one I like, change it to all the bikes (except the tt bike). But one thing has always stayed constant: no matter what saddle I use, when I put a straight edge on it (tip to tail) it's always O degrees. I don't know how the saddle manufacturers do it but regardless of the shape, zero tilt is always the best set up for me.

Fwiw, I always kept the contact points as consistent as possible for each of my mass start bikes: same pedals, saddles, and handlebars. Obviously positions had to vary slightly but that was always super import to me. I never wanted to jump from my road race bike to my points race/madison bike and have to get used to different bars or saddle.

 

I think for specific rides, on specific bikes, in specific environmental conditions they make a difference. For basically untrained losers like me, they are for show. It's like having a 458 Speciale that is only used for getting coffee at Starbucks. Lots of folks do it, and there's nothing wrong with it --- but it certainly isn't necessary.

I have a big climbing ride coming up in May in the NC mountains (100 miles, 10k climbing) and I'll likely go back to my normal Ultegra wheels for that.

 

This is how my LBS did my setup when I took delivery of my new ride too. 0-degrees was the plan, and they said we could adjust later if something didn't feel right. They spent a good long time (45 minutes?) measuring, checking angles of my knees, elbows, back, etc and made a lot of little changes while I was on a trainer.

 

Here is a pic of my saddle set up on my road bike. It's zero degrees with a straight edge, although it looks slightly nose down. As I said, those saddle manufacturers always seem to know what they're doing.

I don't know if I like disc brakes but I knew it was coming. Wheel changes are going to be impossible. Now you have to wait for a whole bike change. You will see that affecting race outcomes.
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Saddles should always be leveled and not tilted.

Never in my over 35 years of cycling with elite riders have I ever seen any proper cyclist tilt his saddle... and retain his ability to have children. Tilting causing weight to concentrate on whichever side is bearing weight or compensating the imbalance and you don't want that. Not only will it cause you pain due to muscle tension and concentration of weight, your body will also strain to maintain its position as your hip naturally slides forward or backwards due to its unbalanced position on the saddle.

Don't buy disc brakes for road bikes.

Disc brakes for road bikes are a cheap cynical ploy by bike makers to get people to completely re-equip their expensive investments in wheels and bike frames. I ask you, after you have about 3-4 really good bikes, unless you are a collector, why would you buy a new bike unless one of your "necessary really good bikes" expire?

The bike industry is the victim of its own greed - they need cyclists to continue buying in order to stay solvent. In the old days, people scraped to save up for a really good frame, a set of their favourite group set (brakes and gear shifters), picking up special lightweight fasteners from small manufacturers. Bike makers were small companies that made bike gear because they loved their work. It was not big business.

Nowadays, Shimano-style big business marketing has changed all that, turning the bike business into mass market high volume model where volume is king. Ironically, over the years Shimano arguably made more money selling fishing tackles, golf and snowboard gear. They are into whatever fad makes them the highest profit. High volume sales models force bike manufacturers, big and small, to strive for high volumes in order to obtain discounts they get from their suppliers like Shimano, so as to stay alive.

As I said, once a serious cyclist has some really good bikes to ride, he doesn't need to constantly buy new bikes, save for tires and the occasional new sets of wheels.

They are playing people for fools, by coming up with a badly-designed braking system that is rigged to make people spend money unnecessarily and forces bike makers to abandon perfectly good technology, which in turn, will eventually result in new high end bike wheels and frames no longer being offer to people who need gear for rim-brakes... eventually forcing them to abandon the huge investments they made in perfectly good (and actually better) bikes. Eventually all bike makers are forced to play the game because they need supplier discounts.

I ask you, why would anyone with extremely expensive low-weight high performance aero wheels or TT bikes ditch them to buy new heavy clumsy non-aero disc brake bikes or wheels?

Don't buy disc brakes for road bikes... they need to come up with something better than this kludge. A proper brake design should not invalidate your bike frames or wheels and should be easy to adjust, service, be safe in a crash as well as allow for easy wheel changes in pro races.

 

I recently had to ditch my saddle and try more "virility friendly" models. While working to get it perfectly level at 0% tilt, it occurred to me that the iPhone ships with an awesome "level" tool within their native Compass app. It was so handy to check the level at various points along the saddle. Just a tip in case anyone's struggling with it.

 

Those are some pretty strong words. While I hear what you're saying, I certainly couldn't say that.

I raced with a few incredibly good guys who had their saddle position slightly off of level. One even won a few world championships and an Olympic medal. I certainly wouldn't tell him that his saddle should "always be level and never tilted." I'm sure that he would laugh at me (from the top step of the podium, most likely). The same for a few other really successful guys. If it works, it works. What works for one person, fit wise, isn't going to work for everyone.

