Originally Posted by
Excelsius
I am still not sure what's this position supposed to be. It's seems that you're saying you decreased the angle between your top tube and your upper body. But in that case, you'd need to bend your neck more (up) to look in front of you.
Yes, this change did result in a decreased angle between my upper body and the top tube, as you say, but the strain on my neck went away. I know it sounds counter-intuitive, but I'll try to explain it better. To me, neck strain is caused by the angle between your upper back (in the shoulder blade area) and your head. The smaller that angle, the more strain on your neck. You can reduce this strain one of two ways. You can either lower your head (which we all do occasionally on long rides by temporarily looking down at the road close to our front tire), or you can flatten your back.
Here's a simple experiment to see what I mean by flattening your back. Sitting in your chair, with your back away from the seat back, look up toward a spot on the wall about 4 or 5 feet above your head. While continuing to look there, allow yourself to slouch forward, so that your back is convex. Feel how the strain on your neck increased? Now while still looking at the spot, rotate your pelvis forward and allow your back to flatten out and become more straight. Feel the neck strain go away? Your head didn't move, but because your back went from slouched to flat, the angle between your upper back and your head increased, taking the strain off of your neck.
Incidentally, another benefit of this better posture is that your upper chest is more opened up, improving your breathing.