I Love Bicycling

I Love Bicycling is a website that is geared towards cycling for beginners with road cycling tips, training articles, nutrition tips, weight loss, how to’s and bike repair articles.

JOIN Cycling: A New Training Platform for Cyclists

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Our friends at Dynamic Cyclist had the pleasure of using the JOIN Cycling app recently. Check out what they had to say about this innovative new cycling platform!

As people dedicated to enhancing the wellness and performance of cyclists worldwide through stretching, strength training, and injury prevention programming, we at Dynamic Cyclist have had a phenomenal experience exploring the JOIN Cycling platform. 

Our team has been in the cycling industry for close to a decade, and are no strangers to the digital experience of helping cyclists perform at their best. What JOIN Cycling has created is nothing short of impressive. 

Over the past few months we’ve been lucky to test out the programming and apply it to our personal cycling goals. Our team has been pleased by the ease of use, training efficiency, and adaptable training plans that fit into our busy schedules. Let’s dive into the main reasons why we love using JOIN Cycling!

Adaptive Training Plans

JOIN Cycling’s smart, adaptive training plans are a standout feature. They flexibly fit into our daily routines, allowing us to maintain a balanced training regimen that supports our holistic approach to cycling health. Whether it’s a long ride day or an easy recovery workout, JOIN Cycling’s schedule adjustments keep us on track without having to worry about overtraining.

Easy Access to Data

One of the highlights has been how simple it is to access and interpret the training data. The app presents everything from ride stats to fitness trends in a clear and accessible manner, making it easy to track improvements and understand the impact of each workout.

Community and Support

The social features within JOIN Cycling are a welcome bonus. Meeting local riders through the app and finding upcoming races has allowed us to go beyond our training metrics and further integrate ourselves into the cycling community. 

User Interface

We have found the user interface to be intuitive and incredibly easy to navigate, as well. Some digital training plans out there can seem too information-heavy, making the experience overwhelming and difficult to understand. JOIN Cycling does a great job of organizing everything into categories that transition smoothly and blend well with the social aspects of the app. 

JOIN Cycling is not just a training app; it’s a comprehensive training partner that understands the dynamics of modern cyclists’ lives. It’s been a go-to tool in our training arsenal, and will continue to be going forward. We are impressed with how the training plans adapt, not just to our cycling goals, but also our daily schedules. This perfectly complements our Dynamic Cyclist commitment to riding pain-free! 

Here’s to more cycling, more goals being achieved, and continuing to enjoy the sport we all love so much!

Join Cycling is  the perfect companion app to Dynamic Cyclist, and is offering a 30-day free trial to you! CLICK HERE to sign up for your risk-free subscription today, and discover what adaptive and flexible training plans can do for you.

Is Cycling Good Cardio? The Answer Is Yes!

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Is cycling good cardio? Absolutely. It’s not only good cardio exercise, but maybe one of the best forms of it out there. Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death globally, annually claiming the lives of almost 18 million people. All forms of cycling have been shown to reduce it significantly. Let’s get the world cycling, so we can all live longer, happier, healthier lives!

cycling cardio

(Image credit: Adobe Stock)

What is Cardiovascular Health?

Let’s start with the cardiovascular system, also known as the circulatory system, which is a system that comprises the heart, lungs, and blood vessels, all working together to help sustain bodily functions. The heart pumps blood throughout the body, while the blood vessels serve as its conduits. The lungs oxygenate the blood and remove carbon dioxide from it.

Cardiovascular health, then, is the ability of this system and all its components to be able to do their job efficiently and effectively. Being able to transport oxygen and nutrients to the body’s tissues and organs as well as removing waste products is what helps a person regulate their blood pressure, maintain proper circulation, and have a strong, healthy immune system.

To develop this health, this fitness, we need to subject it to a certain level of stress. When people hear that word they often jump to the negative, failing to understand that there are positive stresses as well. Exercise, in the right dosage, can be a positive stressor that triggers beneficial adaptations. And for cardiovascular longevity, cycling is one of the best exercises you can do.

Cycling for Cardiovascular Health

When you take into account how adaptable cycling is to any fitness level, any level of socioeconomic status, any body type, and almost any geographical location, it’s a sport that the world can enjoy as a whole. It has a low impact on the body but a big impact on your cardiovascular health, and is something you can do at any age.

Learning to ride a bike is a common skill many of us pick up as kids, but even the inexperienced can learn later in life, and make cycling an activity that is a regular part of their routine. As a form of cardiovascular exercise, cycling can easily regress to train even the most deconditioned of individuals, and progress all the way up to elite cyclist’s with world record VO2 maxes.

By pumping the legs while pedaling, you’re placing considerable demand on several muscles, particularly the quadriceps. These muscles need oxygen and nutrients to perform those movements for you, and is one of the reasons why cycling can become so exhausting (in a good way). Our cardiovascular system needs to feed these tissues in order for them to perform.

Increasing your speed, incline, and gear are all ways to make cycling even more challenging. As you get stronger and more fit, you can ride farther, longer, and through more technical terrain like mountain paths and forest trails. The cardio demand on your body is one thing, but there are other parts of cycling that contribute to your cardiovascular health as well…

(Image Credit/Adobe Stock)

Social Benefits & Nature Exposure

Stress reduction is key when it comes to lowering cardiovascular disease and all-cause mortality. Lucky for us, the sport we love or are just getting into reduces stress in a number of ways. Exercise in general is a potent stress reducer, and exercising in groups can be even more effective for its social benefits.

Cycling is commonly done with a partner, as a family, or as part of another club or group environment of some kind. The social benefits of this sport should not be overlooked. We are social beings who need connection with others in order to thrive both physically and mentally. Cycling contributes to cardiovascular health not only directly but indirectly in this way, as well.

One last note worth pondering, is the exposure to nature and our connection to the planet as a whole. It is becoming evident that we need to actually look at and be in nature for optimal health. We did not evolve living in skyscrapers and staring at screens, our modern society has forgotten that we are products of the world around us, and we need to spend time in it to be healthy.

