Tom Sanders wrote:
>
(snip)
> Seems like these shorter bike rides aren't doing us too much damage.
> Chuck, you ride some heavy mileage on some pretty vintage stuff, I believe.
> Any insights here? Others with some views on this?
Well sometimes you get lucky. In my case it is that I'm totally average when it comes to height (around 5' 9" or 10") and body proportions. I'm pretty much the 50th percentile male they talk about in industrial design. (I used to envy my Dad's height of 6' 2" when I was very young but not after how I saw how he fit in sports cars!)
Bikes that have 55cm or 55.5cm or 56cm (c to c) seat tubes are the average size bike (actually the idealized bike) and that's the size I ride. And bikes this size don't vary in geometry hardly at all; only the large and small size frames vary much because different builders all have their own ideas about the geometry of a large or small frame, their 55cm frames are all amazing similar. As an example check out the geometry charts of all bike company's brochures and a 55cm frame is pretty much the same across the board!
Now if you're talking about older bike fit, like 1950s and earlier I fit something around a 58cm because of the laid back seat angle and the lower bottom bracket. The seat posts and stems back then were _short_! I still have an inch of stand over clearance with these.
Sometimes it's very good to be average!
http://www.velo-retro.com/
Chuck Schmidt South Pasadena, Southern California
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