LeMaster of the V-Locus
Finding The V-Locus is something of an extension of the Goldilocks Principle; bars set somewhere between Sit Up and Beg and a face-plant, saddle height somewhere between speed skater and Baryshnikov, and reach somewhere between a unicycle and the Batpod. This is art more than it is science, a process of iteration and refinement. And everyone knows “iteration and refinement” is the formal way of saying “we’re making this up as we go along.”
We are in the midst of a Sit Up and Beg Epidemic, and with that comes an emphasis on the rare rider who looks completely natural on their machine. There is a sense of ease that belies the power the rider generates; the position must allow for balance between opposing forces experienced while riding on two wheels, not to mention the sophisticated coordination required to coax a system of muscles that can only push or pull into generating power through a perfectly circular pedal stroke.
Cyrille Guimard is known to be a kind of grand master of il posizione, having been responsible for developing all three of the dominant Grand Tour riders of the late seventies and eighties. These three riders – Bernard Hinault, Laurent Fignon, and Greg LeMond – shared a common theme: their positions on the bike was so beautiful it has been scientifically proven to have cured infertility in women who watched them race, indirectly accounting for the baby boom in the 70’s and 80’s.
Of the three, LeMond stood out as being the most perfect, pioneering the use of the wind tunnel to refine his position to maximize the balance between physiology and aerodynamics in order to wring the most V from himself and his machine. He had the advantage of living in an era when frames were tailor-made like a suit on Savile Row but he used it to great effect, tweaking seat tube angles to maximize use of his long thighs and stretching his top tube to account for his long reach reach. In America at least, it’s easy to pick out riders who took a page out of his book on positioning, riding long and stretched out positions and mashing gears heels-down at 60rpm while gently rocking their shoulders. It brings a tear of joy to my eyes whenever I see it.
In our day of cookie-cutter carbon frames, we’re often left to refine our position through stem length and seatpost setback, but that’s no excuse for allowing us not to Look Fantastic and natural on the bike. Take heed of the Apostle LeMond and don’t stop tweaking until you have found your V-Locus.
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“These three riders – Bernard Hinault, Laurent Fignon, and Greg LeMond – shared a common theme: their positions on the bike was so beautiful it has been scientifically proven to have cured infertility in women who watched them race, indirectly accounting for the baby boom in the 70″²s and 80″²s.”
Blows. The. Fucking. Mind. Yeah, its not news to any fan of the beautiful sport, but it is always amazing to see what that one man produced. And what these three icons did on a bike.
Great article. Lesson? Never stop tweaking (as opposed to twerking).
The Z-Peugeot and Look-La Vie Claire kits? Awesome.It helps you to go fast when you look fantastic.
Picture #7 is my favorite. Mind you, in all of them LeMan’s positions look as comfy as an old pair of slippers.
Question. What kind of brakes is GL using in the main picture? The rest of the Campag gruppo is silver, but the brakes are black and I didn’t know Campag did black anodizing back then. Oli?
Cool article @frank. I especially enjoyed the first paragraph. I have to wonder, however, if someone secretly swapped your inhaler for a vaporizer.
Also, there is no need to be nostalgic about the bespoke frame. Even in this day and age of molded carbon there are many small builders who can make a fantastic bespoke frame. A metal frame might weigh a bit more than a carbon one (although there even are bespoke carbon builders) but the small tweaks that can be made to put the contact points in the right places and wheels properly positioned relative to the rider’s center of gravity are well worth it.
@wiscot
Possibly the brakes just appear black because they are in a shadow.
I find tweaking the bike to be one of the best parts of riding. Learning how each individual change effects our personal geometry. It’s also a great excuse to go for a ride. “But I just changed my stem and seat post positions honey, I need to test it out.”
The position thing is such a mystery. I’ve been reading everything I can find on bike fit and trying to figure it out for myself. I started to experience some upper back pain and assumed my bars were too low. I finally had a professional bike fit from a guy in Adelaide. He started from the cleats and worked up from there. To my surprize he took spacers out of the stem, thereby enhancing N1s rule compliance. The overall result: a better position, no more back pain and a slammed stem (actually he ended up leaving a 5mm spacer in to account for different stem stack heights if I ever want to change stems).
