Seat height vs bar height?

[staceysue]

How high is your seat supposed to be, compared with your handlebars?

I just raised the seat an inch yesterday (think it was too low) They're about even now - of course the drops are lower than the seat. Now it seems like maybe I should be tilting the seat forward a little, though - new type of coochie pressure.

I want to get into that super racing position. It looks like a lot of fun. Unfortunately the bars are as low as they'll go and I can't raise the seat any higher. I wonder - could I put platforms on my pedals? Ride with platform shoes? hehehe

I want to ride in that super racing position.

You know what would be really cool? If you had a bike with a really high seat and really low bars, with the pedals way back. It would be like flying. :D

[Becky]

It's a matter of personal preference. The tops of my bars are an inch or so below my saddle. I can ride with them lower, but not for any length of time. For me, this is a good compromise between efficiency and comfort.

And yes, my saddle is tilted down ever so slightly to help relieve pressure on the girly bits. Not too far though, or I slide forward and put too much weight on my hands.

[Cataboo]

staceysue, you can drop the handlebars by putting a different stem on your bike - either one with a lower rise, or 0 rise. You may be able to just flip the stem over that you have on it to give it a negative rise... Are you riding in your drops or on your hoods? riding in the drops will make you a little bit lower.

My bikes all have my saddle even or slightly higher than my handlebars... It's nicer on my wrists not having it lower.

My handlebars sort of have an dip to them at the sides where the drops are - and I've found that I can kinda lay/stretch myself forward, rest my forarms in that little dip and get in a fairly aero tuck without using aerobars. It's more comfortable than when I had aerobars on my bikes. So I do that going downhills or if I'm really trying to crank.

[staceysue]

Thanks for the quick responses!

I'm always switching around. I switch between the clip-on aerobars and the hood mostly. There's something uncomfortable about the angle of my drops. As soon as I go into my aerobars from my hood, my speed increases by 2-3 mph without any extra effort on my part, and it makes it easy to put in the extra effort so I really end up giving myself a good workout.

I wonder if I could post a picture of my stem on here and you could tell me if it's possible to get it any lower.

[jusdooit]

Your seat height should not be determined by it's relationship to handlebar height. You could be setting yourself up for knee problems. Your seat height should be such that your legs are almost fully extended at the bottom of your pedal stroke. To get a more aggressive riding position go for a negative rise stem. I recommend consulting your LBS for these adjustments so youdon't compromise overall fit and comfort.

[Cataboo]

Thanks for the quick responses!

I'm always switching around. I switch between the clip-on aerobars and the hood mostly. There's something uncomfortable about the angle of my drops. As soon as I go into my aerobars from my hood, my speed increases by 2-3 mph without any extra effort on my part, and it makes it easy to put in the extra effort so I really end up giving myself a good workout.

I wonder if I could post a picture of my stem on here and you could tell me if it's possible to get it any lower.

Post a pic, so we can see your bike anyways :)

[staceysue]

Post a pic, so we can see your bike anyways :)

OK - I'll go see if I can find my camera battery recharger and get out there and get a picture of my lovely Lexi.

[staceysue]

Lovely Lexi and Edith

http://photos-e.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc1/hs208.snc1/7521_1041177325057_1694287366_75948_553810_n.jpg

Close-up of Lexi's stem

http://photos-f.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc1/hs208.snc1/7521_1041177365058_1694287366_75949_278695_n.jpg

[Cataboo]

staceysue,

You can probably flip that stem over.... Or you have a lot of spacer rings underneath your stem.... If you take the stem off, take out some of those spacer rings, put the stem back on... then put the spacer rings on top of it - you can drop the handlebars... but you're then going to have a bump sticking out right there... which is not ideal if you're bending over into your aerobars. But it will let you try out various positions to see what you like.

so if you do want your handlebar dropped long term, you can get your fork cut or shortened so that it doesn't stick up so high.

Pretty pretty bikes. Lexie's handlebars seem to be rotated upwards with the shifters tilting back towards you... if you loosen the connection at the handlebar to the stem, you can let them drop a bit so that they're more level and then the drops will probably feel more natural to you. (you'll probably have to rotate the aerobars level as well when you do that.)

