My son Matt couldn’t get his head around the idea that I had an appointment for “a bike fitting.” It’s a new bike, I already had a few thousand miles on it, what needed to be fit? Well, I really didn’t know, but went down to Halters Bike Shop for my appointment. Jay put my bike on a stationary stand, and I started to ride. “I can fix that.” said Jay, and I knew just how my students feel when I look at the draft of their paper and say, “I can fix that…”.
Jay started from the bottom up. “You pronate. It makes you knock kneed. That robs you of power. Give me your shoes.” Jay puts wedges on the inside of my cleats. They make my feet flatten out and my thighs run parallel to the top tube. It’s better than it was, and I didn’t even know it was wrong.
Then it was the seat. The forward/aft positioning was straight forward. We argued about the height. Dogma says “higher is better,” Jay wanted to jack me up. But there are times when Dogma doesn’t hold. I’d developed an overuse injury after riding the 600 mile California AIDS ride two years ago. (Don’t know how that happened.) The physical therapist told me to lower my seat. I listened to the physical therapist, not Jay.
Having gotten my feet and butt squared away (so to speak) Jay attacked the critical issue of reach and height. “Reach” is how far the handlebars are from the seat post. “Height” is how high the handlebars are relative to the seat. With a short reach and low height, the effect is of a hunchback ready to dive into the pool. A long reach and high height has the effect of stretching to get something off the highest shelf. Obviously, I want to be somewhere in between. Without going into the details of how it was done, Jay found the right combination for me. Now when I ride, neither my back, neck, or wrists hurt anymore. It’s so comfy.
So in 90 minutes, Jay took my “off the rack” bike and made if fit me. That feels really great. I’m sure that on day 37 of the big ride, the bike fitting will be all the more special.
p.s. Now all of my other bikes feel like they don’t fit.
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