Before I begin this post I want to give a huge shoutout to the team at Specialized Bicycles. This is more than a company that builds bikes. These are people that have immense passion and care for the sport and everything surrounding it. We can’t thank them enough for opening their doors for us and giving us this opportunity.

The day began bright and early in the Fit Studio. We were accompanied by Aaron Post and Julie Bates, both absolute experts when it comes to the Retul Fit System. Quinn and Matthew were up first, beginning with pre-fit physical examinations. In order to be fit correctly on the bike, the body needs to be understood. They were tested for flexibility, imbalances, and recurring effects of past injuries. Following that, they hopped on the Retul Fit bikes and Aaron and Julie worked their magic- interpreting immense amounts of data, followed by small adjustments. While they were being fit I made frequent trips to the Specialized Café- enjoying the coffee and having a few too many bowls of Lucky Charms. Eventually Quinn and Matthew finished up and it was my turn.

I worked with Julie. We began with a chat, talking goals and aspirations, past injuries, and any current problems on the bike. Moving on to my physical assessment Julie walked me through a series of stretches and exercises while she watched. She discovered my stretching routine had payed off and Im quite a flexible person. We found a minute leg length discrepancy with the left being slightly shorter, and corrected my incredibly flat feet with some BG insoles. Next I hopped on the fit bike.

The Retul Fit Bikes allow for almost infinite adjustment of ones position with ease. With the limitation of the UCI, the time trial fit was relatively easy. Saddle setback as well as extensions reach is basically predetermined through regulation so all that was really needed to dial was saddle height and extensions height. I was stickered up and the Retul 3D capture system produced a live picture of all my physiological angles for Julie to interpret. After multiple trial we found a position. This gave me a set saddle height and a basis forearm height- one which we would take to the wind tunnel to dial in even further.

Following the Fit, we headed to Metabolic Testing. This protocol measures metabolic efficiency at different forearm heights. Basically we are discovering how low one can go in the front end before losing power. In my case, the test took approximately 45 minutes and involved a multitude of 4 minute trials at different bar heights. The erg on the trainer kept me right at 3 w/kg for all the trials. From this- we discovered I could go low. My metabolic efficiency barely changed in a 7 cm boundary from my baseline position. This meant I could either go up or down and still produce the same amount of power. From here, we headed to the tunnel to test these boundaries, and find my fastest position.

Once in the tunnel, the procedure was relatively simple. The testing began with some free time. A graph was projected in front of me with my live drag coefficient and I was given time to ride freely, move around, and see the resulting changes in my drag. After this, the aero engineer, Ingmar came in and we made some adjustments.

The first change made was going lower. Given the flexibility we found through the metabolic testing we wanted to see if going lower made a significant difference in aero. We removed 10mm of spacers and ran another test. Each test was composed of three 30 second trials with the fans running at 52 km/h. Between each trial I was asked to sit up and then return to position; ensuring position consistency. The lower position did grant an aero advantage but only of approximately 3 watts. Because the difference was so minute, we put the spacers back in and returned to the higher, more sustainable position.

Next up was forearm and hand position. Through multiple trials we found that for me, elbows touching as well as a hand over hand position was the fasted. We moved my arm pads medially as far as possible to allow for this position. Elbows touching as well as hands stacked saved approximately 9 watts each, saving 18 watts just through forearm position. Following this was head position. Keeping my head super low and having my head resting on my hands is the fastest, but its not sustainable. What I learned from this is when racing, I need to know the course quite well :) Basically what a real race day TT will involve is looking up every few seconds to make sure i’m going the right way. The head down is faster so I just have to 1) know the course well and 2) look up every once in a while.

The most important and biggest aero benefits stem from the shoulder shrug. Shrugging your shoulders all whilst keeping your head as low as possible yields immense improvements in drag. The shrug narrows your frontal profile drastically, meaning free speed. The shrug was the final tip I got in the tunnel.

For the numbers people out there my final CdA was somewhere around .192.

What an incredible day. Thanks again to all involved.

To all those at Specialized, you're awesome.

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