If you decide to shift the stem around... make sure to tighten it back up in the right order. tighten the bolt up at the top of your fork first - then tighten the 2 bolts on the side of the fork... And after tightening everything, stick the front wheel of your bike between your legs and grab the handlebar and try to steer it.... if you don't have it tight enough, the handlebar will move independently of the wheel and that's really bad if you're biking.

[staceysue]

Thanks, Catriona! I really appreciate your help. Maybe some time I'll get somebody to take a picture of me riding it and you can give me even more great tips!

I've enjoyed riding so much already - I hope I don't get everything so out of whack that it won't be fun anymore. But I do want to ride in a better position so I'll give it a whirl. If I get it all out of whack I'll head on in to the bike shop.

[Becky]

+1 to everything that Catriona said. The position of your bars looks a little awkward to me, but that's easily fixed.

I might even think about moving the shifters themselves down, but that requires untaping the bars partway and retaping them.

Take all of this with a grain of salt- I sometimes have trouble judging these things from pictures.

ETA: You might want to see if the shop would help you make some adjustments. It's sometimes easier to have someone else tweak things while you're riding the bike in a trainer.

[Cataboo]

Just make small changes one at a time, ride with it and see how it goes...

That way you can always undo whatever you did if you don't like that. If you develop pain or anything like that, consider getting a fitting done.

[staceysue]

Thanks!

Hey - by the way - I was just looking at the picture of the bike in BikePedia: http://www.bikepedia.com/QuickBike/BikeSpecs.aspx?Year=2006&Brand=LeMond&Model=Reno+Women%27s&Type=bike and the picture I posted above, and it looks like different wheels? Mine have fewer spokes.

[OakLeaf]

Just make small changes one at a time, ride with it and see how it goes...

That way you can always undo whatever you did if you don't like that. If you develop pain or anything like that, consider getting a fitting done.


+1

And +1 on the bars being rotated oddly, but maybe you did that to bring the shifters closer to you? Which means that if you want to put the shifters where they're comfortable and have the bars rotated so that you can ride in the drops, you'll need to re-tape the bars anyway.

The good news about that is that you only need to re-tape above the shifters. I just did it myself, in fact. Before you unwrap the handlebars, put masking tape just below the shifters - low enough so that you'll be able to re-position the bit of tape right against the clamp, but high enough so that it holds the tape in place and you're not unwrapping any more than you have to. The hardest part to tape is the ergo bump, and you won't have to do that if you don't unwrap them.

[staceysue]

+1

And +1 on the bars being rotated oddly, but maybe you did that to bring the shifters closer to you? Which means that if you want to put the shifters where they're comfortable and have the bars rotated so that you can ride in the drops, you'll need to re-tape the bars anyway.

The good news about that is that you only need to re-tape above the shifters. I just did it myself, in fact. Before you unwrap the handlebars, put masking tape just below the shifters - low enough so that you'll be able to re-position the bit of tape right against the clamp, but high enough so that it holds the tape in place and you're not unwrapping any more than you have to. The hardest part to tape is the ergo bump, and you won't have to do that if you don't unwrap them.

I bought it used and the handlebars/shifters came like that. I do really like where the shifters are.

So - do I need more handlebar tape before I start this mess? The shifters are on top of the tape . . . .

I'm getting a little intimidated by this whole process. I am seeing myself sitting there surrounded by tape and handlebars and pieces, not knowing where everything's got to go . . .

[Becky]

I bought it used and the handlebars/shifters came like that. I do really like where the shifters are.

So - do I need more handlebar tape before I start this mess? The shifters are on top of the tape . . . .

I'm getting a little intimidated by this whole process. I am seeing myself sitting there surrounded by tape and handlebars and pieces, not knowing where everything's got to go . . .

Check out these instructions: http://www.parktool.com/repair/readhowto.asp?id=71 They show you how to wrap a bar from scratch. You'll only be doing it from, at worst, just below the shifter lever.

Then again, if you like where the shifters are, don't mess with them. Start with some of the other tweaks and see if they make things better.

