Australian Cycling Forums - Bicycles Network Australia

I would defiantly go with maybe a bit longer stem, look a bit cramped up

Hey Guys,

I got some Profile T2+ recently to add to my road bike. I have done one time trial without clipons, and want to try again with clipons. I know little about setup and just did a bit of searching on the Web for some advice. I started by flipping my seatpost and lifting 5mm and moving saddle all the way forward. Measured the BB to saddle height as similar to my normal setup. Hopefully this opens the hip angle and does not cause any other detrimental effects to my fit? Then I placed the aero bars on the unchanged main bar position. I adjusted the for/aft position to get the angle at my elbow to around 100 degrees (read 90-110 was normal). I placed the pads just in front of my elbows with hands in a nice position to use bar end shifting. That is about it so far. There is about 20mm drop available in stem spacers if I choose to use it, but playing cautious at first to get used to this position.

Is this a reasonable starting point:



Here is a pic without me on the bike if that helps at all:



Drop from saddle to pads is about 6cm.

Any advice appreciated!

Cheers,

Adrian

Took it out for a ride yesterday. Front end felt higher than it did on the trainer. Needs to go down. I am going to try and mount the aero bars under the main bar with some spacers on the pads.

Overall it felt good and I was able to go generally faster on some motorway runs I frequent than I have been without aero bars. I used to rest my arms on the bars on flats and downhills, so not much difference aero there with the bars, but I can now stay on the bars on the hills where I had to go on the drops or hoods before, so enjoying that aspect of the aero bars. Unfortunately I cannot stand without hitting my legs on the arm pads, so I am going to have to move them forward. For a TT I probably don't need to stand, but for some longer rides with some steep pinches, it is good to be able to stand. Is this a common issue with Aero bars.... do people just accept not being able to stand or do they adjust accordingly? Also, these bars are quite long. I am tempted to cut them once I have located a good position. They extend a good few inches back behing the arm rest mounts, and may cause some issues with standing again.

Cheers,

Adrian

Hitting your knees on the armpads is a pain. I had a Retul fit on my TT bike and afterwards my knees were bumping slightly when out of the seat (on the armrests not on each other). I ended up getting a slightly longer stem to sort that out.

I'm surprised it felt high because your back is actually nice and flat in that picture. I would say for a set up on a road bike it overall doesn't look too bad.

Thanks for the response. I have some spacers now to get the aero bars under the main bars with pads resting right on top, so will try that shortly. I will also have to push the armpads forward until I no longer hit my knees on them.

Cheers,

Adrian

Read in Alex Simmons blog about shrugging to improve aerodynamics. I do this on my track bike, which has a fairly high head set.

What I'm interested in knowing is does the benefit come from the the change of shape caused by the shrug or would you get the same benefit by lowering your handlebars a little?

Took some video from the laptop webcam after a windtrainer this morning and grabbed the below snapshot. I look like a hunch back, but it feels relatively comfortable while im riding. Obviously i need to practice flattening my back, but roughly how does the position look otherwise? I moved my seat forward this morning before this photo and I felt like I had more power in my pedal stroke but i think it's causing a higher back arch.



**Edit** I'm wearing a loose running shirt in this photo - I dont actually have the chest cavity of a bear.

mikesbytes wrote:Read in Alex Simmons blog about shrugging to improve aerodynamics. I do this on my track bike, which has a fairly high head set.

What I'm interested in knowing is does the benefit come from the the change of shape caused by the shrug or would you get the same benefit by lowering your handlebars a little?

A bit of both. The main thing though is that the shrug 'closes the cup' in terms of what you are pushing into the wind and it can also push the tail of your TT helmet down to your back.

Gun lock...if it was me, I would run a slightly shorter stem and make up for that loss in length with longer extensions.

So the shrug may also depend on which helmet you are using. I'm using this one, which doesn't have that point

Turtling should reduce your frontal area regardless of the helmet worn...