The process of breathing itself is an intimate entanglement with the world around you. You breathe in the oxygen produced by trees, and expel the CO2 that they absorb, utilize during photosynthesis, and release back into the atmosphere as oxygen. Cycling outdoors brings you into the heart of this incomprehensible and never-ending dance. 

The bronchi in your lungs are hauntingly similar to the branch networks of trees. They branch off smaller and smaller into what are called bronchioles and eventually alveoli, which are tiny sacs where gas exchange occurs between the lungs and the blood stream. The alveoli are like the leaves on the ends of the branches of your lungs, for leaves on a tree are also responsible for the absorption and release of gasses (CO2 and O2, respectively). (Image credit: Adobe Stock)

Increase Your Cycling Cardio

Dynamic Cyclist was designed to help cyclists worldwide get better at their sport and to ride-pain free! We have hundreds of high-quality follow-along routines to help you get stronger, more mobile, and less susceptible to injury. Join thousands of cyclists today and try out our programming for 7-days FREE by clicking here! We’ll see you there!

Anterior Pelvic Tilt: How To Correct Imbalances & Improve Performance

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Two of the most common problems amongst cyclists are knee pain and lower back pain. In fact, 94% of cyclists experienced injury during a one-year period of study; low back pain and anterior knee pain being prevalent for 58% and 36% of participants, respectively. While the causes of these issues are numerous and varied, there are several similar originating factors between them, and consequently a structured approach to relieving them short and long-term. 

One of those commonalities is the presence of an anterior pelvic tilt in the cyclist’s body. This basically translates to the pelvis, which is the bony structure that your spine sits on and your femurs attach to (it also supports the intestines, contains the bladder, reproductive organs, colon, and more), is tilted farther forward than normal.

anterior pelvic tilt

Different pelvic positions. (Credit: sumaki/Adobe Stock)

This has ramifications for the entire body, and can be the source of much pain and dysfunction in cyclists at all levels of performance, especially compared to non-cycling individuals. In this article we’re going to talk about why anterior pelvic tilt tends to develop in cyclist’s, the problems it can cause, and what we can do to prevent it from happening.

Common Causes of Anterior Pelvic Tilt in Cyclists

When we look at a cyclist positioned on her bike, there are some immediate red flags that we can point out as likely contributors to this postural phenomena we’re calling anterior pelvic tilt. We’re about to see very quickly that just the way people ride their bikes in general (because of their design) is one of the biggest pieces of this puzzle. 


Use this picture for reference when reading the next section. (Credit: Artem Varnitsin/Adobe Stock)

Compressed Hips

If you look at the picture above, our rider has her left leg at the top of a pedal stroke. If we look at her left hip, it’s in a fully flexed position, accentuated by her bent forward torso. Because this happens thousands of times every time we trek out for a lengthy cruise, our poor hip flexor muscles are being subjected to a lot of short, cramped positions. Over time, this will make them tight.

Tight hip flexors are one of the main causes of anterior pelvic tilt, resulting also in lower back pain. The reason for this is because one of your main hip flexors, the psoas major, attaches to all five of your lumbar (lower back) vertebrae. When the psoas becomes short and tight, it pulls on all those vertebrae, arching your lower back, and tipping your pelvis forward.


Psoas Major. Notice its attachments to all of the lumbar vertebrae. (Credit: SciePro/Adobe Stock)

Other aspects of our modern lifestyles (mainly sitting, by way of office work, driving, and excessive leisure time) further overwork our hip flexors and encourage them to stay tight 24/7. It’s an inevitable part of riding, and something we need to address it in order to get our hips and spine back into a good position.

Weak Glutes

Having a strong backside is not only attractive, but also incredibly important for keeping your pelvis in a balanced, neutral alignment. The gluteus maximus in particular is your biggest, most powerful hip extensor, and is crucial to maintaining good posture through its action of posteriorly rotating the pelvis and counteracting the pull of the hip flexors. 

Our hips never fully extend while we’re cycling. This is largely due to the fact that we’re always hinged over at the hips to keep our hands on the handlebars, and almost completely folded in half when dropping down into the aero position. Cycling has been promoted in the past as a good activity for developing our glutes, but these positions unfortunately make that almost impossible.


Biomechanically, the positions we get into while pedaling make it hard to recruit our gluteus maximus. (Credit: Jacek Dylag/Unsplash)

Because the gluteus maximus is such a big powerful muscle, it often needs intense, full hip extension to be optimally stimulated for growth and development. Cycling doesn’t offer that, and in fact causes the body to recruit secondary hip extensors (hamstrings) to do most of the hip extension as an energy conservation method. Weak glutes = anterior pelvic tilt.

Weak Abdominal Muscles

Cycling primarily occurs in what is called the sagittal plane of movement. This plane divides the body down the middle (refer to below picture) so it is split evenly in half, and accounts for forward/backward movements. There is slight frontal plane (side to side) motion when shifting weight from pedal to pedal and leaning to take hard corners, but it is minimal.


The three anatomical body planes and corresponding motions in the human body. (Credit: VectorMine/Adobe Stock)

This is important because our core musculature needs to be challenged in all planes of movement to function correctly. We need to learn to brace and be strong while twisting, moving our legs independently of our torso, lifting loads off the ground, etc. Cycling limits these opportunities by keeping us fixed and reliant on the bike frame in place of support from our core musculature.

Muscles like the exterior obliques, rectus abdominis and transversus abdominis stabilize the back by creating intra-abdominal pressure and influence the position of the pelvis by rotating it backwards. Cycling discourages mechanisms like this from happening whilst riding, allowing our pelvis to be pulled forward by the hip flexors while the core remains relatively dormant.

Other Causes of Anterior Pelvic Tilt in Cyclists

Having your bike properly fitted is essential to avoid a whole host of injuries, pain, and dysfunction, including anterior pelvic tilt. Having a saddle too high will force you to learn forward excessively to reach the handlebars, compressing the hip joint. If it’s too low, your hip will be forced into extreme flexion at the top of the pedal stroke, further tightening the hip flexors.