[Cataboo]

Where those shifters are looks like it probably bends your wrist/hand back towards you - which is a recipe for developing pain or numbness... you want to try to keep your wrist in a neutral position while riding.

Try just swivelling the handlebars down and seeing how you like the position of the shifters first... you just have to loosen the bolts lightly and it should rotate.... if it doesn't work for you, then you might want to retape things... but if you're careful when you unravel the handlebar tape that is on there, you won't need new handlebar tape. just pay attention to how it's wrapped, have some electrical tape to retape it at the ends afterwards...

to loosen the shifters so you can move them, pull that rubber hood thing at the top back towards the handlebar, and it'll expose a bolt head on the outside of the shifter... loose then, the shifter'll slide to whereever you want, then tighten it back up and then retape.

Your wheels do look different, definitely less spokes - but that's not a bad thing... more performance type wheels typically have less spokes because it makes the wheel lighter. it does make the wheel not quite as strong - so if you're very heavy that might be bad when hitting a bump.

I'm not sure if bikepedia is entirely accurate on their archives of lemond bikes... I've looked up a few lemond bikes I've seen on craigslist, and the pics/descriptions usually don't match the listings and what I see on forums when I google... but since trek took the lemond archives down, bikepedia's all there is.

[jusdooit]

Mine have fewer spokes.

The bike on wikipedia has single spokes, your bike has paired spokes. Overall count should be about the same.

+1 on rotating the bar down. And the stem is definitely in a positive position and can be flipped. It may say on the stem +/- the number of degrees. Looks like maybe 7%.

Forgot to add that changes to the bar and/or stem may require adjustments to seat position.

[OakLeaf]

have some electrical tape to retape it at the ends afterwards...

You'll also need to remove and replace the electrical tape that holds the brake cable housings to the bars. Once you unwrap the handlebar tape, you'll see it - normally they're taped at the corners and again right inside of where the handlebar tape will cover them. Taping the housings holds them in place while you're wrapping the bars, and also keeps the housing from trying to pull the handlebar tape off from the inside.



to loosen the shifters so you can move them, pull that rubber hood thing at the top back towards the handlebar, and it'll expose a bolt head on the outside of the shifter... loose then, the shifter'll slide to whereever you want, then tighten it back up and then retape.

For Shimano brifters, don't pull the hood back from the top. As you look at the shifter from the outside, you'll see the beginning of a channel in the hard plastic part right outside the edge of the hood. This is where your 5 mm Allen wrench will go to loosen and tighten the clamp. You just need to pull the hood out a little bit at the side there, and you'll see the head of the bolt.


A torque wrench is a good investment for this kind of adjustment (including repositioning your bars on the stem, and the stem on the steerer tube), although obviously it's much less critical with alloy bars than it is with carbon. You want it tight enough that nothing is going to slip out of place at a critical moment, but not so tight that you're risking damage.

As long as you're careful, you should be fine. If you're not confident that you can do it by feel, count turns of the fasteners as you loosen them, then re-tighten them the same number of turns. That presumes that whoever tightened them last put the proper torque on them - which isn't always the case - but it's somewhere to start.

[Cataboo]

Oakleaf, you're more skilled than I - I always just tug it down all the way - just makes it easier to see what I'm doing.

[staceysue]

OK - I'm back from a very exhilarating ride.

Thank you very, very much for all of this awesome information. Honestly - you people are the greatest. I didn't move the shifters yet, but when I do I'm going to have this thread right in front of me.

I took out two of the spacers from below the bars and put them above, rotated the bars, and then fixed the aerobar. I took it for a nice ride and stopped about 3 times to make adjustments along the way. I'm thinking I still want to raise the seat a little and maybe drop the bars more. It's feeling so much better than before - much more enjoyable to ride. Thrilling, actually. I think it can still get a little better, though.

My knees just touch my elbows when they come up. It feels comfortable to me but I'm wondering if it means I need to move my seat back a little. When my legs are extended, there's still a bit of a bend to them.

I'm much more comfortable in the saddle now - like I'm not sitting in it so heavily. Part of it is that my legs are getting stronger and I'm riding in slightly higher gears, and part of it is that I'm leaning forward more and putting more weight on my hands.

