Look Pro(phetic): Muck Around with Your Seatpost
I have a friend who is borderline OCD. He’ll sometimes wash his hands dozens of times a day, doesn’t like sticky stuff, cats drive him to antihistamine hell and there is a place for everything, with everything in its place. This can be annoying, not only for those around him, but especially for himself. It’s not a great place to be.
The upside is his bikes are always meticulously maintained, fully Rule compliant, or they are in a state of tear-down having last week’s grease freshened up and each ball bearing individually polished. He’s gotten it under control quite admirably these days, and while a chip in the duco of his beautiful steel frame will still understandably piss him off, there’s not the slightest hint of sending it back to Italy to be re-sprayed by the 78 year old artisan who originally painted it, who inconveniently happened to retire in 1984. But you can rest assured the touch-up job he’ll do himself is of paintshop standard.
But I’ve never seen him muck around with his seatpost height. Not once it’s set, anyway.
This poses the question: did The Prophet have OCD? To this observer it seems so, if numerous viewings of Le Course En Tete and A Sunday in Hell are any reliable indicator. The guy was constantly fiddling with his seatpost height. His mechanic must’ve been ready to throw his hands in the air proclaiming “Merde, Eddy! I’ve measured it three times already! Why do you not trust me?”
It seemed to matter little to Eddy that poor Charly had adhered to the numbers scribbled on the lid of his toolbox, taken the slide rule and spirit level to every possible surface and angle, and used his impeccable line of sight to position the saddle just right, exactly where it was requested to be. “How’s that Eddy?” “Is perfect.” “Then why are you borrowing a spanner from RDV’s team car? Hmmm?”
If he wasn’t adjusting his saddle, he was adjusting his stem. If he wasn’t adjusting his stem, he was squirting water from his bidon onto his brakes. If he wasn’t doing that, he was simply laying down the law. The law of The Prophet.
Obsessive? Yes. Compulsive? For sure. Did it affect his ability to waste all comers? Not likely.
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I’nt it ‘cos of the bad crash he had, that caused him pain every time he rode afterwards, or was he like that before hand?
@Martin Cashman
Correct. The crash on the track at Blois that killed his derny pilot meant his back gave him constant pain, that he could partially alleviate by slight variations in saddle height. Although he’s freely admitted that altering it actually did little except give him a small placebo effect…
@Oli
That was in 1969, by the way, in the off season after he utterly dominated his first Tour de France, winning every classification. He maintains that he was never anywhere near as good after the crash, although you mightn’t agree when you read his palmares!
Frank has a “friend”? Dude: man up. We still love you.
Too bad he didn’t have a rock shox reverb. He could have been adjusting all day long with little hassle.
I was thinking about this on my ride today. I wonder how much became psychological warfare. Seat adjustment, moving bidon to the jersey pocket, parting the waters of a puddle. Eventually the peloton would pick up on these and associate it with being dropped like a feral stray. Mind games.
@Steampunk
It’s Brett’s “friend”.
I have a “friend” who has CDO which is a bit like OCD but alpabetical – THE WAY IT SHOULD BE!
That’s a beautiful post (and great photo captions) Brett. I pondered that too: quit fucking with your damn seat, your legs have not grown since last Sunday. And the lead photo, can you actually adjust your seat whilst sitting on it, and riding? We will get up in his Belgian grill about all this next month. I’m still confused as to who speaks French and who speaks Flemish but we will make Frank ask these probing questions of Eddy regardless, so we don’t get blamed.
His mechanic must have hated him.
I have a “friend” who has CDO which is a bit like OCD but alpabetical – THE WAY IT SHOULD BE!
That’s just awesome.
And I agree- i would bet it probably was legit once, and then probably turned into a tell or fidget just to mess with the combatants. As if he needed to do more than mount the bike to have that impact…
@Gianni
I’m sure the regular and sizeable bonuses probably made it tolerable.
That lead photo has me thinking I need a classier watch for riding my bike!
Do all of you set the saddle height exactly the same on all of your road bikes? Or, do you vary it a bit depending on the bike? Also, do you take into account crank length? I have some bikes with 170mm crank arms, some with 172.5mm. I’ve gotten a lot of different answers on this. Just curious.