It occurs to me that many of the riders I think of as having a centered V-locus are from an era when riders were bigger, not as wafey. The three you mention, RdV’s sublime flat back. Boonen and Faboo have it though too but they are bigger guys. What is the climber’s version of the V-locus? Is it the same or does it have more to do with seeming weightless?
@geoffrey +1. A pro fit is the start to a good position. For us also-rides at least.
It’s funny. I will ride my ’06 carbon Marinoni with basic race geometry and I might feel a bit of strain somewhere and the spanners come out for an adjustment. I ride the 2013 Cipollini and I forget there is a bike under me. I guess money does buy happiness.
I’m deeply intrigued by the “unicycle” image. It’s such a fabulous cross between Dorothea Lange and L. Frank Baum.
Back on topic, this summer my life changed forever when I simply started rotating my pelvis forward on the saddle a bit.
This would be the V-Locus in “face-plant” position….
Love this photo from LeMan’s FB page
@marko
V-Locus? Bigger riders?
@Chris not all but most. Lemond, Hinault, Fignon are/were not wafey little men. Sure, the Badger is short but he’s built more brick shit houseish. to clarify, I didn’t mean tall necessarily, but bulkier, more muscular.
@sthilzy
Holy Marion Joseph…
@geoffrey
Who’d you see?
@Marko Totally agree, hence the photo of Yates, he only achieved waifishness years after he finished riding.
I strive for V-Locus mastery every time I race out at the Velodrome….
Photo #3: position and bike lust. Reversed my vasectomy.
@sthilzy
His head-drop had such a huge influence on my idea of what it meant to ride a bike that to this day, I still drop my head anytime I’m hammering.
And I probably rock my shoulders a bit too, just for effect.
@Nate
I didn’t mean to imply you don’t have them available; I think bespoke frames are just as accessible now as they were in the 80’s and 90’s – if not more so. Its just that what we buy is often a geo set by some dude somewhere behind a computer.
This is especially true for the Pros, who back then always had a bespoke frame and never something off the shelf. These days, they’re riding a molded frame and have no input into the geometry. Hence all the weird setbacks and slammed 17 degree stems all over the the pro’s bikes. Fucking Hesjedal even took the top cap off his headset to get the bars low enough.
LeMond? Don’t you mean Boardman? I’ll read the actual article when you correct your typo.
And your photos are wrong too. Some fucken yank staring at his stem and waiting to crash.
@wiscot
They are just the standard Campa caliper brakes in a shadow to look black – possible a year or two older than the deltas that would have been available at the time, but apparently they valued some weight savings and stopping power.
Here are the same brakes on their road machines.
@frank
Unless your name is Phil, Cadel or TJ, if you believe the hype, like me, from BMC…
@DCR
This also validates re-photographing the bike from every angle and putting it up in the living room for a few days.
@geoffrey
I’ve said this before, but if you have back pain, try dropping your stem. I suffered for a score before starting to drop my bars and the back pain went away.
If your bars are too high and you’re in a sit up and beg position, your lower back is doing all the work to stabilize the bike. If you get your center of mass lower, then it helps with those micro-adjustments your back will do all day. But don’t over-do it.
Until the later 90’s when people started riding smaller frames, the riders accomplished the same effect by riding much more stretched out than they do today. The bars also had more drop, but the main thing was a long position which kept the center of mass close to the top tube.
The least beneficial position you can have on the bike is a short, upright position; it will be unstable and rough on your back.
At least, that’s my opinion – and I play an expert on the internet.
@marko
I think its the same; just the natural position where you gain most V. Traditional wisdom has climbers sitting more upright but that’s bullshit. You need to be in a position where you can breath and have leverage. For my physiology, I have the most leverage when I pull up on something, not horizontally, so I still like a low position even on climbs. I’ll climb in the drops a lot; I only go to the tops when I’m in maintenance mode and not trying to accelerate or gain any kind of advantage. I can breathe plenty fine in any position on my bike.
@minion does bike yoga count? The key aspect that LeMan has over Boardman is that he really looks like he just loves to ride his bike, cos he does, Boardman is all about the hurt.
@PeakInTwoYears
There was a much more appropriate photo but this one took the cake for being COMPLETELY FUCKED.