Here's a picture after the adjustments.

http://photos-a.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-snc1/hs228.snc1/7521_1041220046125_1694287366_76008_6229168_n.jpg

[OakLeaf]

Oakleaf, you're more skilled than I - I always just tug it down all the way - just makes it easier to see what I'm doing.

No, maybe we just don't have the same brifters. On my R700s you can actually see a lot more of the channel and bolt if you pull the hood only from the side. Pulling it from the top puts a lot of tension on it that keeps it from pulling away from the side where the bolt is located.

Plus, it's such a PITA to get it back on if you pull from the top. I had to try it just now, to see. :rolleyes:


Glad you're making progress staceysue!

Re: knees/elbows, you want to set your saddle fore/aft position based on your knees' relationship to the pedals. Where your elbows fall isn't relevant to your saddle position. When you're in the drops, your knees may be inside your elbows at the top of the pedal stroke. If they're not inside but actually overlapping so that they hit uncomfortably, maybe think about either wider bars, or bringing your knees in closer.

[Cataboo]

OK - I'm back from a very exhilarating ride.



That's awesome! You should have a very slight bend to your knee when your leg is full extended - have your foot flat and ankle not pointed...

as for whether your seat needs to go backwards or forward, I'll let someone else tell you how you're supposed to know what's the right spot - something about dropping a line from your knee to the pedal. (Someone on here has posted it on 80 million threads) I usually find that when I'm riding, I shift my butt to the right spot... if I find that I'm keeping my butt to the back of the seat or going off the end, it usually means, okay, the seat needs to be push backed. But I almost always have my seat all the way back on a setback seatpost because i like a slack seattube angle. I think lemonds are supposed to have slack seattubes in general.

The shifters look like they're in a much more natural position now - can you use the drops now?

[staceysue]

The shifters look like they're in a much more natural position now - can you use the drops now?

The drops feel GREAT now. Thanks!

I was scooting back a bit, so I went ahead and moved my seat back a little - I'll find out tomorrow if it works.

[staceysue]

Re: knees/elbows, you want to set your saddle fore/aft position based on your knees' relationship to the pedals. Where your elbows fall isn't relevant to your saddle position. When you're in the drops, your knees may be inside your elbows at the top of the pedal stroke. If they're not inside but actually overlapping so that they hit uncomfortably, maybe think about either wider bars, or bringing your knees in closer.

My knees are coming inside my elbows and it feels great. Now - how are the knees supposed to line up with the pedals?

[VeloVT]

Everyone is different, but I would say you've rotated your bars too far in the other direction. A line extending from the end of the drops would now point up -- and in most set-ups with anatomic (rather than round) bars it would point slightly down (not horizontal). I would be a little worried that your wrists would be breaking in the opposite direction, rather than being in a neutral positions. Also I would think the ramps and the especially the bottom part of the drops might be pretty uncomfortable now (it's sometimes nice to be able to hold the ends of the drops getting started sprinting, for instance, and they don't look like they'd be comfortable in that position). Just my .02.

I also wonder if you are wanting to rotate your bars down that far (i.e. get the hoods farther away) if you might not really be wanting a longer stem.

[Kano]

Rather than moving the saddle back, try making it more level to help with the "scooting back" you noticed. In the more recent picture, it looks to me like the nose is tilted WAY down?

The next fun change to make is clipless pedals. You want to feel more power? Add the up stroke to your arsenal!

Karen in Boise

[KnottedYet]

There are lots of ways to make a bike that's a bit too small fit well, keep experimenting! Like Liza said, you can get a longer reach stem to place the bars out farther; and if you can't get the saddle back any farther on the rails but you still feel like you want to be even farther back there is the option of a seatpost with more set-back.

Neither stems nor seat-posts are terribly expensive, and are worth it to get the fit dialed in. (We've all done the fit dance, some-times folks sell their various stems and such in the For Sale section. http://forums.teamestrogen.com/forumdisplay.php?f=58 It's a good way to get parts fairly cheap.)

