Is that her Tri position as well? It’s such a great looking aero position, but looks tough on fatigued triceps?
No, I’m working on deciding what her tri position is going to be like. And deciding how, if at all, that will be different from her 24-hr TT World Champs position. Neither are required to be UCI legal, thankfully.
Roughly, from that above-pictured position it’ll be:
- Move saddle 50-100 mm forward
- Move elbows ~10-30 mm upward & 10-15mm forward
- Move hands 30-100 mm upward & 30-50mm forward
- Move saddle up ~5-10mm
Totally thinking “aloud” here. Open to suggestions.
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Enjoying the thread, watching the fit transformation progress, and even the RChung cameo appearance.
To me, we’ve hit limits what what you can do with the stem for your frame. I’m even hearing rumblings of slamming the saddle forward. Maybe it’s time to look at the other contact points on the bike beyond just the Reach/stem length. Specifically:
- Frame with steep seat post angle (larger number)
- Short cranks
- Potentially a new saddle
This adopts what has been discovered by the Slowtwitch TT community many years ago. You’d just be massaging it for your road application so that it strikes a balance between aero, comfort, and handling.
One ‘affordable’ alternative to (1), is if you can find a zero-offset seat post for your current frame. Tho there are some drawbacks to this for your given situation and frame.
Note that when going steeper STA with shorter cranks, you may need to search for a brand new saddle that works for you in that steeper, more forward position. Be prepared for this trial & error, just in case the saddle that came standard on your bike isn’t the one.
Lastly, having done this a few times (optimizing for aero + sustainable power + handling on road bikes), I think it’s important to bring all of these changes together at the same time. Stem is the easiest of the 3 knobs, but you need all 3 contact point knobs to perfect the fit for what you are after. So you must account for what is happening at the saddle and pedals in addition to the bars.
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This one is shorter but similar speed and power…
https://www.strava.com/activities/5564637254
It is a local loop training ride, some speed was lost due to traffic lights on the way there etc. It was windy, and 3x the elevation gain per km (or mile) as your ride. I had quite strong wind and high temperatures, hence the “fear and loathing” hah.
I am very broad-shouldered and was 92 kilos at the time. I don’t shave my legs, my bike is round-tubed , I run shallow rims, but the hubs are really smooth and the tires are low-resistance.
I suspect that my position on the drops and the “horizontal forearms and hands on the hoods” are both good.
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Some of the guys at the track have great flat positions. The key seems to be length, long effective top tubes and stems. I did a quick search to see if any of the sprinters are nearly as tall as you. Theo Bos is 6’3”. Theo bos IG
You might generate some ideas by looking into the geometry utilized in his case. He does appear to achieve a flat position with bent arms. I bet you’ll need to look into something custom. I’m only 172cm tall. My road bike has a 55 cm top tube. My recently purchased track bike has a 53 cm top tube and with a -17 150mm stem I’m still wanting more length. I have my eyes set on a frame with a 56cm top tube and 50cm seat tube. I’m not sure what the limit is for general road riding. The weight distribution is approaching a TT. I think we’ve all seen clips of pros understeering off the road during TT’s.
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To me, we’ve hit limits what what you can do with the stem for your frame. I’m even hearing rumblings of slamming the saddle forward. Maybe it’s time to look at the other contact points on the bike beyond just the Reach/stem length. Specifically:
- Frame with steep seat post angle (larger number)
- Short cranks
- Potentially a new saddle
This adopts what has been discovered by the Slowtwitch TT community many years ago. You’d just be massaging it for your road application so that it strikes a balance between aero, comfort, and handling.
I hadn’t been keeping track of fit philosophy among road or tri pros for the last few years - and I actually am a roadie, not a triathlete. What, specifically, are you talking about? It sounds like you and a bunch of people are recommending a relatively far forward saddle position with long reach, correct? (And separately, a bunch of people are recommending more drop, but the other group seems to be saying focus more on reach and forward saddle position). When did this philosophy originate?
I’m curious, because I got a custom road bike in 2007. I basically asked for an endurance bike, in not so many words. My torso position in the hoods is what I’d characterize as an endurance position (it’s about 45 degrees, maybe less). I definitely like to go fast at times, and in my road racing days I went for a very far forward saddle position. So my bike has a 76 degree seat angle, and it also has a relatively long TT (55.7cm effective TT, about 400mm reach, can’t remember the stack but I think it’s about average for small endurance road bikes, 46cm seat tube because I’m short and have short legs). Basically, it sounds like I might be in roughly the position you’re recommending for the OP. It wasn’t exactly a conventional fit when I got it. Although my back’s not flat when I use aero hoods or drops, it’s still reasonably low, probably low enough for my goals right now.