Our partners at MyVeloFit offer an AI powered bike fitting app you can use to adjust your bike right at home. (Credit: MyVeloFit)

There are other factors in a person’s lifestyle that are going to encourage anterior pelvic tilt, these include: Having a sedentary job, driving, spending a lot of time sitting on couches and chairs, not participating in any type of explosive movements like sprinting and jumping, etc. All of these things contribute to tight hips, weak glutes, and bad posture overall.

Symptoms of Anterior Pelvic Tilt in Cyclists

Without getting a professional postural assessment done on your body, there are some common symptoms you may be able to relate to that point to an anterior pelvic tilt being present in the body. Some of these include:

  • Knee pain: When the pelvis tilts forward, it internally rotates the femur (your thigh bone). This puts awkward strain on the structures in your knee, resulting in pain and discomfort.
  • Lower back pain & tightness: Excessive pull from the hip flexors can arch your lower back into a posture known as lordosis, often resulting in significant ache, pain, and tightness of the lower back muscles.
  • Mid back tightness: When the lower back arches excessively, sometimes the mid back will round to compensate posturally. This chronically stretches muscles in the mid back, making them feel like they need to be stretched, when actually they need to be strengthened.
  • Distended abdomen: When the pelvis tilts forward it stretches the muscles on the front of your abdomen, making them weak over team. This results in a loss of abdominal tone, and a belly that sags forward as the organs fall against a weak abdominal wall.
  • Loss of power on the bike: If the core can’t maintain optimal stability, it can’t create a strong base for your legs to push off while pedaling, resulting in a loss of power.
  • Hip pain: An individual is likely to experience ache, discomfort, and pain in the hip if the hip flexor muscles are being overworked and holding excessive tension even in time spent off the bike.

Prevention Strategies for Anterior Pelvic Tilt in Cyclists

While the picture we’ve painted so far hasn’t been favourable to our beloved sport, hope is far from lost for those of us with a tilted pelvis! Actually, the fixes for this problem, depending on the cause(s), can be quite straightforward and easy to integrate with some supplemental training. Try out some of these protocols and see what they do for you and your cycling performance.

Hip Flexor Mobility & Stretching

It has become evident now throughout the duration of this article that the hip flexors are major culprits in cyclists with anterior pelvic tilt. To combat the stiffness that is bound to develop in our time on the bike, we can actively work to lengthen and mobilize these muscles so they rest and function in a more balanced position.

Give this exercise a try, the Reverse Lunge w/Leg Lift. It offers an amazing blend of benefits for the hips as a whole. Stepping back into a deep lunge helps lengthen the hip flexors and also strengthen them in those stretched positions at the same time. The added leg lift (and lunge action in general) also helps to strengthen the glutes and pull the pelvis back down into a neutral position.

Perform three sets of 10 reps per leg, adjusting as necessary. You can also hold a dumbbell in front of you for extra intensity.

Strengthen the Glutes

As previously mentioned, the gluteus maximus, your body’s largest muscle, is our most powerful hip extensor, and plays an important role in maintaining a neutral pelvis by rotating it backwards. If we aren’t getting enough activation of this muscle through our riding, then we need to make up for it in our strength and conditioning routine. Here are some ways to make it stronger.

Any sort of squat, lunge, or deadlift type exercise is going to stimulate the glutes and help them develop. A great bang for your buck exercise is the Jump Squat to Jumping Jack, because it combines a deep squat with a jumping jack which forces you to spread your legs and extend the hips simultaneously, an amazing stimulus for all the muscles in your posterior and lateral hip.

See how you feel doing three sets of 10 reps, adding more or less sets/reps to moderate difficulty.

Strengthen the Core

Being fixed on the bike through the saddle and handlebars discourages any significant use of our abdominal musculature. The bike does all the stabilizing for us, a much different environment than a soccer player sprinting down the pitch or a powerlifter lifting a heavy squat. Certain muscles in our abdomen help to posteriorly rotate the pelvis and counter the pull of the hip flexors. Those are the ones we are going to focus on in this next exercise.

The deadbug is a wonderful introduction to low back/trunk stability and overall core strength. The main focus is keeping your lower back flat on the ground as you move alternating arm/leg away from the torso. By keeping you back flat, you’re using your exterior obliques and rectus abdominis to counter the pull of your hip flexors, and strengthen the core in concert with your extremities.

Three sets of 10 total reps (five/side) is a good start for this exercise. If you feel your lower back coming off the ground, limit the range of motion of your limbs so you can maintain that hollow position. 

Build a Better Body With Dynamic Cyclist

The above exercises were pulled from our extensive mobility, strength, and conditioning programming over at Dynamic Cyclist! We have hundreds of follow along instructional videos and routines to help you correct postural problems, prevent injury, get stronger, and become an overall better cyclist in the comfort of your own home! Sign up for a 7-day free trial by heading over to our website.

Ride Pain Free: Stretching & Mobility Program for Cyclists

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Do you experience pain while riding? 

As avid cyclists ourselves, we know firsthand the toll that years of hard-earned riding can do to your back, your knees, your muscles, and your body in general. Nasty spills, the same positions, countless pedals, arduous climbs, burning lungs, and everything else that makes the challenges we face on the bike that much more rewarding…it all has a price.

We often come out on the other end with tight muscles, achy joints and chronic pain. This begs the question: “Is cycling itself the problem?”

Well, yes and no. 

Yes, because there are components to the sport of cycling that encourage the development of overuse injuries. The fact that we remain stationary in a seated position while riding, that we are hunched over to reduce wind resistance, and that we tend to ride for hours at a time over incredibly long distances (to name a few).

No, because there are things we can do to prevent our bodies from breaking down so we can continue to enjoy and excel at the sport we love.

