How to Perfect Your Riding Position & Technique
By Ed Pavelka of
www.RoadBikeRider.com
Cycling is full of
prodigious numbers—the distances ridden, the
calories consumed, the tires trashed. Another
statistic that can seem astounding is the number of
pedal strokes made.
Let’s suppose it takes
you six hours to ride a century and you pedal at the
rate of 90 rpm throughout. As you cross the finish
line, you will be making pedal stroke number 64,800.
Whoa, that’s a lot! But
it barely registers on the scale of what happens
during a full season. For example, during the year
in which I had my biggest mileage total, I figure
that I got there by pushing the pedals around
approximately 13,340,000 times.
Can you say, repetitive
use injury? You can see why cyclists are good
candidates, especially if we aren’t pedaling from a
nearly perfect position.
Your body and bike must
fit together and work together in near-perfect
harmony for you to be efficient, comfortable, and
injury-free. The more you ride, the more essential
this is. If even one thing is out of whack, it’s a
good bet that it will cause a problem during
thousands of pedal strokes.
Fortunately, it isn’t
difficult to arrive at an excellent riding position.
But it does take time and attention. You need to be
careful with your initial bike set-up, then
conscientiously stay aware of your body and the need
for occasional refinements. As time goes by, your
position will stabilize and you’ll be riding in a
smooth groove.
The following guidelines
come from my experience and the advice of various
experts. One is Andy Pruitt, Ed.D., the director of
Colorado’s Boulder Center for Sports Medicine. Andy
has probably solved more position problems than
anyone during his years of work with elite cyclists.
As you work on your
riding position, always remember Pruitt Rule No. 1:
“Adjust your bike to
fit your body. Don’t force your body to fit the
bike.”
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Frame:
Measure your inseam from crotch to floor with
bare feet 6 inches apart, then multiply by 0.68.
The answer is a good approximation of your road
frame size, measured along the seat tube from
the center of the crank axle to the center of
the top tube. As a double check, this should
produce 4 to 5 inches of exposed seatpost when
your saddle height is correct. When the
crankarms are horizontal, the top tube should be
right between your knees when you squeeze them
together.
-
Arms:
Keep your elbows bent and relaxed to absorb
shock and prevent veering when you hit a bump or
brush another rider. Hold arms in line with your
body, not splayed to the side, to be more
compact and aerodynamic.
-
Upper
Body/Shoulders: Don’t be rigid, but do
be fairly still. Imagine the energy wasted by
rocking side to side with every pedal stroke on
a 25-mile ride. Save it for pedaling. Also,
beware of creeping forward on the saddle and
hunching your shoulders. There’s a tendency to
do this when pushing for more speed. Shift to a
higher gear and stand periodically to prevent
stiffness in your hips and back.
-
Head and Neck:
Resist the temptation to put your head down
when you’re going hard or getting tired. It
takes just a second for something dangerous to
pop out of nowhere. Occasionally tilt your head
to one side and the other instead of holding it
dead center. Change your hand location to
reposition your upper body and give your neck a
new angle.
-
Hands:
Prevent finger numbness by moving your hands
frequently. Grip the bar firmly enough to keep
hands from bouncing off on unexpected bumps, but
not so tightly that it tenses your arms. For the
same safety reason, keep your thumbs wrapped
around the bar instead of resting on top. Move
to the drops for descents or high-speed riding,
and the brake lever hoods for relaxed cruising.
On long climbs, grip the top of the bar to sit
upright and open your chest for easier
breathing. When standing, hold the lever hoods
lightly and sway the bike side to side in synch
with your pedal strokes, directly driving each
pedal with your body weight.
-
Handlebar:
Bar width should equal shoulder width to open
your chest for better breathing. A bit too wide
is better than too narrow. Make sure the hooks
are large enough for your hands. Modified
“anatomic” curves may feel more comfortable to
your palms. Position the bottom, flat portion of
the bar horizontal or pointed slightly down
toward the rear brake.
-
Brake Levers:
Move them around the curve of the bar to give
you the best compromise between holding the
hoods and braking when your hands are in the
hooks. Most riders do best if the lever tips
touch a straightedge extended forward from under
the flat, bottom portion of the bar. The levers
don’t have to be positioned
symmetrically—remember Andy Pruitt’s rule. If
your reach is more comfortable with one lever
closer to you than the other, put ‘em that way.