And, do you set the height by feel, knee extension, an equation?
@Ron
I set my seat height/position by feel/knee extension. I’m sure it’s different on each bike I have.
@silkrider
You might be on the wrong website.
Y’all may not be able to abide by the following statement, but my experience tells me that guys who constantly adjust their kit have a confidence problem. Often they win because they drive themselves to inhuman levels of pain during training and in the main event to win. Guys with confidence say “fuck it as long as it has a bloody seat I can win.” Those who second guess themselves measure and adjust multiple times in a given day. So The Prophet was always questioning himself… maybe that’s why he is the Master.
I mean, really, let’s admit it, this site is really just a support group for most of us anyways, right?
@Buck Rogers
+1. My VMH agrees. Step one is admitting that you have a problem… My reply is that I could spend all of my spare time and money on activities that are much worse than cycling. Little does she know that I am just waiting to pursue those other activities until I am physically incapable of throwing a leg over the top tube…
Since this is a support group, I’m going to vent about the bitch who couldn’t wait the extra 1.5 seconds to pull into her driveway, nearly killing me in the process. Two babies in car seats in the back seat, she ended up almost driving into her neighbor’s mailbox… For literally 1.5 seconds that she tried to save.
@Buck Rogers @Anjin-san:
Sob! I love you guys!
My name is RedRanger and I have a problem…
@Calmante
Ugh, I’ve had one of those recently too. And I pass that same house often. And the car has a personalized license plate that makes them seem like the jerk they acted like. I just love the Must Pass Damn Cyclist pass, then turn or stop at a light immediately move. Why oh why?
It’s even better when they have kids in the car. I like to say to those folks, “Um, don’t you think I have a mother as well? And don’t you think she’d be sad if you ran me over?”
Gotta just try and stay positive & not get run over!
silkrider – Got it! I try to have mine pretty close, but I do ride differently on my different bikes – Sunday cruiser, heavy KM bike, race bike.
@Ron
Good point. Stay positive. I try and do that as much as possible, but sometimes it just eats me up inside. I do have a couple of stories about times when I didn’t quite let it go. Might as well tell them here…
When I was about fifteen, I weighed 135 lbs, and just about the only thing I could do well outside of schoolwork was ride a bike. On one summer day, as I was just about to pull into my driveway at the end of my ride, a bright yellow Mustang with a loud exhaust passed me so close that his rear view mirror clipped my ungloved hand as I gripped my hoods. I was extremely lucky to have stayed upright. There was a stop sign just a couple of hundred feet up the road, with a couple of cars ahead of him. I don’t know what came over me, but I sprinted up to him, and when a caught him, I unclipped my left shoe, and as hard as I could, left a Look-cleat-shaped dent in his rear quarter panel. He peeled out and I never saw him again.
I hope someone made coffee.
I’m always measuring and checking my saddle height. Even with a ring of black tape or a small Sharpie mark on the seat pin to make sure it hasn’t slipped…
@gravity bob
Haha, x2.
As someone who suffered a back injury that has never one minute allowed me to ride the way I did before, I can say….
Eddy was fooling himself.
I would no more screw with my saddle height than I would eat a Clif bar with the wrapper on it. It is not your leg that has the problem. It is your back. Why not work on the reach? I found after the accident that I was only comfortable on bikes with a less than 2 inch saddle/bars drop. So that means that I ride frames that are “technically” too large for my 32 inch inseam. My Merckx MXL is a 62. My Scapin (yes one of the Kawasaki green ELOS frames) is a 63. The guy at the LBS says I should be riding a 58. I did break down and get a 60 for my cross/winter frame. But that is only because I got a smoking deal on a handmade frame.(Ves Mandaric. Anyone else know that name but me?)
I have to admit, I have not ridden a lot in the past few years. A second incident caused me to have another round of issue with my back. But I am working on getting back on the beast and getting some of the 136 kilos off. (I was a svelt 6’4″ 235# at the first injury. Doesn’t that put how a back injury can kill ya into perspective.) And I will be doing that riding with the same seat hight on all 3 bikes because I know what works. Consistency.
Cool post Brett and the captions to the photo’s had me giggling like my 4yr old son after a handful of jellybeans.