@Marko
I agree. You needed some bulk to win a Tour back before EPO. Reserves and all that. Now, they can race on nothing and keep at it for three weeks because they are on using their body to get through it.
All the past riders – Coppi, Bobet, Anq, Mercxk, Hinault, LeMond and even Indurain (who I am convinced was on EPO) were all bigger guys – low body fat, but not zero. You need some reserves to get through a grand tour. The modern guys don’t have them, even the mid-pack guys are skinny enough to be a Tour winner in ’68.
To Froome’s credit, he kept almost bonking at the end of stages this year, and that’s why his team kept taking on food and water within the restricted zone. Also douchey but might in something less than a fantasy world point away from blood manipulation.
@Chris
I understand that when Bjarne Riis wanted Ulli on CSC (which would have won him a few more Tours, sure as hell) he hired Yates for he express intent of keeping Jan’s weight under control due to his penchant for becoming a bratwurst over winter.
@Haldy
Which are you? Inquiring minds need to know. Are you third or fourth wheel? Elbows in, nice and compact. And possibly losing. Guy in front looks good, but elbows good be tucked in.
@xyxax
Yeah. I hear you mate. Bar position is so interesting; he but the brake levers up just a bit, but then rotated the bars down. What I’d give to be a fly on the wall when that call was made.
@minion
Wow, welcome back and nice fucking ficus. Did you and Marcus have a fight?
@piwakawaka
Maaaaaaaaaaaate…So totally loving your attack at the flag-turnin’ Minon, but that’s fucking Graeme Obree not his arch rival Boardman.
But Graeme was all about finding the V-Locus in the most unconventional ways.
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@frank – I am the one up front..this point is the final
sprint for the line..the elbows start to move wide as I am digging for more V.
But..I do tend to be a bit elbow wide as I get down deep anyway…it’s what works best for me!
@PeakInTwoYears
I had the same revelation this year. Pure enlightenment.
@frank
Smiles, too many smiles.
Good timing for this article. I just switched the insert in my one Specialized stem from -8 to -12 degrees, went for a short (~45 km) ride and my hamstrings were talking to me. I’ll leave it that way for a few hundred more and see if they pipe down. I’ll get it right one of these days…
@DerHoggz Yeah, LeMan would not be smiling when Le Blaireau attacked his ass over the next few days. What an awesome tour. “Slaying the Badger” is a must read of you all have not read it.
@frank wish I had a brain that could post pictures rather that the interweb…maybe just the brain.
First pair of “real” cycling shorts I ever bought was in 1987 and they were the the Look/La Vie Claire shorts that LeMan is wearing in the main photo with real chamois. Man, what I wouldn’t give to have those shorts now.
Anyone else see the link to the article on LeMans page? I love this sport.
Where is that photo of him bombing a descent with a huge grin? ( I think it was in the Z Vetements days)
@DerHoggz http://www.velominati.com/general/anatomy-of-a-photo-greg-leman/
@frank
Whatever was happening for them in that moment, in that stage, in that race, to see a photo of those two men riding together and smiling as if they were the two luckiest men on the planet is enough to make me smile all evening.
@frank
We probably did fight but the make up sex was unbelievable. Australia’s like the fucking Borg, assimilation is inevitable.
I actually fully endorse the fact that, now that Lemond is the winningest Yank cyclist ever, that he’s getting the cudos he deserves and isn’t being showered in you-know-what by you-know-who from a great height. Fuck Armstrong was an absolute piece of shit wasn’t he?
Also hate to say it but this is about as good as modern time trialling gets position wise. This,
not this. Fucking Mary.
My search for The V Locus and trying to iron out a few kinks amounted to a re-fit at my awesome LBS, with the owner. It’s amazing how tweaking your cleats, stem, seat height and a new saddle makes you feel totally different, in a good way. I so should have done something about my saddle ages ago.
didn’t all of Cyrille Guimard’s riders later complain of knee pain due to the positions he made them adopt?
@minion Funny that,don’t remember LeMond crashing very often.Can’t say the same about Boardman.
@minion This a good position to be in too.
@Drew
That was usually from traveling at approximately 1/8c.
@unversio Now that’s a ‘set-back’!!
Another great article Frank and nice pics of Apostle Greg LeMond !
In my humble opinion – no one looked better on a bike.