I’m getting knee pain when I ride, and at first I figured it was some of the usual suspects--seat height too low, seat not properly adjusted fore/aft. But even after making sure the seat was high enough, doing the plumb line/knee test, and even getting the pedal extending “kneesavers,” I’m still getting some knee pain. I love my Tern Verge x10 folding bike (and it fits in my New York apartment great), and I’m just trying to figure out what the problem is here (whether it’s me, whether it’s the bike, whatever) so I can keep riding.
Some people here have at least suspected that some people’s knee pain can be isolated to just folding bikes and their geometry (versus regular sized road bikes):
http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread...bike-any-ideas
Either way, I don’t want to necessarily take it back to my shop; part of the issue here is that folding bikes largely don’t have the same options for fit and customization, so their staff isn’t necessarily skilled in assessing such things. I also would prefer not to (if I can avoid it) going to some road bike shop that is skilled in fit issues just for them to jump to the conclusion that folding bikes are rubbish and what I need is another expensive custom-fitted road bike when it’s going to be big and cumbersome to deal with in the city and my apartment.
The other thing is, my problem might lie at some unknown intersection of the standard bike fitting/geometry stuff and some more esoteric geometry issue: ever since I could walk, my knees have been a little weirdly aligned so that my feet splay outwards quite a bit, especially when bent. A bike shop may only be able to diagnose the former regular bike fit issue, a sports doctor without bike specific knowledge may only be able to diagnose the latter issue in a limited, non-biking related way. If it's just a "I have messed up knees and maybe biking isn't for me" issue, this would be useful to know before dropping another two grand on a new custom road bike or a fitted Bike Friday bike.
Anyway, I know this isn’t a place for medical advice, but I just wanted to see if anyone can spot some basic issues I might be overlooking before I had to go with the expensive race bike shop route or sports doctor route (or give up biking altogether).
There’s a high speed video of me biking as well as screencaps showing that I think everything looks ok, I can't identify any of the basic issues other than maybe my foot being angled too much (seat too high?). It feels good biking with my feet like that though, and feels most powerful at this height ("
If it had been too low before, your bike will feel lighter and faster with the new riding position.")
Video:
Screencaps:
