Fighting with chronic tight hips can always be chalked up to sitting for hours and hours a day in front of a computer coupled with the hours and hours I spend on my bicycle. Being hunched over for the better portion of the day can lead to some pretty major issues for anyone.
I've been seeing the same bike fitter since I started riding about 4 years ago - Craig Fulk of North Texas Dynamic Bike Fit. He has fit me a number of times on 3 different bikes over the years. A while back (OK, maybe 2 and a half years ago), he made the suggestion of my switching to a shorter crank, specifically a 165.
NONSENSE! I had purchased a 175 crank for my first bike in order to replace the 165 that it came with! I refused to be on baby cranks. You know, the ones the inexperienced riders needed because they weren't riding enough to push a longer crank...never mind my own inexperience. I knew better than that.
Fast forward 2.5 years and a few more suggestions later. I went from racing as a Cat 4, barely able to hang on at the weekly world championships that left from the grocery store parking lot, to a 2 dabbling in a few national races with an offer to guest ride in a month for an elite level team at one of the biggest women's crits in the nation - Tulsa Tough.
I had mentioned my hip tightness in varying degrees to just about everyone who came into contact with me. In case there was any doubt, my hips were tight. I also dealt with what felt like my knees being pulled apart any time I put in extended harder efforts or had to do repeat sprint workouts. Whatever, pain is good. Pain means you're growing. Pain is weakness leaving the body. Yada yada yada...
About a month ago I went back to get a fit in order to resolve some power imbalance issues, and to see if I could do anything to relieve my tight hips. I had finally given in and decided to ignore everyone who just told me "I should get used to hurting, I was training after all". Something wasn't right and I knew I wouldn't be able to go much further in my racing without fixing this issue now. I proceeded to pretty much drill him on why he wanted me to change and why he couldn't change something else to accommodate it. Here's the breakdown about how it went:
Him: Your hip angle is too closed off for my liking. If we can open it up, your hips won't be so tight and you might be able to eliminate the knee issues you mentioned.
Me: Can't you just raise the bars to open my hip angle?
Him: Sure, but your back angle is exactly where we want it already; not to mention, it won't do anything to help your knees.
Me: *Thinking to myself, my knees hurt because I'm training, DUH!*
I wasn't interested. My bike, a Look 695, has these awesome one-piece adjustable length carbon cranks and a massive bottom bracket. It's part of what makes the bike so awesome and I wasn't going to part with it. It was so #pro. *smirks* Sorry, but I'm not sorry. Next topic please.
Being a Retul Master fitter, he had recently acquired the Retul Muve. This basically lets you figure out how your bike should be set-up while riding on the fly. He offered to set up the Muve to match my bike fit exactly only with shorter cranks.
Fine. Whatever it would take to get him to stop suggesting the change.
I hopped on the Muve and realized almost instantly that I should have made the change years ago. Honestly, I was a bit stunned at how much of a difference there was, and how little time it took me to notice it. Now I was faced with a major dilemma: do I take the dive and make the change a mere week before my A race, or continue on and make the change after my peak race season, which was June (just 2 weeks away).
We chatted a bit about it and I proceeded to ask a number of questions again, only this time I wasn't quite so closed minded. We both concluded that it would make sense to ask my chiropractor about the bio mechanical impacts to making the change in order to determine if I should wait until the off season so as to not have to deal with adaptation in that regards.
I went to my chiropractor the next day and asked him about it. I figured he would be a good one to get feedback from since he's successful triathlete as well. Turns out, he had made the same change himself just a week before doing an Ironman. He didn't have to adapt at all, and in fact, had a better ride than before. When I asked if he would make the change in my position, he said "Without a doubt, I would do so immediately".
I then decided it was time to do some reading online to see what others were saying. I came across a number of threads on various forums that were of little value, a number of blog posts about people talking about it, but nothing that gave me a good idea as to WHY I should or shouldn't do it. Simply going off of others experiences isn't enough for me, I need to know the basic science behind it. I need to understand WHY I should make the change. Then I found the following page: http://www.stevehoggbikefitting.com/bikefit/2011/06/crank-length-which-one/
Of all of the other pages I've read through, this one had the best explanations that I was able to directly relate to. The talk about the potential for an increase in knee problems due to shear force almost stopped me dead in my tracks. This explained everything.
In talking with my chiropractor earlier in the day he basically said that because my quads are so developed compared to my hamstrings, it's caused my entire anterior chain to be extremely tight. This means my hip flexors are chronically tight as a result, which is rotating my pelvis forward, which is keeping my hamstrings in a constant state of tension, which doesn't allow me to drop my heels in my pedal stroke without it being uncomfortable.
So, in short, opening up the hip angle is just a byproduct of a more important change - less shear force on my knees. While some people claim that you will have a decrease in power output, I beg to differ in my situation. Whenever my body would scream at me to stop pushing, it was my hips and knees. I would have to back off in FTP tests simply due to the extreme pain I was experiencing. This was not your typical 'OMG is this test over yet' pain mind you. If I can't make it to the end of the race with the pack, what good is having all of that power? I'll take a slight reduction in top end power if it means I actually get to try and use it at the end of a race.
Some people mentioned that I would have to increase my cadence as a result. Sure, after doing the math, it came out to around a 3.5% increase. At 100rpm, that means I need to run 103.5rpm instead. Not a problem.
SOLD! Time to find that bottom bracket adapter for my bike and get a new crank ordered. I swapped out the ZED2 crank for a SRAM Red one and raised my saddle only 3mm. The idea behind only going up 3mm was that it would be temporary until my quads and hamstrings are relaxed and able to recover, at which point I will go up the additional 2mm to offset the 5mm shorter crank.
The week before my big race weekend, I saw my regular massage therapist. I had mentioned in passing that I was thinking about making the change, but hadn't told her that I made the change just yet. She commented about how my glutes and hip flexors felt a ton better. I had been riding on this crank for only a few days at this point, in addition to doing a number of posterior chain exercises.
My A race weekend has come and gone and I have to say I'm a little upset at myself for not making the change earlier, like years earlier.
I managed to finish 4th in the biggest crit in Texas. The only ladies ahead of me at the finish easily had a combined 30 years of experience on me and I was caught in a racing tactic that I wasn't prepared for so I missed the jump before the last corner. The fact that I was with them when we broke from the pack on the last lap and that I felt fresh at that point in a pretty fast race was all the testament I needed. Sure, it was my A race and I must give a good deal of credit to my training; but, the fact is that my hips and knees weren't yelling at me, they weren't even tight, they didn't even seem as if I had done anything.
The next day was the age based crit state championship, of which I not only won my age group (30-34) but also the over all (all age groups from 23-39 were run together). The skills based state championship was 2 days later and I managed a 5th in a very stacked field (the same as Friday night plus an additional very strong rider on the top team), on a highly technical course, in the pouring rain. Again, my hips and knees never screamed at me, just my lungs.
In short, if you have ANY of the issues I mentioned above, I would HIGHLY suggest at least considering the change. I'll be posting more about my June racing as I'll be traveling heavily outside of the state to test my legs against some of the best women in the country.
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