And it’s these preventative measures that inspired us to write a book… 

Ride Pain Free: Stretching & Mobility Program for Cyclists

stretching and mobility program for cyclists

I Love Bicycling and Dynamic Cyclist joined forces to bring you this 7-day guided program that addresses the most common muscle imbalances for cyclists with both dynamic and static exercises. Each routine is designed for cyclists to target the common issues they endure by our team of physiotherapists, athletic therapists, and personal trainers. Through easy-to-follow routines, we will target all areas of the body, and teach you how to alleviate tension and improve posture for pain free riding!

Why We Wrote It

We wrote this book to address the unique needs of cyclist’s worldwide; to help them stay healthy and injury-free. 

Cyclist’s face a number of challenges when it comes to injury prevention, and in few sports is it more important to find balance in the rest of your training. We understand how hopeless it can feel to be left with debilitating pain that keeps you off the bike, and we’re here to tell you that there is always a way to not just heal, but thrive.

Stretching and mobility are poorly understood concepts in most sports, and even more poorly practiced. By incorporating the correct stretches and mobility exercises into your routine, and giving yourself the time to open up and counteract the hours you spend on the bike, your body will be that much more prepared to tackle anything you throw at it, on or off the bike.

As cyclists, we understand the specific needs of our sport and the types of injuries we are all susceptible to on the bike. We felt we were well positioned to address those needs with a detailed, 7-day instructional program that is fun to do, easy to follow, and can be done in a condensed time period to accommodate any schedule. 

We wanted to show people how easy it is to make a difference in your own body in just 15 minutes a day. And that’s exactly what we hope this book will do for you.


torwaiphoto/Adobe Stock

How This Book Can Help You

The fact cycling keeps a person in the same positions, doing the same things, repeatedly, is both a blessing and a curse. 

The bad part about it is that, without properly implemented stretching and mobility protocols, we’re bound to develop overuse injuries that cause pain, dysfunction, and demotivation. The good part, though, is that we can tell where these problems are coming from, and systematically address them through our training.

Some of the common problems cyclist’s experience that we talk about in this book are:

  • Low Back Pain
  • Knee Pain
  • Tight Hamstrings
  • Neck Stiffness

You will learn about why these tend to develop over time as a result of cycling, the symptoms you may experience, and most importantly, what you can do to resolve the problem and get back to smooth, enjoyable riding!

While going through the routines, you’ll notice that each exercise has a supplementary benefits section that teaches you what it does for the body and why we’re including it. This helps the book to be not just a follow along workout regimen, but an educational resource that will help you train smarter and harder to become the best possible cyclist you can be.


Sidekick/Adobe Stock

Start Riding Pain Free TODAY

Sometimes a little guidance is all you need, and if you’ve been dealing with nagging pain, aching joints, and any other recurring problems on your cycling journey, this book was written for you. Accompanying the written directions are instructional photographs detailing the steps of each exercise, making it fun and easy to read through; it’s like having a workout partner right there with you at home! 

Our team of dedicated health professionals and experienced cyclists want to help you enjoy the sport you love. Invest in your health and performance, and get your copy of Ride Pain Free: Stretching & Mobility Program for Cyclists today!

Why Cycling Is Good for Your Mental Health

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Cycling and mental health are often intertwined within the same conversation. For good reason. This sport has been shown to have a profound effect on people’s mental health (perhaps even your own). But that’s a big term – mental health – what does it mean?

From the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC):

“Mental health includes our emotional, psychological, and social well-being. It affects how we think, feel, and act. It also helps determine how we handle stress, relate to others, and make healthy choices.”

Our mood regulation, how we interact with people, what we remember, our ability to process information, the way we see ourselves…anything and everything in life can be linked back to and influenced by our mental states. So it goes without saying that taking care of it is important…but how do we do so?

Well, it looks like our sport is one we can rely on when it comes to mental health. IF we use it properly, that is.

Cycling and mental health

GutesaMilos/Adobe Stock

Movement & the Accessibility of Cycling

We are not made to sit still. What many people don’t realize is that your brain is actually built on movement. From the time you were a toddler and throughout the duration of your life, movement has been the bridge between your mind and the outside world. It only makes sense that we need copious amounts of it to keep us healthy.

Modern lifestyles have done their best to divorce people from movement. Our jobs are sedentary, we drive, we “relax”, we watch TV, we go on our phones…it goes against the grain of millions of years of evolution. If you look at a baby they are constantly fidgeting, moving, reaching, exploring – it’s an inherent impulse deep, deep inside our nervous system. One that can always be reignited, even if it’s been ignored or suppressed for years on end. 

Cycling is something almost everybody can do. Most of us learn to ride bikes when we’re kids, and it’s something we never really forget. This partly explains the explosion of popularity the sport has experienced over the past decades. You don’t have to join a team or get a membership, you just need a bike, and the rest of the world is yours to explore. 

Cycling & Mental Health

There are several reasons why cycling is one of the best exercises for your mental health. Exercise in general has been shown time and time again to be a crucial component in the mitigation of mental health problems, especially commonly experienced conditions such as anxiety and depression.

Cardiovascular exercise in particular has a profound effect on cognitive function and the stability of someone’s mental state. The constant pumping of blood and repetitive movements in sports such as cycling help to circulate nutrients, oxygen and neurochemicals like dopamine and serotonin to keep your organs and tissues healthy, while at the same time making you feel good, satisfied and rewarded for your efforts. 

The after effects of a ride or other physical activity are long lasting, and also contribute to you sleeping more deeply at night, lowering your stress levels, increasing your sex drive and maintaining a healthy body composition. If you view your cycling regimen from a zoomed out perspective and stretched over time, you’re going to look better, feel better and have an improved self-image. All significant factors in keeping your mind healthy. 

Being Outside & Social Connection

cycling team on a mountain road

kovop58/Adobe Stock

Two other important aspects of our sport when it comes to mental health are the outdoor element and the exciting social opportunities. 

Being outside in new environments and natural surroundings are both stimulating and salutary parts of the human experience. We are products of the environment, and it’s an ancient yearning within us all to be a part of it in some way. Think about the proclivity towards an activity like camping, even among homebodies. Cycling takes us there, and anywhere we can really imagine.