As far as disc brakes, I'm not a fan and I don't know if it's a good idea. It seems to me that modern calipers seem to work well enough to lock up my wheels at will and still have plenty of modulation, while allowing fast wheel changes. That said, I certainly wouldn't say to anyone not to buy bikes equipped with them. If they want to do it and go through the headache and hassle and think that the difference in braking is worth it, so be it. Back in the day, lots of people said the exact same thing about carbon frames and that nothing was better than steel. I think that anyone who said that carbon frames are a fad and a ploy by the bike industry would be deemed a fool by most serious cyclists. Maybe in 10 years, we will be saying the same thing about people who decried disc brakes.

I think that people should do what they works best for them and if they are really in tune with their bodies and their performance, they will know. Even if I were a 10x world champion I wouldn't go and tell people that they shouldn't do something or try something new. Let them decide for themselves. If it's all wrong, they will know quickly. And if it's right, they will be glad they tried it.

 

All saddles are designed to be fitted level. I do not know of any saddles that are designed to be fitted to riders in a tilted position.

While some of your friends may have adjusted their saddles slightly off, it is probably because those saddles did not properly fit your friends to start with. Think about it, if you have to tilt the saddle to feel comfortable it means the front or the back of the saddle is either pressing too hard or is not sufficiently in contact and is lacking in support. What follows from that is that a properly-fitting saddle would either relieve the pressure or provide the missing support.

It would get unnecessarily very complicated for a saddle maker if his saddle is designed to be tilted in application. Think of all the possible permutations a single saddle design would have to account for... how many degrees of +/- tilt?

Disc brakes work well for MTB and dirt applications (like in cyclocross events). However, speeds for those applications are much slower so fine modulation of brake force, aerodynamics and low weight are not of concern. The bike makers threw all these considerations out the window when they went along with promoting use of disc brakes in road racing and high speed cycling. They lost all credibility with me from that moment on.

You are right about "...modern calipers seem to work well enough to lock up my wheels at will...". Good rim brakes work well and no one wants grabby brakes that can throw them over the handlebars when they brake hard. Good brake modulation is extremely important. The only drawback with rim brakes at the moment is when the brakes are very wet on a fast descent that the rider overcooked and this can be mitigated by continued research into brake pad design as well as synergistic pad and rim surface material combinations.

I tell people not to buy disc brakes for road bikes not simply because it is a bad product but because it is a dishonest ploy to stealthily engineer obsolescence into rim brake bikes. When new technology is aggressively promoted by bike makers they tend to push out the existing standard and choices for buyers of the older standard becomes harder to find and more expensive to buy. Research and development becomes switched to the new standard... which forces riders to buy new bike frames and new wheels to take advantage of. The bike making industry does not solicit their customers' input or permission when they want to change the game and their game right now is sustain their bloated sales by forcing buyers to continue to buy new bikes. If you have been in the biking community for the last 40 years you will notice how many fad bike stores have popped up and the pretentious culture of super expensive bike gear that many of these stores depend on.

A good brake design should never invalidate your bike frame and all your wheels, especially if those are actually of superior design to disc brake road frames and wheels. A high end bike is worth over $12,000. Disc brakes are ~$500. Why would anyone be forced to choose between a top-performing $12,000 bike for a $500 brake that does not offer any practical advantage? To put this in perspective with Fcars, high performance bike wheels may be compared to ultra high performance tires for Fcars in that they are of similar costs and are consumable especially when raced or ridden over high mileage.

So what if car makers decided too few people were buying new cars and decided to force people to buy new cars by promoting a new brake design that won't work with existing tires and existing cars? How would you feel if your Fcar could no longer use the best tires? People would be up in arms in a second. Unfortunately, racing bike gear is a very specialized niche that's not understood by the general Public, a business sector that is not considered a public necessity and doesn't garner the same degree of scrutiny from consumer protection groups. So bike makers can get away with these sorts of scams unless people speak up to point out the unethical ploy and act accordingly.

 

Road time trialing employs an extreme body position that's intended to be only maintained for a short period so I fully understand your point on wanting to achieve a low profile. I also train TT on my TM01 using aero bars with just a 1 cm riser for my armrests and an ISM TT saddle. My TT rides are usually only around 30 kms.

However a good TT riding position requires your head to look up and not have your body be so tilted down that you cannot maintain a heads-up position. This is why tall TT riders will stack very tall risers for their elbows, to make their upper bodies level. Their bodies are not pointed down so unless your saddle doesn't really fit you, you also shouldn't have to point your saddle down. If the saddle is pointing down, your body would tend to slide down and forward, pushing your arms and hands forward. I ride TT and I know I don't want my hands to be pushed forward. My hands need to feel neutral so I can operate the gear shifters with ease as well as be able to move my hands to the hill-climbing/off-saddle riding position on the wings without having my body become unbalanced when I lift them off the extensions.

Here are some photos of national champion pro tour riders of varying body sizes competing on their TT bikes. Their bodies are not pointed downwards and neither are their saddles.
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