Australian Cycling Forums - Bicycles Network Australia

Hi All. 2008 Optima Lynxx/Orca has to go(Damn it) I've found another mountain y. I got to admit coal trucks doing 100kmph and narrow verges are not a good mix.
I am informed it was an impetuous purchase anyway, The bike is brand new, ridden less than a dozen times and still has hair on the tyres.
The reference to the Lynxx/Orca was one of Ians brain farts. My receipt says Lynxx, The bike spec is Lynxx but the badge says Orca. I haven't noticed it slowing me down at all.
If your interested PM me. Bike is in Newcastle.
Cheers Rog

The Optima now has a new home. Was a pleasure doing business with Rog. I have to agree with him about the road riding conditions where he lives - despite overlooking and having lovely views of Lake Macquarie, the roads around his very nice house are indeed rather narrow and fairly heavily trafficked by fast-moving vehicles.

The Optima is a lovely bike in the metal - clearly a very well-resolved design, furnished with good-quality but not extravagant components. Lots of potential for upgrades in due course, and as needs dictate. Now all I have to do is learn to ride it... have successfully ridden in circles and figure-eights on some local basketball courts yesterday evening, but clearly quite a lot of practice is needed before venturing out on the roads. Intention is to use it for weekend day-tours on quiet (semi-) rural roads for a while, and then start to commute on it - about 30 kms each way from Epping to Ultimo in Sydney, via Sydney Harbour Bridge. I do that about twice a week on my flat-bar commuter now, but it is at the limit of the endurance of my lower back (injured in a car accident when I was younger and more stupid).

Will put up pictures when I have made enough posts to be allowed to. I'd better think up some questions to ask...

BB

Second successful ride around quiet back streets, even up some hills. You really need to relax your upper body and lean back, and then it works. Tense up and it wobbles all over the place. But on just my second ride, I was doing circuits. But will be while before I feel even mildly confident, I suspect. I can see that uphill starts are going to be very challenging...

I've seen guys on these bikes rest with one hand on the ground and both feet still clipped in. That might be a way to get those hill-starts working for you.

Cheers,
Graeme

Kalgrm wrote:I've seen guys on these bikes rest with one hand on the ground and both feet still clipped in. That might be a way to get those hill-starts working for you.

Err, the bike is not that low, nor are my arms that long, despite my ape ancestors (note my avatar). I think that reducing the inertia will help to make uphill starts easier, and alas there is a great deal of unnecessary mass in the rider at present.

I always wondered how much learning was involved in riding a recumbent. It surely doesn't look very natural.

Let us know how the learning goes

T.

I always get a smile out of that question/statement. I mean, how natural is it to be bent forward travelling at 40km/h with your torso horizontal and a plastic wedge inserted between your legs?

There is nothing "natural" about riding any bike (we didn't evolve with a bike between our legs) but there is certainly a familiarisation associated with conventional bikes. Surely the statement should read "It doesn't look like what I'm used to riding", in which case that's definitely true. If 'bents were the most common form of bike (yeah, right! ), people riding double diamond frame bikes would be getting the same "that's unnatural" comments.

Cheers,
Graeme

thomashouseman wrote:I always wondered how much learning was involved in riding a recumbent. It surely doesn't look very natural. Let us know how the learning goes
T.

For a couch potato like me, reclining at about 40 degrees with my feet up is a very natural position indeed.

I am told that riding any bike at low speed, until gyroscope forces start to provide stability, is an exercise in continuously corrected toppling. Walking and running are much the same, and thus humans are very good at such continuous correction when upright, but your cerebellum has to relearn how to do it when reclined. Also, the lower you are, the smaller the rotational moment that the inner ear has to detect to determine which way you are falling, and thus the lower the recumbent, the trickier it is to balance at low speed. At least that is one theory, but it seems plausible, and there is anecdotal evidence in practice to support it.

I'm going to go for a short ride every evening in order to grow the necessary neural connections in my cerebellum.

bennelong.bicyclist wrote:

thomashouseman wrote:I always wondered how much learning was involved in riding a recumbent. It surely doesn't look very natural. Let us know how the learning goes
T.

For a couch potato like me, reclining at about 40 degrees with my feet up is a very natural position indeed.

I am told that riding any bike at low speed, until gyroscope forces start to provide stability, is an exercise in continuously corrected toppling. Walking and running are much the same, and thus humans are very good at such continuous correction when upright, but your cerebellum has to relearn how to do it when reclined. Also, the lower you are, the smaller the rotational moment that the inner ear has to detect to determine which way you are falling, and thus the lower the recumbent, the trickier it is to balance at low speed. At least that is one theory, but it seems plausible, and there is anecdotal evidence in practice to support it.

I'm going to go for a short ride every evening in order to grow the necessary neural connections in my cerebellum.

Isn't a diamond frame road bike or TT riders head at a similar low angle to horizontal?
I think riding a recumbent is more to do with built in bike stability, rider reference points and different steering/balancing techniques than anything else.

bradwoodbr wrote:Isn't a diamond frame road bike or TT riders head at a similar low angle to horizontal?

They aren't horizontal when starting off or riding at low speed. As the speed increases, gyroscopic forces provide a degree of innate stability in just about any bike. It is when riding at or below walking pace that your inner ear and cerebellum really need to work hard in order for you to keep your balance, and the ability to do that while reclined with your head only a meter or less above the ground needs to be learned - it is intrinsically more difficult than with you head upright and 1.5 metres or more above the ground. But far from impossible - I was able to ride my new recumbent first go with essentially no previous experience (well, a 10 minute ride on a Bacchetta about three years ago), albeit still with quite a few wobbles, but I haven't fallen off once, well, not yet away.

bennelong.bicyclist wrote:

bradwoodbr wrote:Isn't a diamond frame road bike or TT riders head at a similar low angle to horizontal?

They aren't horizontal when starting off or riding at low speed. As the speed increases, gyroscopic forces provide a degree of innate stability in just about any bike. It is when riding at or below walking pace that your inner ear and cerebellum really need to work hard in order for you to keep your balance, and the ability to do that while reclined with your head only a meter or less above the ground needs to be learned - it is intrinsically more difficult than with you head upright and 1.5 metres or more above the ground. But far from impossible - I was able to ride my new recumbent first go with essentially no previous experience (well, a 10 minute ride on a Bacchetta about three years ago), albeit still with quite a few wobbles, but I haven't fallen off once, well, not yet away.

Oh, Ok at take off or low speed. I checked out what I do and I tend to instinctively sit up a bit or lean forward enough to take any weight off the back of the seat.
If it is a quick take off up to speed then I pretty much have my back fully pressed against the seat.