@Calmante
Recently as my buddy and I got back into town a guy behind us started honking his horn at as. In the UK the law of the road is that you give a cyclist the same room as if they were a car when passing and that cyclists have as much right to be on the road as everyone else. There were some islands that were gonna stop him passing safely so I moved out to the middle of the lane to make this point maybe holding him up for five to ten seconds. I looked over as he passed and he was poking his temple to suggest it was me who was crazy, I didn’t have time to check his wife’s expression but his daughter was poking her temple just like daddy. We didn’t think it was a good example to be setting. We had been riding in single file about half a metre from the kerb (second position) but we are perfectly within our rights to ride in the middle of the lane (first position).
I have to say though that just about all of the cars on the roads around here are very respectful of cyclists, I always give a wave of thanks if they wait till it’s safe to pass.
@harminator
Solid gold!
@brett
A good and interesting wee piece. I’m sensitive to my seat being straight, can’t imagine getting it right in a race which adds more awesomeness to Merckx’s awesomeness.
Somedays i’ll keep raising my seat over and over. its like i’ve got I got a fever. And the only prescription.. is more seatpost.
This piece sits well with me but also makes me worry. Yesterday I adjusted my seat for the first time since I have had the bike (about three months). It felt weird at first and then after about eight to ten miles felt like normal whilst also propelling me up the slopes somewhat better than usual (I am not a climbing god).
It seems it was the right move to make, I only adjusted it upwards by 5mm but it felt like a huge amount whilst also seeming to benefit my riding greatly. 5mm to awesomeness, whoda thunk it?
I also had a couple of reversing mum moments yesterday but I can spot those post pregnancy numbskulls in their high-elevated baby sheds from a hundred yards.
All the more worth it as once I am clear of the initial 5miles through the outskirts of town I was out riding on the most deserted old farms tracks in the county. Some surfaces were strewn with the odd pot hole, shocking shakey surface whilst others were newly surfaced smoothly tarred beauties.
No cars, vans or otherwise to disturb the piece of the humming derailleur, just the occasional horse or walker enjoying the countryside on a crisp clear day, it was nirvana, the first above zero Celcius ride of the year.
I only did 50 miles (due to buddy with bad knee, serious lack of Rule #5) before diving into the pub for a jar or two of good ale (Badger Golden Champion), followed by a roast beef dinner cooked by my wonderful VMH.
I rode most of the way singing in my head to Matt Monro’s On Day’s Like These. A great day in the saddle.
Sounds like a great ride.
@SimonH
50 what?
That 5mm is crucial, – I stick a rim of electrical tape around my seatpost if I remove it so I can find that G-spot again, otherwise it’s back to fiddling around, which you can’t do in a group ride
Not sure how you do that whilst riding, as one imagines the seatpost will just slide down when you loosen it – then again the Prophet’s seat post was probably scared of him, so knew where to move to next when he loosened the nut?
This was nice post ride yesterday
@SimonH i find getting saddle height right is easier after you’ve been riding for a bit as your legs are warmed up and stretched out etc. have you tried pushing your saddle back? that makes a huge difference to me, particularly for climbing.
@Dr C my cheap alloy post has distance markings on it that helps when making adjustments, if you ever replace your post its a useful feature to look for.
Any article about the Prophet is a good article and when the subject is on one of the most important relationships of rider to machine – genius.
To me seat height is about that sweet spot and over the years going back and forth between the road bike and fixed for winter riding has helped narrow it down. If the fixed seat is a few mm’s off when spinning 100+ there is bounce but a tiny adjustment will get rid of it and one feels butter smooth. On the road bike there is a little more lee way, usually a tad higher for more power.
I was afraid I’d have to fiddle with seat height this weekend after putting new pedals on the bike, which supposedly have a lower stack height. Happily, I didn’t have to, which was good because I spent all my time messing around with cleat position.
@Oli
It was a goody, like an early morning spring ride, still low sun and chilly to start but a great leg burner and nicely fast paced too.
