Completely upgrading my bike – stem size question

[hozn]

I definitely wouldn’t trust a tech manual alone, though you can use it to bolster your own suspicions if you really think the bike is too long. Lemonds are generally designed to be very stretched-out geometries, though; that’s something LeMond riders claim to love about them. (I’m not sure I “get” the LeMond geometry, honestly; everything since my Lemond Victoire has made so much more sense fit-wise). Lower-back pain could very well be something else, as you note. I don’t have my Pruitt medical cycling book in front of me, but would recommend looking at some other ways to determine the correct length/stretch for your body dimensions. Also consider the setback of your seatpost. My Lemond had a 25+mm setback which put me fairly significantly behind the pedal spindler (as in knee-over-pedal-spindle), which is another whole holy-war debate — but I think general consensus is that a good place to start is with your knee directly above the spindle.

[GoodOmens]

@hozn 53917 wrote:

I definitely wouldn’t trust a tech manual alone, though you can use it to bolster your own suspicions if you really think the bike is too long. Lemonds are generally designed to be very stretched-out geometries, though; that’s something LeMond riders claim to love about them. (I’m not sure I “get” the LeMond geometry, honestly; everything since my Lemond Victoire has made so much more sense fit-wise). Lower-back pain could very well be something else, as you note. I don’t have my Pruitt medical cycling book in front of me, but would recommend looking at some other ways to determine the correct length/stretch for your body dimensions. Also consider the setback of your seatpost. My Lemond had a 25+mm setback which put me fairly significantly behind the pedal spindler (as in knee-over-pedal-spindle), which is another whole holy-war debate — but I think general consensus is that a good place to start is with your knee directly above the spindle.

Yea when I have it reassembled I’m definitely going to have my bike refitted. I don’t think anything has been touched adjustment wise (seat height etc) since at least 2003 haha.

I guess this is something I should have done before I had the bike sent off (to even determine if it was worth repainting) – but hindsight is 20/20. I didn’t even thing framing size was a issue until I was digging around to make sure I was ordering the right parts for it and came across the tech manual.

[pikebike]

I recently purchased a 2004 Poprad in a 57cm, when I should have gone with a 55cm due to the different geometry of the Lemonds. It had a 120mm stem on it stock, which stretched me out far too much. My road bike is a true 58cm with a 100mm stem and fits me perfectly. I swapped the stem with a 110mm I had laying around, and while it felt better, I still felt too stretched. So I bought a 90mm stem and the bike fits me perfectly now. I say you buy a 100mm stem and see how it works. They’re fairly cheap and easy to install, and help when you have a few laying around if you end up with a stockade of bikes.

I guessed on the 90mm size by just placing my hands in a comfortable position on my handle bars, and then roughly measuring the distance from my hands to the hoods to see how much I needed to remove with a shorter stem. It worked pretty well for me.

[Author]

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