When you start riding you also instantly become a part of a new community. Humans are social beings, and we need to find relatability and commonality within other members of our tribe. Riding is a surefire way to do just that, and you’re guaranteed to find a cycling group or club that goes out for rides in or around your town. Even our equipment and apparel, which outsiders love to taunt, is something that unites us and automatically signals another tribe member from afar.

As alluded to at the beginning of this article, mental health is a massive term, and it has many components that contribute to its fitness and longevity. Being in tune with the harmony of human nature, by being outside and connecting with others, heightens our chances for a sound relationship within the mind, and are things that the essence of cycling naturally adopts.

Avoiding the Masochistic Trap

We must be careful of just one thing, and that is the often romanticized idea of working yourself to death on the bike. Cycling’s low intensity/high volume repetition allows people to train and race for hours on end, covering tens to hundreds of miles. It is one of the joys within our sport that we have the freedom to cover such distances and put in so many hours. But it is also a risk.

A healthy reminder that learning to push yourself is good, and learning how to use your bike regeneratively and therapeutically is just as valuable. Like anything, exercise/cycling can be addictive, and it’s possible to have too much of something good. The bike will always be there to pedal, it never gets tired, but you do, and you should never let it take you farther than you can go.

Cycling for Health, Longevity & Performance 

If you’re looking to build a strong and balanced body that allows you to be the best cyclist you can be, consider joining our community over at Dynamic Cyclist. We’ve developed a 100% online, fully interactive, follow along training platform for cyclists that helps you ride pain free to the best of your abilities. Sign up for a 7-day free trial by clicking here!

How Mobility Impacts Your Bike Fit

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Often when we are experiencing discomfort on the bike the first solution is to consider changing your bike fit. While a poorly set up bike can be the cause of many issues, so too can limited mobility, especially if that mobility wasn’t considered in the initial set up of the bike or there has been a recent decrease in mobility from either injury or lifestyle changes. Limited mobility is one of the leading causes of discomfort on the bike and presents some of the greatest barriers to both being more comfortable and being in a more efficient position.   

Every aspect of your mobility has a corresponding impact on your bike fit to varying degrees. To help understand how mobility correlates to each element of the fit we are going to break our analysis down to two main categories:

  • Upper Body – everything above the belly button, but specifically your upper back, neck, and shoulders. 
  • Lower Body – everything below your belly button, specifically the spinal erectors, glutes, hip flexors, and hamstrings. 

These two areas are key in determining how much leg extension and flexion your body can comfortably handle – essentially how high your saddle can be – as well as how long and low your handlebars can be in relation to your saddle. The range of saddle and handlebar positions that your body can comfortably and efficiently accommodate is referred to as your fit window, knowing your fit window helps provide a set of helpful boundaries for your bike fit. 

What is a Fit Window and how do you determine yours?

At MyVeloFit, our philosophy is that every rider has a fit window, this means that instead of one position which is dialed to the millimeter, every fit parameter (e.g. saddle height, handlebar reach, etc) has a range in which that touch point can be adjusted and the fit will still work well for that rider. The fit window is the total amount of adjustment you can make and still be in a good or acceptable position. For instance a rider could have a saddle height of 685mm to 695mm and still be in the range of their saddle height window. If the rider has been sitting a lot and not working on mobility they’d err on the lower end of the range, whereas if they have been riding a lot and doing mobility work then they could go to the higher end of the range. Depending on the rider these ranges can be smaller or larger. Smaller riders or those with less mobility will typically have a smaller range, while taller riders or those with more mobility will have a larger range. 

It is difficult to determine your fit window on your own. The best way to determine your window is with a professional bike fit or an app like MyVeloFit. At MyVeloFit we use AI to analyze your mobility and your position on the bike then we make recommendations to get you into your fit window. Once in that window you can use the joint angle ranges (see the color coded bars below) to explore your position within these windows. Joint angles don’t tell the entire story of the fit window though, as quality of movement is also important. If you are bouncing, or rocking, or experience significant discomfort you are likely outside of your fit window. 

Lower Body Impacts 

Lower Body and the Saddle:

Lower body mobility can have a number of impacts on how we set the saddle position within the fit window. Having tight hamstrings will usually mean we need to run lower in the fit window, while having good hamstring mobility will mean we can run higher. 

Tight hip flexors can result in anterior pelvic tilt which can make many saddles uncomfortable because it pulls the front of the pelvis down towards the nose of the saddle resulting in less pressure on the sit bones and more on soft tissue. Having excessive anterior pelvic tilt may mean you need to select a saddle designed around more pressure on the front of the saddle. Modern short-nosed saddles such as the Pro Stealth, Bontrager Aeolus, or Specialized Power have been designed with this in mind. It may also help to run the saddle slightly further forward but still within your fit window. 

Lower Body and the Handlebars 

Having tight hamstrings, glutes, or low back muscles can make it difficult to comfortably reach the handlebars while pedaling efficiently so your handlebars might need to be higher and/or closer within the fit window.  

Tight hips can also cause issues requiring a higher or closer handlebar position due to “bunching” or pinching in the front of the hip. This is especially true as we move to more aggressive front end setups like those seen in road racing or Time Trial/Triathlon.

Upper Body Impacts

Upper Body and the Saddle

Unlike the lower body which can have some significant impact on the handlebar position of the bike, the upper body has limited influence on saddle position. The standout consideration is that a very tight mid or upper back can lead to an atypical seating position on the saddle. This results from accommodating poor upper body functionality. A more forward saddle position within your fit window can sometimes help to relieve these issues, but a more comprehensive analysis of the rider’s position is typically warranted.    

Upper Body and the Handlebars

Handlebar reach and drop are the measurements that are most affected by limited upper body mobility. Shoulder mobility typically will affect handlebar reach while neck and back issues will typically affect handlebar drop. 

Tight shoulders, typical of those with injuries or who spend long hours at the computer, will typically require a shorter reach, whereas those with good shoulder mobility can go longer within their fit window. 

