Knee Pain

and get lost on your way home.

Actually went the correct route this week.. Thanks to riding with Fred..

i may be wrong but i thought a plumb line dropped from the leading knee should hit the pedal axle when the cranks are horizontal, and i go with the old "knee straight, heel on the pedal at the bottom of the stroke, so when the ball of the foot is in the normal riding position the knee is neither over-stretched nor too bent" thing. seems to work for me. also, i find it takes at least a fortnight to settle in to a new bike so i woulnt make too many changes unless its proper 'sore' as opposed to just 'uncomfortable'.

i may be wrong but i thought a plumb line dropped from the leading knee should hit the pedal axle when the cranks are horizontal, and i go with the old "knee straight, heel on the pedal at the bottom of the stroke.

the plumb line trick sets the aaddle position... i.e. fore aft movement, the heel on the pedal isn't ideal as different shoes have different sized heels, you are looking for a 25-30 degree bend in the knee, which is hard to guess, so you ideally need a protractor type thing (sorry forgot it's proper name) to measure properly

yeah, hadnt relly considered that. still, seems to have worked ok so far. also, i usually drop it an inch or so for off-road so theres more room to move arond the bike which is presumably less important on a road type bike?

I've started riding a fixed track bike (Fuji Track) on Wednesday. I commute like 15 minutes in the morning and after work home. I realised I have pain in the knees when I try to pedal hard and start getting speed.

I think my posture/frame size/seat height is quite ok. I ride a 48/15 (fuji std.) ratio. Is this too high for a beginner?

For a 15 minute commute... YES.

very high ratio,try 48/18

or try a 48/19 lot's of skid patches

I ride that too - no knee pain, but it's definitely unhelpfully high. What pedals are you using? I use Crank Bros which have an absurd amount of float, which I suspect helps - I wouldn't want to use the Look Deltas I use on my road bikes, for example.

I use the Wellgo from the Fuji Track stock :)

They're caged and I tried to fit them properly to my feet.

Try spds, again loads of float.

I run 47:16 and tbh that's overgeared for around town with all the stopping and starting.

Well, I think I have to add that the "pain" (it's a weird feeling) is on the inner side of the knee (the side to the frame - on the right knee the left side and vise versa) and it goes slightly up to the thighs

Seriously - put on a lower gear than you need and go a little slower / spin faster. The pain will go and you'll do a lot to improve flexibility in the knees.

I have a similarly short commute, I concur with what everyone else has said wayyyy too high a gear, I personally favour and use 44-18

As has already been said, that is an extremely high gear ratio.

If youve got 15 on the back, you want something like 39-42 on the front for an urban commute.

I run 39:15 , do mostly shortish city riding. Am able to spin down steep hills just fine.

For longer rides I flip wheel to 39:16

Your ratio is definitely too high, but the knee pain isn't necessarily something to worry about. If it's in the same place on each knee, then it may just be your legs adjusting to a new type of excercise (fixed is subtly different to bikes with a freewheel).

I had minor complaints from my knees at first, even with a low ratio. It went after a short while. but then again I am lucky enough to be in the limber years of my youth.

Also, another example - I recently started skidding with my weak foot forward, and that gave me knee pain in my left (weak) foot for a week or two, while it adjusted to the new strains that skidding puts on my muscles.

As Chug_it would say- pain is just weakness leaving your body.

HTFU!

44-18 ftw!!!!

Innit George, fo sho!

46x14 FTW tomorrow morning, but that's for a 40 mile cruise out to a 25 mile time-trial, and then a 40 mile cruise back home again... with tri-bars.

98rpm FTMFH :)

When I started riding fixed I got knee pain & aches (at night, strangely). After a few weeks they went and I've got muscles in all sorts of places on my legs I never knew you could get muscles.

Personally I'm happy with the standard-issue Fuji Track gear ratio - I've got quicker on my starts and I'm not spinning too much when I get to go fast. (But I freely admit I don't know any better either!)

http://www.londonfgss.com/search.php?searchid=2267859

sounds like quite a high ratio to me

what about your position on the bike - what's it like?

are you knees over the pedal spindle at the front of the stroke?

are you sitting far back enough?

Maybe I'm too close to the handlebar with the seat position, I'm gonna try another setting tomorrow