To the OP, I see you are in Minneapolis. If you’re looking for a fitter, I know that Now Bikes does fits and they’re a very fast roadie and tri oriented shop. No experience with their fits, but I did get a bike from them. I’ve had great experience with fits at The Fix; they’re a more inclusive sort of fit philosophy but both the principals have definitely had experience road racing and fitting pro athletes. And their bike fits are integrated with functional movement screens, so if anything is tight, they will help you address it - and face it, you probably have some muscle groups that are tight that you don’t realize.
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Thank you thank you. I’m familiar with both places. And yes, none of use have perfect biomechanics, something can always be improved upon. Myself included.
I was playing around with position, just to see how far out I can comfortably extend myself to the hoods and figure that on my current bike (60.5 ETT, 396mm reach + a 130mm stem) I could comfortably ride with another 3-5 cm of stem length. 170-180mm, yeah, I’m long.
I’m starting to see data on changing bikes. Started road biking in 2016 and had 5 years on a Trek Domane endurance geo:
Last year I definitely felt like I could use a more aggressive geometry to achieve a more aero position. Rode this for a couple months:
and it took some time to adjust to the more aero position.
Went to the fitter two days ago, and he pushed the seat up about 1" on my Tarmac SL7:
post-fitting I have two hot 91-102F rides in light 5-8mph winds so far: 1 hour on Monday and 2+ hours last night. No conclusions yet, although so far this bike has been faster on zone2 riding. My self-fitting made the saddle disappear under me, it certainly was supremely comfortable and I could easily ride a century or longer with the seat an inch lower. The post-fit more aggressive position is putting a little pressure on the perineum and I don’t know yet if it will have a positive or negative impact on power in the drops, or if for a given power, its faster on the hoods or in the drops. That said for two days in these light/hot winds I have seen 20mph riding into a crosswind while putting out less than 200W, so it seems faster. I’ll probably be tweaking this for a bit…
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Curious in how it works for you. I have been on a Trek domane for the last 4 years. Very much love the ride. Been debating on next bike being more aero.
I had a 2015 Domane 6.2 Disc, the last of the gen1 models. As stated above, with the seat 1" lower the SL7 is faster and with 32c Conti GP5000 TL (tubeless) tires had enough compliance to ride a century or more. I’ll put the 26c optimized mid-aero wheels back on, but first impressions with those on 2 hour rides were also positive.
My fitter is also a long-time coach (published on Pez News), and it kills him seeing me in non-pro shoes (5 year old Specialized Audax). So I’m going to try his ‘more pro’ fit and see where I end up. And buy the S-Works 7 shoes that fit like a glove.
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I’m a roadie too. Yes, in short it’s about getting Long & Low.
Double-clicking into that, it is about reducing frontal area in addition to becoming as slippery as possible to maximize Watts/CdA.
“How” any individual cyclist gets there is completely dependent on their unique physiological specifics. Obviously, there isn’t a formula that will work for everyone. But as a start, a common approach that works for most fit and flexible people of “average” proportions relative to their height, is to scoot that saddle position forward and selecting a TT with longer reach, as you stated. And the major knobs to tune are the 3 I specified earlier.
That’s a tough question. In fairness, this philosophy is not new.
It’s probably been around since the beginning of road bikes because we can observe competitive cyclists from even the black & white photos era all intuitively understood the importance of reducing frontal area to go faster – even without power meters, speed sensors, wind tunnels, or the Internet.
Though, maybe, Dan Empfield would claim that 25~30 years ago is when the ‘steep vs shallow seat tube angle’ thing started catching on as a debate topic amongst the conventional crowd. So that is one point in history we could peg the “long and low” philosophy to. The steep STA was in favor of achieving a long and low fit.
Relatedly, the topic of short vs long cracks has swung back and forth over the past several decades as well. So likewise, hard to peg that philosophy to a specific date, because some topics simply act like a pendulum throughout history. Sorry for the unsatisfactory answers.
Ya I’m seeing these 2 schools of thought being discussed here too. Personally, for the OP, I am in favor of focusing on reach and saddle first.
For his situation specifically, I actually disagree with increasing the drop by removing spacers or going to a negative angle stem (for now). Too soon for that.