[jusdooit]

It still looks to me as though the stem could be flipped over. Does anyone else see this? +1 on nose of seat being tilted down too far.

[VeloVT]

I agree on the saddle tilt looking extreme, also. This can cause its own problems (more weight than might be desireable on hands, extra friction on seat from sliding forward and pushing back, etc). In general if you need an extreme tilt to your saddle, it usually indicates that it's either the wrong saddle for you or there's another fit problem going on.

[staceysue]

Wow - this bike fitting is a lot of work!

My saddle feels great, but maybe I tilted it down too far. I had to tilt it down a little when I put my handlebars lower because of the new pressure it was creating in front of the girly bits. I'll try it up a little.

So - there's a stem that will make the handlebars further away from me? That sounds like something I'd be interested in.

Jusdooit - what's this about flipping the stem over? What would that do?

KnottedYet - thanks for the link. I'm going to check it out!

[jusdooit]

Remove the handlebar by removing the four screws on the front of the stem and let the stem gently rest on your front tire (if it will reach, otherwise it will hang). Then take the stem apart like you did to take out the spacers. Take the stem itself and turn it over so the top is now the bottom. Put the stem back on the bike as you did before. Reattach the handlebar.You should now have a "negative" angle to your stem. A way to tell if it is at a positive angle before taking it apart is to use a straight edge (ruler) and line it up with stem where it attaches to the bike. Extend the ruler length towards the handlebar and if the stem rises above the ruler it has a positive rise and you should flip it over. If it falls below the rulers edge you have a negative rise and should leave it. If it's easier to tell after you take it apart just rest the part of the stem that attaches to the bike on a flat surface. It's pretty easy to see the angle that way.
Hope this helps. Happy riding.

[jusdooit]

So - there's a stem that will make the handlebars further away from me? That sounds like something I'd be interested in.

Meant to answer this in last post. Stems come in various lengths and angles. If you're lucky it will be stamped on the stem. If not, you can measure it (in mm). I don't recommend making big changes in this at one time, 10mm is very noticeable. If it's the stock stem it is probably 100mm. See if you can find it in specs about the bike online (bikepedia?). You can get a quality stem for $40-50.

[staceysue]

Thanks, jusdooit. I'll flip the stem over tomorrow. I just got back from a ride - fixed the seat and handlebars. I'll wait on getting a longer stem, because right now I don't know how it's supposed to feel and I don't want to waste the $ until I know what I'm doing.

[Yelsel]

I'm not sure if bikepedia is entirely accurate on their archives of lemond bikes... I've looked up a few lemond bikes I've seen on craigslist, and the pics/descriptions usually don't match the listings and what I see on forums when I google... but since trek took the lemond archives down, bikepedia's all there is.

Shhh... Trek didn't kill the Lemond pages in the Wayback Machine (http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.lemondbikes.com) (though they could if they thought to ask...) The internet archive has been overloaded a lot recently, try to access at an off-peak time of day.

Unfortunately, the geometries were in a popup window and were not recorded. But Bikepedia doesn't record that anyway, which makes it less useful. (Often the pictures are wrong in Bikepedia, but I've found it at least accurate enough to date bikes being sold on Craigslist / eBay... many people don't know what they are really selling.)

[Cataboo]

Thanks Yelsel. From what I've read of lemond's geometry, I think they'd suit me... Slack seattube angle & long top tube...

But then... I need another bike like I need a hole in my head.

[Yelsel]

Thanks Yelsel. From what I've read of lemond's geometry, I think they'd suit me... Slack seattube angle & long top tube...

But then... I need another bike like I need a hole in my head.

Sorry to do this to you ;)

...but the 2007 geometries (http://web.archive.org/web/20070306225624/lemondbikes.com/bikes/road_racing/triomphe_carbon/victoire.php?tab=2) work in the archive at least. I was looking for the geometry of an older sweet 52 cm Poprad, but quickly realized it would be too large for me from what I could find about it. I'm glad to know that some of the latest Lemond geometries are available. (I find it incredibly petty for Trek to immediately kill the site -- there were still a lot of their dealers with 2008 stock on hand.)