What’s the Best Time Trial Position?


Cesar Oliva wants to know more about the riders position on a time trial bike, not an easy answer, as many different things have to taken into consideration, air resistance, comfort and the best position for pushing those pedals round at speed.

Question: Road bike, there is a specific position to ride based on bike geometry. How about TT bike, what is the correct position for this type of bikes?

Hello Cesar Oliva,
The position you have on your road bike and your time trial bike should be similar, but you will find that when you are riding full out in a time trial you will move forward on the saddle, this is because you want to push back on the pedals, look at the position of tri-athletes when they are on the bike, they are right forward and use special seat pins.

This is a bit severe, but you can play with your TT position, pros now all go to air tunnels for testing and usually have a lower back and a more forward position.

Be careful with your experiments as you could damage your knees, hips or back, if you have a coach or can contact one, I�m sure they would help you with a perfect TT position.

It was always said that Miguel Indurain would have gone faster with a more flat back position, but maybe he wouldn’t have been comfortable and gone slower, so the position has to be a combination of comfort, power out-put and low air resistance.



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