Back and neck injuries or tightness will generally require a more upright position while more mobility will allow a rider to get lower in their fit window. 

Key Takeaways:

It is clear that mobility plays an important role in your position on the bike, so remember the following things when you are setting up your bike:

  • Get a bike fit or use MyVeloFit to determine a good starting point
  • Be honest with yourself about your mobility and set the bike up to accommodate your individual mobility characteristics. 
  • Be sure to add regular mobility work to prevent injuries and improve your ability to hold your position on the bike.
  • Most importantly let comfort be your guide. If a position isn’t relatively comfortable you likely won’t enjoy your bike as much as you should.

Jesse Jarjour is the co-founder of MyVeloFit, an app that uses AI to help improve your bike fit. Jesse’s love for bike fit started when he bought his first road bike and was sold a bike that was two sizes too big. He fell for cycling but was plagued by chronic injuries due to the poor positioning. Once he finally got a fit and set up the bike somewhat functionally, he was amazed by what changes could be made to improve his comfort and enjoyment of the sport. As Jesse’s affinity for cycling grew, he decided on a career change from economics to bikes. Recalling how much bike fit improved his cycling experience, Jesse devoted himself to learning everything he could about achieving the optimum fit. Fast forward almost 15 years later and Jesse now holds Level 2 certification from the International Bike Fit Institute as well as fit certifications from Retul and Trek. He has fit over 2,000 people of all backgrounds and is just as comfortable fitting a National Champion as a first timer.

Unlock Your Glutes For More Cycling Power

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Does cycling work your glutes? How do you use your glutes when cycling? What are some good glute exercises for cyclists? These are all questions we will address in today’s article which focuses on everything glutes and how we can put them to work for you, on and off the bike. 

Introduction

Your butt. Your bum. Your glutes. We are, with all these terms, describing more or less the same group of muscles that surround the posterior and lateral aspects of the hip. They are the inspiration of gym goers and fitness enthusiasts worldwide. They extend the hips, keep us balanced and make us attractive. An enigmatic area to say the least.

Glutes and cycling have a love/hate relationship. We ask them to initiate movement on this vehicle we’ve invented, and they try desperately to help us through unspeakable numbers of repetitions. All this while sitting on said vehicle; sitting being a known contributor to a modern condition sometimes called “glute amnesia” (a term first coined by Dr. Stuart McGill).

Glute amnesia, where the glutes are inactive and become consequently weak, occurs for a number of reasons, three of which are relevant to cycling:

  • Pain and tightness in the front of the hip, which is common for the avid cyclist. 
  • Pressure is put on the glutes while riding the saddle, which inhibits their neuromuscular response (the same way that a massage relaxes muscle tissue). 
  • Lack of explosive/intense movement, which is what the largest glute muscle (gluteus maximus) is most responsive to.

Source: Antonio Diaz – Adobe Stock

For these reasons and more, we have to pay special attention to this area. Not just for cycling performance, but overall health and balance. Let us start with a brief introduction to the muscles we’re talking about.

Glute Muscles & Cycling

Gluteus Maximus

Source: SciePro – Adobe Stock

The gluteus maximus is the largest and most powerful muscle in the body. It is very misunderstood, particularly when it comes to cycling and glutes. It’s a major hip extensor and stabilizer of the pelvis. It tends to have a significant percentage of fast twitch muscle fibers, which are responsible for quick, explosive movements like sprinting and jumping. 

Where we get into trouble as cyclists is the long, low intensity and high repetition nature of the sport. Our hips don’t fully flex or extend while pedaling, which makes it hard for us to recruit our gluteus maximus at all. In fact, electromyography studies show very little activation of this muscle while cycling.

Source: Electromyographic Analysis of the Lower Extremity during Pedaling

In the above graph, you see far more activation of a muscle called the biceps femoris (your outer hamstring). That’s because in low intensity activities (where the load is minimal, i.e. cycling), the body will recruit secondary hip extensors (hamstrings) as opposed to primary hip extensors (glutes) to save energy. 

This same phenomenon, known as synergistic dominance, is what makes our elderly population so vulnerable to falling injuries. Falls are one of the leading causes of injury and even death in seniors, and lack of gluteal strength is a significant component of that. 

Gluteus Medius

Source: SciePro – Adobe Stock

Gluteus medius is our primary hip abductor, which means it is responsible for moving the leg away from the midline. It is also extremely important for the side to side stability of our pelvis (frontal plane). Any exercise or activity performed on one leg places significant demands on the gluteus medius; walking, running and any single leg weight bearing exercise.

When we put our weight onto one leg, the gluteus medius contracts on the standing leg to neutralize the height of our pelvis on that side. This lifts the opposite side of the pelvis where our leg is off the ground, which allows our foot/leg to swing through without hitting the floor. 

Failure to do this is called a positive Trendelenburg Sign in physiotherapy.

Source: Kyungmin – Adobe Stock

There is some activation of the gluteus medius while cycling, particularly when riding out of the saddle. The lack of hip abduction however suggests we need additional exercises to keep it strong and healthy.

Gluteus Minimus

Source: SciePro – Adobe Stock

Gluteus minimus is the smallest of these three gluteal muscles, and has a similar function to the gluteus medius. Hip abduction and unilateral stability of the pelvis. 

Interestingly, marked weakness occurs in the gluteus minimus/medius around the time of puberty in females1. This creates a “wagging” motion in the hips, the same motion purposely used by experienced runway models. It has been theorized that this rocking of the pelvis is attractive to males because it’s a biological signifier of potential gene reproduction.

Good for the propagation of human beings (hooray), not so good for the health of your hips. Display of this hip tilting in adulthood is known as a Trendelenburg Gait, usually meaning weakness or inhibition of the gluteus medius/minimus. Or a great runway strut.

Source: Dmytro Flisak – Adobe Stock

Why Are We Obsessed With Glutes?

