timtak

It is not that I have a hang up with UCI fit, but that too many Local Bike Shops, selling as they are the image of the UCI racers in the form of the major-mark-up UCI sponsoring brands, have a UCI fit fetish. The UCI fit is good for those that ride around in a group of 80 people for long distances. It is a good fit for those people. It may even be a good fit for those who have the leisure to go on 50 mile rides on their own.

But for the majority of fat-forties, who cycle shorter distances, on their own, the UCI fit is inappropriate and should and would be demoted but for the UCI-industrial-lBS complex that makes money out of the races, making massive mark up bikes, and massaging egos ("You look just like a TDF/Grand Fondo pro") for money.

Cobb ("advisor to Lemond and Armstrong") claims the butt is not designed to sit on. Supporting yourself on your sit bones in your butt is less comfortable, he claims, than rotating around and putting weight on your thigh muscles. I tried it and found him, the expert saddle maker, advisor to champions, to be right. What a surprise.

The lower handlebars and rotated position (he uses a -60 stem, I use a long -30) actually takes some weight off your hands, because you can support yourself more easily on your muscles on your saddle. Sure I do have some weight on my hands, but no I am not doing push ups. I have as much weight on my hands as the average fat-forty rider (except less now that I have slimmed up).

By the way, my skill at geometry is not great but I think that when rotating a rider forward on a relaxed frame, a long -30 stem is going to be better than Cobb's short -60 degree stem because as one rotates forwards ones head and center of gravity rotate forwards so with a short stem, the good imho rule of thumb "your handlebars should obscure your view of the front axcle" which is true of my bike, will not be true for a short -60 stem. That is not to say that my fit is better than Cobb's because I am sure he advises his riders to purchase a bike with a longer top tube. But if you been fitted up in a "relaxed" UCI catch-the-wind 'Grand Fondo' peleton-position by an lBS then, the long -30 stem (not the short -60 stem) is the way to go, imho.

And variable stems creak. And long stems flex your forks providing suspension. Perhaps I am saying my fit is superior to Cobbs. It is very similar, and it was his idea.

Now that it is winter, though, the pounds are coming back! I may go for lunch time rides.