Bicycle Fitting

A few weeks ago, I sent an email out to Sarah and Stu at Parvilla Cycle looking for ride sponsorship for my Bike & Build trip.  Despite being booked up through April 1st for bicycle fittings, Stu was kind enough to squeeze me in for a static bicycle fitting today at their shop in Edgewater, MD.

Just one-half of the giant Parvilla Cycle & Multisport store

I went in today for my fitting and was immediately blown away by the variety and professionalism of their shop!  I've been to the local Bike Doctor and to my favorite outdoor shops EMS, REI, and HTO (why do they all go by their three-letter abbreviations?), but none of them could touch this place in terms of the high quality gear selection offered.  Since "getting into" road biking for Bike & Buld, I've spent far too much time in researching different products and trying to figure out what would stand the test of time on a long trip and I'll tell you that they feature only the top of the line stuff, not necessarily in price but certainly in quality.

Stu, a co-owner of Parvilla C&M and my bicycle fitter today

When I arrived, Stu had me join him in the back of the store in the bicycle fitting room.  He already had a bicycle trainer out and ready for my bike to be mounted up, so while I went to get changed for the fitting (yep, I had to wear my actual gear... blue jeans were not going to cut it), he got the bike all ready for me to hop on and take it for a spin.  When I first got my bike a few weeks and 50 miles ago, I initially used the free online Competitive Cyclist bicycle sizing tool to get my bike set up roughly to my body size, which seemed to work alright, but I never was that comfortable on it.  I assumed that the unusual and uncomfortable posture was just part of road biking... boy, was I wrong (the unusual posture is normal though)!  Stu showed me, on my own bike, how I had the saddle set at least 3 inches too low, my handlebars were pointed downward too much, and my seat was tipped up by the nose by at least 3 degrees too much.  By fixing my seat and handlebars, he set the bike to cradle my body instead of trying to ditch it off.  While we went through the fitting process (maybe took a half hour?), Stu had me pedal the bicycle under light and full load to watch the motion of my legs to make sure that they were doing what they should.  His attention to detail was fantastic, even going far enough to ask me about any medical issues that might necessitate a different riding posture on the trip.

GURU Dynamic Fit Bike

Bear in mind that this was a static fitting, which Parvilla does not actually offer any more.  These days, the shop offers custom 3D dynamic motion capture fittings on the micro-adjustable GURU dynamic fit bike to make sure that every athlete can get the most out of his/her race bike.  It is obvious that business is doing very well for the company, based on the number of people coming and going while I was there and that Stu is booked on the dynamic fittings for at least another month.  Again I'll applaud their shop for being so kind to squeeze me in for the static fitting, which was much simpler and quicker than the dynamic fitting (which can take a couple hours) and worked quite well for this non-racer.  All in all said, I'm much happier with my bike now and I look forward to cranking out those miles!  Cheers to you, Parvilla Cycle & Multisport! :)

And thank you to my roommate Katey for another impromptu photo shoot!