@Dr C
Yeah, I know I should convert to km but I’ve always been used to imperial in distance, weight, height etc …
Have been doing the electrical tape thing for a while too as I found the post slipped a bit when I got it, stopped putting carbon paste on it and it holds firm now. Need to push the saddle back a touch too and drop the stem 10mm to see how that feels. I started doing pilates a couple of months ago, to aid in back flexiness, and it seems to be working a treat, not quite up to Franks level of saddle to bar drop but certainly alot more lithe than I was before which makes the longer rides more comfy on my back. I’m still getting dialled in trying to find my sweet spot.
I’m going to build a second bike soon (steel frame, Campagnolo Chorus, self built wheels 32h three cross, V-brakes, maybe cantis) which will be used in part for light CX duties and also as a winter hack / pub / commuter. I will get a bike fit done by LBS when ordering the frame to see what they think I should be riding like.WOuld be interested to know how close it is to my No.1 setup.
I brought a new bike home over the weekend. Spent a bit of time obsessing over the seat. Was the height right? Was the fu@#er level? Are you sure it’s level? Maybe the ground underneath isn’t level. Check it again. Idiot, you just posted a photo of you bike on Facebook and the fu@#king saddle is obviously not level. Why is the nose of the saddle crushing my ballz or should I just HTFU?
I don’t EVEN want to think about the stem right now.
@theChaz
You can always post the pic over at Slowtwitch. Then get a hundred helpful responses, mainly consisting of “your seat’s too low”.
I really haven’t messed with my saddle since I purchased my bike and was fitted. When I purchased my new saddle I made sure it was at the same height/set back but that was it. Seems to be the right spot for me, but I may get a new fitting this Spring, as I think my riding position has probably changed since I started riding two years ago.
Speaking of honking cars, I was out in my V Kit yesterday and has someone do one of those little “chirps” with the horn, where they just tap it a few times really lightly. Not sure what they wanted, they were stopped at a red light and I had a green, and I didn’t recognize the car. They probably just thought I looked freakin’ fantastic and wanted to try and tell me.
@mcsqueak
I got the same thing yesterday, but I’m sure it was to chastise me for the abominable balaclava I was wearing.
@Ron
I go to tremendous pains to ensure I’m riding the same crank length on all my road bikes, same setback, same saddle height, and same reach to the bars (I measure this to where I hold the hood, not the center of the bars) if I don’t have the same bars/shifters on each bike. The more I ride the bike, the more I pay attention to how closely it matches Bike #1. Same bars, stem, saddle, pedals, cranks, etc.
But I’m more OCD about this than most.
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@The Oracle
You gotta do what you gotta do. Riding in Rule #9 condish sometimes supersedes your Flandrian Best in these parts. Here I am yesterday riding in temps well below zero. Full neck gator and headband for the ears, tights under bibnicks, base layer, LS jersey, gilet, and windbreaker, full length wool socks and neoprene booties, lobster claws with cycling mits inside. Great ride.
@gravity bob
This – I use tape. Color-coordinated with the frame, of course.
@snoov
I’ve also heard Pros angle their saddle just a bit to ease pressure on a saddle sore or some such. I’ve been known to make minor adjustments to bits of my bike while riding – in safe conditions only, of course. The ultimate in Casually Deliberate! Don’t worry about me, I’m just servicing my bike. Can’t be bothered to stop riding, you know!
@motor city
+1
@Marko
And yet with all that, still nicely color-coordinated.
I have a ruler with the distance marked from the center of the crank bolt to where the ruler intersects the top of the saddle. It is 27 5/8 inches. I subtract any crank length longer than 170, to keep my leg extension the same. Works like a charm. I’m currently obsessing on saddle position. I managed to jettison my headtube spacers and get a better position by moving the saddle forward. Then I start nitpicking my stem length, not so easy to experiment with, but worth the effort.
@Doug P
Thats a good point. I measure to the center of the saddle rail, but thats because I use all the same saddles. If you’re going from one saddle to another, use the top. Ideally, use the spot where you actually sit…
It quickly becomes very hard to get it all perfect, if you don’t have the same gear…hence, the Solist purchase for the rain bike…
The revelation for me during a bike fit was the order of adjusting things. Saddle position first for optimum leg extension and power efficiency. This setting then drove all further adjustments of handlebar height, angle, and stem length. Makes sense after the fact.