I recently upgraded my road bike a few months ago to a Cervelo R3.
everything is great … except i’m getting knee pain on my left outer knee when traveling distances greater than 40KM.

I got fitted when i first bought the bike, and recently went in for another fitting a few weeks ago (at another bike shop), to try to fix this problem.

He adjusted my cleat position, to straighten out my foot on my pedal stroke, as my toes were pointing outwards before (causing the pain)

I thought this would work … but unfortunately i still get the pain.

I cycle everyday, all year. 90% of it being ridden on a fixed gear track bike.
Have I ruined my knee from fixed gear riding?

I’ve done 40KM+ rides on my fixed, and i don’t get the pain I experience on my cervelo.

Is there anything else i can adjust on my road bike, or some kind of knee brace that would alleviate this pain? .. I’m getting frustrated that I can’t do my usual longer weekend rides.

I am guessing here because you don’t specify what hurts, but I also had outer knee pain from the iliotibial band. I remedied it by lowering my seat a quarter inch.

Another thing that helped me A LOT was using pedals that allowed my feet to float.

Are your Cevelo and your fix gear using the same pedals, cleats and shoes? Are your seat locations identical with respect to locating your hips relative to the bottom bracket? Are your cranks the same length? Look long and hard at any of these if they are different.

A guy who initiated life long knee issues switching from 168mm cranks on his fix gear to the 175s of his racing bike.

Edit: my knees HAVE to have my feet toed-in by force so all my bikes and shoes use no-float cleat systems that set my feet to the same angle. Float is not everyone's answer.

Ben

Yes. it is my IT band that is in pain.

You know ... that might be the problem. --- one thing that is different from this bike compared to my other bikes, is the crank arm length. the Cervelo rotor3d is 170+mm ... and my track bikes both have 165mm crank arms. I have kinda short legs. So it would make sense for my saddle to drop a bit.

Also .. I'm using moutain-bike SPDs currently. (which have no float) while i find a good deal on proper road pedals/shoes.

I'll try lowering my saddle on a ride this weekend ... and maybe even switch out my pedals to a pair of old-school cages+straps. see if that helps.

thanks.

the previous poster made me think about my saddle height... I'll have to measure when i get home. compare the two, and try to match.

My track bike has a higher BB and shorter crank arms. (165mm)
Cervelo has a lower BB and 172mm crank arms i believe.

Which means ... i probably SHOULD drop my saddle quite a bit. -- makes me wonder why the fitters didn't seem to think my saddle height was a problem though.

Without cleats, I hope!

If it helps, I use Speedplay Frogs exclusively. Lots of float.

Do these stretches: IT Band pain (during ride)

Fixed me right up in a few days. I started doing them 3Xday, then once/day.

I assume you measure your saddle height from center of pedal axle to top of saddle, in which case crank length doesn't matter. Try the heel-on-pedal saddle height measuring technique.

Regular SPD pedals and cleats have ~7° float, so I don't know what you're using. SPD-SL pedals have 3 cleat variations, 8°, 2°, and 0°. A minority of riders do better with zero float. There's no reason to use anything but SPD. I've ridden fast 400k rides on them, sprint, etc. No foot problems. SPD and Sidi Dominators are the standard system among randonneurs here.