by Dave Newton | Mar 21, 2017 | Bike Fitting, Blog
Bike fit is an incredibly important aspect of cycling. A poorly adjusted bike can lead to injuries and inefficiency, so having your bike set up for you is paramount. In recent years cycling has become increasingly popular, and you can now see cyclists, either in groups or on their own taking over British roads – you’ll no doubt be riding alongside them. With this drastic increase in the number of people taking up cycling, bike fit has never been more important, since this new popularity means that more and more cyclists are hitting the road without much knowledge of the sport. What does GURU bike fitting involve? Any bike fit involves a lot of small adjustments to your bike which aim to make your riding experience as comfortable and efficient as possible. Possible adjustments include the height of the saddle, height of the handlebars, how far forward the saddle is, and alignment of your cleats. GURU have created a way of finding out your perfect bike set up to ensure you have the perfect ride. The GURU system allows for adjustments to be made instantly because the rider is actively involved in the process. This means that, instead of being prescribed a ‘best position, based on a bell curve of average angles, changes are made on the fly with instant feedback. It’s this that makes the GURU system stand out from other bike fit systems. The vertical and horizontal positioning of the bars and saddle can both be changed remotely whilst the rider is still pedalling, and this means that the GURU machine, although very smart, is only effective...
by Dave Newton | Aug 17, 2015 | articles, Bike Fitting, Blog
Still not sure what that bucking bronco in the shop is actually for? Well, while we’re not ones to blow our own trumpets here at Ten-Point (Okay, okay, Brian is excluded from that statement…) we are very happy when someone else does a little trumpet blowing on our behalf! Just a few weeks ago Helen went to carry out a bike fit. She was filmed doing so and also interviewed….by Bikeradar! And they’ve put a little story online talking about the GURU Dynamic Fit Unit and the process they went through. It really is worth a watch if you’re even remotely interested in finding a comfortable position on a bike. You can find the article and video right here!...
by Dave Newton | Jan 28, 2015 | articles, Bike Fitting, Blog, Inspiration
Here’s the first in a series of short videos we shot with Dan Empfield while he was over at Ten-Point teaching the first of many F.I.S.T. bike fitting workshops. In this video, we ask Dan, “What makes a great bike fitter?” As ever with Dan, his answer my surprise you… Question time with the bike fitting Guru – Dan Empfield at Ten-Point in Buckinghamshire from Ten-Point on...
by Dave Newton | Jan 20, 2015 | articles, Bike Fitting, Blog, Tips
When you go to buy a bike, you could be forgiven for thinking that bike manufacturers all size their bikes in a similar way and that as the size goes up, so the bike gets larger. Sadly, this couldn’t be further from the truth for many manufacturers. Historically, bikes were sized a bit like clothing – Small, Medium, Large and so on. Some folks actually gave (and in fact still do give) the sizes numbers, but exactly what that number correlates to can vary – some makers use the height of the bike, others use the length. It is, in simple terms, a bit of a mess. Dan Empfield, the father of the F.I.S.T. protocol of bike fitting, proposed a method of bike sizing based around Stack and Reach. Start by thinking of a bike and now overlay a rectangle on top of it. Place the bottom left corner of that rectangle at the bottom bracket (that’s the bit the pedals rotate around). You should now be visualising something a bit like this (see left): Point 1 is our starting point. The Stack of a frame is the distance from point 1 to point 2 while the Reach of the frame is the distance from point 2 to point 3, where point 3 is the centre of the headtube. Since both the height of the bike and the length of the bike are important in finding a frame that fits you, this makes a far better method of sizing a bike than simply an arbitrary figure for either the height of the seat tube or the length of the...
by Dave Newton | Jan 16, 2015 | Bike Fitting, Blog, Coaching, Events, News
Regular followers of the blog will know that Dan Empfield was at Ten-Point this week. On Monday and Tuesday he delivered his F.I.S.T. bike fitting course for the first time outside of the US. With 8 students on the course, we had a fantastic two days learning from the master. Dan was full of amazingly interesting insights, in-depth learning and some wonderful stories from his years in the bike industry. Here is a short introductory video we produced with Dan while he was over explaining why he has partnered with us as his European training centre. Whether you are a dealer who is interested in bike fitting, or simply a cyclist interested in learning more about bike fitting, coming on one of these courses here, at Ten-Point in Buckinghamshire, is well worth it. If you’re interested, drop into the shop, call up or send us an email and Brian will get in touch. Over the coming weeks there will be more video clips from Dan’s visit, where we got chance to sit him down and ask him some questions, so stay tuned for...
by Dave Newton | Jan 9, 2015 | Bike Fitting, Blog, Events, News
We’re getting excited here at Ten-Point. Tomorrow Dan Empfield, the father of the F.I.S.T. protocol of bike fitting, arrives! He’s over for a few days to run a two-day course on F.I.S.T. bike fitting for some UK bike dealers who want to up skill their staff in the best bike fitting methods around. For those that have never heard of Dan, beyond his bike fitting knowledge, he is also credited with designing the first triathlon specific bike – the Quintana Roo – and the first triathlon specific wetsuit! He is the owner and manager of www.slowtwitch.com (probably the most popular triathlon specific website in the world) and in 2004 he was inducted into the Triathlete Magazine Hall of Fame. All three of our bike fitting staff, that’s Helen, Brian and Bryn, were trained over in the US by Dan and we are the European Training and Service Centre for the GURU Dynamic Bike Fitting System too. That’s why Dan has partnered with us to run his European training courses from Ten-Point. All places on the course this time around are fully booked, but if you are interested in bike fitting, let Brian know and he will keep you updated with what is going on in the future. Keep your eyes on the blog for pics and a write up next...