-
Stem Height:
Start with the top of the stem about one
inch below the top of the saddle. This should
give you comfortable access to every hand
position. As time goes by, think about lowering
the stem as much as another inch (not all at
once) to improve your aerodynamics. If your
lower back or neck starts complaining, or if you
notice you’ve stopped using the drops, go back
up. Never put the stem so high that its maximum
extension line shows, or it could be snapped off
by your weight on the bar.
-
Top-tube and
Stem Lengths: Combined, these two
dimensions determine “reach.” Depending on your
anatomy and flexibility, your reach could be
longer for better aerodynamics, or it may need
to be shorter for back or neck comfort. For most
riders, when they’re comfortably seated with
their elbows slightly bent and their hands on
the lever hoods, the front hub will be obscured
by the handlebar.
-
Back:
A flat back is the defining mark of a stylish
rider. Notice I didn’t say a great rider.
Anatomy and flexibility have a lot to do with
how flat you can get. Lance Armstrong, for
instance, has a rounded back that’s not picture
perfect and yet he still manages to go down the
road pretty well. The same was true for John
Howard, once America’s dominant road racer. I’m
in their boat (back-wise, not speed-wise). Once
you have the correct reach, work on flattening
your back by imagining touching the top tube
with your belly button. This helps your hips
rotate forward. You don't want to ride this way
all of the time, but it'll help you get more
aero when you need to.
-
Saddle Height:
This is the biggie. You’ll find various
methods for calculating this critical number.
Here’s the one I like best. It has become known
as the LeMond Method, because Greg
brought it to us from his Renault team in the
1980s. (Invite a friend over so you can help
each other and both wind up with primo
positions.)
Begin by standing on
a hard surface with your shoes off and your feet
about 6 inches apart. Using a metric tape,
measure from the floor to your crotch, pressing
with the same force that a saddle does.
Multiply this number by 0.883. The result is
your saddle height, measured from the middle of
the crank axle, along the seat tube, to the top
of the saddle.
Add 2 or 3 mm if you
have long feet in proportion to your height. If
you suffer from chondromalacia (knee pain caused
by damage to the underside of the kneecap), a
slightly higher saddle may feel better. However,
it should never be so high that your hips must
rock to help you reach the pedals. If this
formula results in a big change from the height
you’ve been using, make the adjustment by 2 or 3
mm per week, with several rides between, till
you reach the new position. Changing too fast
could strain something.
-
Saddle Tilt:
The saddle should be level, which you can
check by laying a yardstick along its length and
comparing it to something horizontal like a
tabletop or windowsill. A slight downward tilt
may be more comfortable, but be careful. More
than a degree or two could cause you to
continually slide forward, putting pressure on
your arms and hands.
-
Fore/Aft
Saddle Position: Sit comfortably in the
center of the saddle, click into the pedals, and
set the crankarms horizontal. Hold a weighted
string to the front of your forward kneecap. For
most of us, the string should touch the end of
the crankarm. This is known as the neutral
position. Loosen the seatpost clamp so you can
slide the saddle to get it right. Seated
climbers, time trialists, and some road racers
may like the line to fall a centimeter or two
behind the end of the crankarm to increase
pedaling leverage. On the other hand, track and
criterium racers may like a more forward
position that breeds leg speed. Remember, if
your reach to the handlebar is wrong, use stem
length to correct it, not fore/aft saddle
position.
-
Butt:
By sliding fore or aft on the saddle you can
bring some muscles into play while resting
others. This is a technique favored by Skip
Hamilton, my teammate in the 1996 Race Across
America. Moving forward emphasizes the
quadriceps muscles on the front of the thighs,
while moving back highlights the hamstrings and
glutes—the powerful butt muscles.
-
Feet:
Some of us walk like pigeons, others like
Charlie Chaplin. Your footprints as you leave a
swimming pool will tip you off. To make cycling
easier on your knees, shoe cleats must put your
feet at their natural angle. This is a snap with
clipless pedal systems that allow feet to pivot
freely (“float”) several degrees before release.
Then all you need to do is set the cleats’
fore/aft position, which is easy. Simply
position them so the widest part of each foot is
centered on the pedal axle. If you experience
discomfort such as tingling, numbness or burning
(especially on long rides), move the cleats
rearward as much as a centimeter.
-
Crankarm
Length: In general, if your inseam is
less than 29 inches, use 165-mm crankarms; 29-32
inches, 170 mm; 33-34 inches, 172.5; and more
than 34 inches, 175 mm. A crankarm’s length is
measured from the center of its fixing bolt to
the center of the pedal mounting hole. The
length is usually stamped on the back of the
arm. If you use longer crankarms than
recommended, you’ll gain leverage for pushing
big gears but lose some pedaling speed.
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