They make such a big deal about bike fit. You sit for hours with someone at a bike store, or you pay big bucks to go to a professional to make sure you’re maximizing power output with the most efficiency and minimal energy waste.
But little is known about about shifting your bike positioning during cycling. And I don’t mean actually sliding the seat. I mean that you can actually engage different muscles for different terrain based on where you put your butt!
This article in Triathlete magazine talks about this:
http://www.dshen.com/training/bikepositioning.pdf (7 MB!)
Sorry for the huge file size. I wanted the images and text to come out nicely.
I tried this today in my long ride outdoors, which today consisted of hill repeats. I found myself naturally sliding back and forth and experimented with best positioning on the hill repeats. By sliding my butt all the way back on the seat, I could really engage my glutes and got some real nice power while on my seat going up the hill.
Down on the flats, I found myself sliding forward more to engage a wider range of muscles for making lots of revolutions while on the aerobars.
Along with the article on pedaling from Bicycling magazine, working on both pedalling and bike body position, I’ve been able to boost power output this year by another 5-10 watts.