Saddle height. Too high = Achilles problems.

[Dave_C]

For a few years I have got on fine with my saddle height. Slight soreness on rides over a 1000km but nothing a liberal application of Sudacream did not help with.

In Feb I moved my audax bike's seat post over to an MTB temporarily as I was building a new bike and it fitted. Moving it back I did not notice the saddle was ~9cm higher than my commuter (same size frame & crank arms). I rode a DIY 600 with a set of tri bars and made good use of them. No I'll results all round (heatstroke excepted).

Then later that month I rode a hilly 300 and the result was injured right Achilles. Months off the bike, I thought I'd sorted it out, but a 400 proved my wrong in both Achilles.

Googling I found seat height to be the problem. A left over piece of tape marking the wrong (MTB) seat height was the culprit.

I proved this a week ago on a 200 with no I'll affects.

So my question is, what do riders do on long rides, 500km+ if you use tribars, what do you do with your seat height. Or am I looking at the wrong bit, do you use longer stems, or somehow push your tribars forward??

Cheers.

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[Frank9755]

Using aerobars (or drops) is likely to put more strain on your achilles than riding on the hoods / tops as you are putting more of a stretch down the back of your body. 

I have had achilles pains after a few days on long rides (TCR, IndyPac) and have got relief by dropping my saddle a bit. 

For a pure TT bike you might go for a longer stem and / or shunt your seat forward, but that wouldn't work for a multi-day ride; you'd have too much weight on your hands and shoulders.  It's actually more common amongst ultra-riders to fit a shorter stem when adding aerobars.

[Asterix, the former Gaul.]

When you say '~9cm higher', that's a big difference.  My saddle heights are all very carefully set up within millimetres.  If I get a saddle too high it's a hamstring that complains first - I have a lot of flexibility in the achilles area as years ago I read about 'ankling' and have been a dedicated ankler ever since.  I have never used tri-bars tho' as I am quite happy on the drops.

[vorsprung]

of course there is an expensive gadget solution

https://redshiftsports.com/dual-position-seatpost

In my case I have quite high handlebars with shallow drops, and "comfort" tri bars.  Seems to work fine as a package.  See https://audaxing.wordpress.com/2017/04/23/tri-bar-setup/