Have you ever wondered why we are so drawn to these muscles? After all, despite their allure, they also house our inner pathways for…evacuation. Interesting contrast. Well despite all this there are actually biological reasons for our infatuation that reach far into the archaic roots of human evolution.

Well developed glutes mean power. They align our pelvis and help us stand up tall. For men, adequate glute muscle mass (and a certain degree of lumbar curve) on a female means she can effectively carry and bear a child. For women, a man’s backside indicates strength and the ability to lift heavy objects, making him more useful for fighting and protection. 

Our cultural obsessions can always be traced far into the past.

Does Biking Build Glutes?

Unfortunately, cycling is not going to play a big part in developing a big booty. The lack of heavy load and explosive movement makes recruitment of your gluteus maximus, for example, almost non-existent. 

However, the glutes do work while riding and you may notice some slight toning around your hips, especially with the integration of hill climbs and/or interval workouts. It doesn’t mean they’re not important, it just means we have to account for this lack of stimulation in our strength and conditioning routines.

What follows are some great glute exercises for cyclists that can be performed anywhere with little or no equipment. Click on the accompanied links to watch Alisha, our Dynamic Cyclist coach, teach and demonstrate each exercise in detail!

Glute Exercises For Cyclists

Lateral Leg Lifts

Click here to try this exercise with Alisha!

Benefits

We don’t really get any hip abduction or single leg stability work while on the bike. This exercise tackles both and with zero equipment. All three of the aforementioned glute muscles are being worked, with specific emphasis on the gluteus medius and gluteus minimus. 

Single Leg Deadlift w/Mini Band

Click here to try this exercise with Alisha!

Benefits

This exercise works hip extension both on the standing and non-standing leg. Alisha is using a mini band for resistance, but you could also hold any type of weight in your hand to increase the exercise’s difficulty. This resistance forces your muscles to work hard and pass the threshold of activation in a big muscle like the gluteus maximus.

Clamshell Hip Lift

Click here to try this exercise with Alisha!

Benefits

This is a truly well designed and valuable glute exercise for cyclists. Not only are both sides of the hips working hard to press and open up, you’re also integrating core musculature in the sides and lower back through the obliques, erector spinae and multifidus. Having the core and hips work together is crucial for force absorption and production while cycling.

Glute Pain & Cycling

If you experience glute pain when cycling, a number of factors could be contributing. You might have tightness on the opposing side of the hip, your glute muscles might be weak or not firing properly, or perhaps the problem resides farther up the chain somewhere inside your abdomen. Whatever the problem might be, Dynamic Cyclist can help.

The above exercises are just a snippet from one of our glute focused strength training routines. We have built a comprehensive library and systematic training program to help make you a better, healthier and stronger cyclist. 

Mobility, strength training and injury prevention all under one umbrella. High quality videos led by world class instructors and an interactive athlete interface make training fun and easy to follow. We hope you consider joining our community and being a part of the mission to RIDE PAIN FREE!

The Best Massage Ball Exercises for Cyclists

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If you are currently a Dynamic Cyclist subscriber the use of a ball, of some sort, has become one of your primary self care tools. Nothing feels better than TFL release, am I right?! But this little addition to your stretching and mobility programs can be something you take on trips and races as your own personal deep tissue masseuse.

I always bring a ball with me on trips and races. It’s relatively small, light and easy to pack and is the next best thing to a foam roller. At the end of a 20 hour riding day nothing feels better than to sit down and roll out the muscles and fascia. Here are some ways you can use one to help settle the legs down after a long day in the saddle.

Rolling out the quads: Simply sit on the ground with your legs straight out in front of you. Take the ball in your hand, roll it up and down your quad, pressing deeply into the muscle. You can dig right into your adductors and IT bands as well. 

Shin and Calf: Still sitting, take the ball and roll it up and down the muscles on the outside of your lower leg. You can also place the ball on the ground underneath your calf and apply pressure to roll that area out as well. Spend time pressing on the more tender spots to facilitate release.

Glutes: Just like you would with a foam roller, place the ball on the ground, place your glute on top of it and roll around. This can be pretty gnarly as the ball applies a lot more pressure than the foam roller. Simply place more weight on your feet and hands to reduce the pressure. You can also do this against a wall to better control pressure.

TFL: Cyclists can really suffer here. To find the TFL, place your finger on the front of your pelvic bone.  Slowly move down and to the outside of the thigh until you feel a ropey muscle that is the width of a finger.  It may be tender to touch. You can roll the TFL with the ball by hand or you can use the ground or the wall to really dig in.

Shoulders, Back and Scapulae: Place the ball on the ground or use a wall to focus pressure on various knots in these areas.

Feet: Place the ball on the ground and while sitting, roll the bottoms of your feet from the heel to the ball to give yourself a lovely foot massage.

Arms: After being on the bars all day, simply rolling the ball over the muscles in the upper and lower arms can feel great and will get the blood circulating again.

For something so small and unassuming, the cork ball can really help in relieving tension in the body. It’s cheap, light, portable and really effective at finding those spots that need the most attention. Check your local yoga shop to see if they have them or you can pick them up on Amazon for less than $20.

Written by Steve O’ Shaughnessy – Distance Cyclist & Podcaster

A Bit About Steve

Hi, I’m Steve O’Shaughnessy, born and raised in the town of Deep River, Ontario. I first moved west in the early 90’s and made Whistler, British Columbia my home. Years later and after careers in retail, information technology and coffee roasting I’d find myself with a wife and family in Invermere, British Columbia.

I started cycling in my 20’s after moving to Whistler, and what a place to learn to ride mountain bikes. I was a guide on Whistler Mountain well before its absorption by Intrawest. I spent most of my time on singletrack and still love a rip on the trails every now and then, but lately, riding distances has become very attractive to me.

In 2018, I rode the BC Epic 1000 and finished in (4d 4h), in 2019 I rode an ITT of the Lost Elephant (2d 15h) then again in 2020 on my single speed, where I finished in 2nd (2d9h30m) behind Justin Hettinga. 2021 was the year of my BC Epic yoyo when I also raised a modest $2000 for the Masaka Cycling Club. A huge personal challenge for me that was also a great success. 

