I did a fitting for my wife when we got her the Ritchey Road Logic. (https://blog.piaw.net/2024/06/new-road-bike-for-xiaoqin.html) The reasoning is that once you cut the steerer tube on one of those bikes you can't uncut them, so the fitting was insurance against cutting it wrong. She went from riding at 13mph on flat roads to being able to draft me at 20mph. This is a huge change without getting any stronger, doing any extra training, etc. (You can also partially attribute it to the Road Logic being at least 10 pounds lighter than the Cheviot) She rode the bike for 3000 miles before we returned for a followup, which tells you how much she liked the bike.
This follow up resulted in another series of adjustments, and all prior pain she had with regards to glutes, etc went away. The fitter said: "don't go another 3000 miles in any kind of discomfort without coming back." At that same followup, I got a fitting on my custom road bike, and while I didn't get any faster, I did notice that lower back pain after hard rides were eliminated. That means I can go for more back to back hard days. My brother crashed his bike and for his birthday we got him a custom steel frame. We sent him to the same fitter once again because you cannot uncut a steerer tube. This time, the fitter discovered that his Q factor was too low. (I couldn't believe my ears) He showed us and fitted pedal offsets to give him a broader stance. My brother described that as a game changer. Having said all that, you cannot separate the fitting experience from the bike fitter involved. This one came highly recommended by Terry Shaw (who's retired), a legendary bike fitter/bike shop owner in the San Francisco Bay Area. On Sunday, January 26, 2025 at 10:54:59 PM UTC-8 Stephen Durfee wrote: > I'm curious about the collective opinion regarding professional bike > fitting, and pose these questions as one who has been riding for 50+ years > on mostly drop bar road bikes, without ever having been "fitted"... I'm > not particularly interested in increased performance, although I'd be happy > to ride faster/stronger in some situations - mostly, I'm concerned with > comfort. I'm used to, and have generally learned to live with certain aches > and pains after a good long ride, a sore back or neck for instance... sore > butt is not uncommon either. I follow the conventional rules for set-up > (ie, choose frame and saddle height based on PBH) and I tinker/ > swap/exchange parts for the fun of it, but haven't ever really experienced > an "aha" moment when it comes to comfort/fit! > > I enjoy following threads regarding saddle choice and positioning, woolen > underwear vs. padded shorts, handlebar options, PBH and frame size, drop > vs. reach, etc etc... and I've experimented with a bunch...which leads me > to be skeptical about putting my faith in a service that seems to boil down > to trial and error, plus common sense. So here are the questions: > > 1. Have you been professionally fitted, and did that result in a > noticeable improvement in comfort? Enough that you would advocate for > others? > > 2. I have three or four bikes, set up different ways (Homer with drop bars > as my "road bike", All Rounder with Albatross bars for "adventure", > etc)....if one is "fitted" to a certain bike, does the "fit" apply to > different set-ups? > > Thanks in advance, sd > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/rbw-owners-bunch/03c66339-b529-487d-bf96-0c185ed00a20n%40googlegroups.com.