What I see is the butt being too low. In order to raise the saddle, one way is to reduce the crank arm length so that the seatpost can be raised. So my recommendation is to attack the saddle-bar drop problem from the opposite end.
If you take this plunge, a bunch of other things may change and it’s difficult to predict until you try it. Some things you can anticipate are cleat position may need tuning, stance-width tweaks, and like I mentioned earlier you may need a new saddle to accommodate sitting in that rolled-forward, aggressive position.
Because the seat-post went up, you may need to slam your saddle forward even more. This could be limited by your STA, but we won’t know till you try.
Another potential limiter, is if your frame’s TT isn’t long enough then you’re going to have to use a huge +140mm stem which may be suboptimal for handling based on how you ride. Depends on the rider, but ideally you can choose a frame with a Reach that lets you use a faster steering stem.
My real point is only after everything on the backside has been optimized would I start looking at how to optimize the front-end. Most here are providing well-intentioned advice on how to optimize the front end (which makes sense because it’s the cheapest, fastest, and thus most viable solution given what’s available on hand).
But have a look at how OP is sitting on the saddle. He is fit, flexible, and definitely has the potential to eek out aero gains as indicated by his hip angle still having room. But he can’t take advantage of it because he is sitting too low and too far back.
Getting low on the front doesn’t matter if you can’t find a way to sit comfortably in a high, flat position, let alone generate power sustainably.
Lastly, I think I’m speaking too soon and about to open more cans of worms: but I think for tall riders it is not always necessarily to slam the front end in order to get aero. This works better for shorter riders with tiny frames, but taller riders would do better to focus on getting long and narrow and having the front end sit high enough to cover the air gap between their hands and head.
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I didn’t feel cramped on any bike. I’m 185cm height and the bikes are all 58cm frames. Since 2016-2017 I’ve gained 5kg while also gaining strength in the gym. However despite more muscle mass, at 97kg the redistribution only accentuates the need to lose some mid-section weight. First goal is dropping to 90 and long-term goal of 85 assuming I don’t lose flatland raw power. The double century in 2017 was at 92kg and spent more than 50% in drops on that Domane.
I don’t really grok geometry, so here is the comparison between the 3:
but its easier to visually see the difference in those pics! For some reason I thought endurance geometry was best for me in late fifties but the 3T and SL7 have changed my opinion.
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Always be changing hand positions. The SL7 Comp bars suck, and will get swapped out for some nice carbon bars next week. And regarding the more aggressive position and drops, right now my mid section is pushing against diaphragm and making it uncomfortable to get into the drops on either the 3T or SL7. So he pushed the seat up and sure enough I could ‘more’ comfortably get into the drops for 30 seconds 
My fitter also seems to be amplifying what I told him, and sending me off with a constant reminder to ‘lose the gut or be a loser’ because my spidey sense knows its increasingly becoming a co-morbidity and time to get serious before shit gets real. Step one is to not have beer at the house. Step two is cranking up the burn rate. Already eat clean, sleep, …
Warranty issue and too much waiting, returned it.
Thanks for your super detailed POV. Lots to unpack here, and I’m going to really go over it, but in the last week, I’ve made some tweaks.
- Saddle raised 1cm (saddle-height: 85cm)
- Saddle moved forward 1cm (mid-saddle to tops: 78cm…I measure mid-saddle because tip of saddle isn’t a good measurement when saddles vary in length)
So far so good in terms of how it feels and my ability to generate power. I’m feeling recruitment in all the right places right now and power numbers are looking good.
I feel this way most of the time.
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Getting adjusted and more comfortable with the Tarmac SL7 bike fit. Tonight we had lighter winds, for this area (6mph with gusts 10-12mph), and hit an average speed of 19.2mph putting out just a smidge under 200W:
Progress. 198W average power and 199 normalized. Just a nice easy ride around the z2/z3 border after being out of town most of last week.
Now that I’m really comfortable on the new bike after the fit two weeks ago, going to start working on finding a good aero position.
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i am 184cm and 72 kg ( i have a venge with roval CLX64) this is some data of my Z2 ride not trying to be aero just hand on hoods . 200W = 21 mph
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Wow, very impressive!
Really considering getting myself bars like these as my main goal next season will be a road bike tt and my main problem holding an extreme aero position is lacking forearm support and consequently triceps fatigue.
Seems like a much more reasonable solution for me overall than going for a longer stem.
I wonder why no other companies are going down a similar route. Is it just a matter of weird looks?