In 2018, after the tragic loss of Ryan Correy, I picked up the Bikepack Canada podcast and put out 23 episodes before branching out to start my own podcast, My Back 40. As a podcast producer and host, my mission is to bring listeners inspiring conversations about bikepacking, ultra endurance racing, training, nutrition and the mental health benefits of this awesome activity.

I enjoy writing and recording conversations with inspiring people. If I have learned anything after over 100 conversations I’ve had, it’s that everyone has a story and can inspire. I have also learned that we are all so much more capable than we give ourselves credit for.

Check out Steve O’Shaughnessy’s podcast ‘My Back 40’!

Finally… Enjoying Adventures on the Bike Again Without Pain!

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Hi there and glad you found time to address the vexed topic of stretching. In the  following three to five minutes of reading, I’ll tell you how the Dynamic Cyclist program  helped me enjoy cycling again even after two herniated discs. Minor spoiler: With the right routine and exercises it’s easy to do and also more  beneficial in the long run than aftercare. 

A Bit About Me 

I’m Felix, a multisports enthusiast with a passion for cycling, a love for  challenges, and adventure on the mind at all times. I have done performance oriented sports since childhood, however for me it is about so much more than pushing speed or distance. The most important  aspects for me are enjoying nature and  discovering new regions. Sports are about being a part of a like-minded community, sharing an experience, and the joy of working out in a group. Sports, especially cycling, form a connection! 

Herniated Disc Number Two 

So when I was forced to take a break and was limited to a five kilometer radius around my house I felt pretty bleak. My endorphin levels nose dived like the stock market in 2008. During a period like this you need a strong partner by your side — so a thank you goes out to my  girlfriend, who put up with me during my second herniated disc and always encouraged me. 

So what happened? My morning routine during the Covid pandemic, winter months consisted of 10-15 minutes of freestyle stretching followed by a short HIIT session before work to get a little spritz for cycling. At the time I  had a lot going on at work and sat at my desk day in and day out (not always  ergonomically correct of course), but I believed that with my 10-15 minute stretch  program I would be fine. Apparently, that was not the case! As I found  out later: stretching is not just stretching. If that sounds confusing, bear with me here.  

It was a cool, gray morning in February 2021. On this particular morning I skipped the stretching program and went straight into HIIT and — bam — I went down. After being falsely diagnosed with a blockage I decided to stop training for a while only to be diagnosed with a slipped disc a few weeks down the road. Unfortunately, at the age of 28, this was already my second slipped disc. This was the absolute last warning shot for me.  Something had to change urgently!

Dynamic Cyclist – It’s a Match! 

After being frustrated with myself for not learning from the first herniated disk, I  got my act together and looked into what I could change in the future in a  sustainable way so I could avoid another slipped disc. I had to approach the  whole thing from a holistic perspective. 

What did this involve for me? Acutely and also in the long term a good physio, of course. However, I also had  to change my own behaviour. In addition to a balanced diet this included active regeneration and stretching. My herniated disc is partially genetically inherited (one more reason to take preventive action). As luck would have it I  found the Dynamic Cyclist program. It was a match!  

Give Yourself a Break From the Daily Madness 

The first time I tried the program I was hooked by the concept and presentation. Dynamic Cyclist only includes the most important aspects of mobility and stretching without any unnecessary fluff. It has a logical structure and a stretch program that is designed to guide you through the process of gaining mobility and flexibility over time. I can confirm that it does not get boring. I can easily find where I left off in the program from my home screen and the exercises have become my daily routine. Now my 15 minutes of stretching each day is  more efficiently invested than before my herniated disc. So it is  not the time that matters most, but the selection of the right  exercises and the logical sequence they are performed in. I enjoy the videos so much that some days I  even complete two videos, especially after cycling when my hip flexors are tight. This is another great aspect:  you can easily find the relevant cycling “pain points”  within the app and therefore work areas that compromise your mobility. 

Vary Your Training and Discover New Ways 

I have yet to find a comparable program that is as strong in content as Dynamic  Cyclist, both in depth and breadth. In addition to the Stretching & Mobility  portion, there are numerous other training focuses you can use in the app such  as Strength Training, Roll & Release, or Challenges. Before I found Dynamic Cyclist I found stretching boring, but necessary for me to continue doing my sport in a performance-oriented  way. With Dynamic Cyclist I feel I am at the leading edge again. Everything is more fun with good instruction! In person instruction is nice, but you are much more likely to take 15 minutes and stretch efficiently through an online video program than drag yourself to your local yoga studio every single day. I’m glad I found Dynamic Cyclist. It has a permanent place in my daily  routine and should be considered by everyone who loves to ride. 

Written by Felix Rähmer – Endurance Cyclist

Community Feature: Meet Anne Riesling

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Anne is a former Equestrian turned cyclist on a mission to connect with others all over the world and inspire them to conquer their innermost dreams. Anne is currently training for two ambitious road cycling events named the Cent Cols Challenge. She plans to conquer the 6-day, 1,152kms, and 30,720m total climbing ride in the Northern Alps in July 2022 and the 10-day, 1,865kms, 47,620kms in the Pyrenees in September 2022.

Anne deeply believes in the power of human connection and began sharing her cycling journey through social media. Anne has a passion for story-telling, and by sharing her humble journey to the Cent Cols Challenge, Anne hopes to encourage others to also go after their personal, professional, and athletic dreams.

She wants to make the sport of cycling more inclusive and one which celebrates all levels of cyclists. Anne is a woman who is truly invigorated by making those around her better so that they can be their most expansive selves and be able to contribute to the world in a meaningful way. She has found that cycling has brought a myriad of benefits into her life from increasing her physical health, mental strength, and has had the opportunity to form deep and meaningful connections through sport.

Join Anne on her journey as she shares her heart and adventures through her profile on Instagram: @itsanneries and stay tuned for another post on her training load and how recovery (and Dynamic Cyclist) is an integral part of her training program!

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