Liverpool's Leeuwenhart: The eternal brain melt that is bicycle adjustments

Being a cyclist for as long as I have (15 long, wonderful and sometimes hard years) I have learnt the difficult art of bicycle fiddling. I remember when I was a youth rider, riding for the Liverpool Century Road Club. I’d go to Southport Victoria Park on the weekend to do the Dolan Cycle Series. The night before I’d eat as much pasta as my belly would take then after my tea I’d go in the garage get a tube of polish out of my dad's car cleaning bag (don’t tell him about it he still doesn’t know, he’s quite touchy over use of his car cleaning it, especially his cloths) and I'd give my bike a good buffing-up.

Then in all my infantile wisdom I’d try to fine tune the brake. Sure enough after an hour of fiddling I’d all but rendered my brakes completely useless and just about the time my dad got back from work I’d have to give him the shout that I dare say most fathers are familiar with: ‘Daaaaaad’. This is a universal sign for Dad to come and help because I’ve messed something up. Luckily for me my dad is a mechanic by trade and if he can’t fix it then it's just about unfixable (although my mother would disagree). Anyway my dad would first give me a dressing down because I’d taken his ‘best’ allen keys out of their holder and distributed them between my pockets, on top of the freezer and various other hiding places. Once all the allen keys here relocated we’d spend another hour mending the brakes and sure enough they were working just as good as they were before I went at them with the 5mm allen key.

I may have matured slightly, grown-up, graduated to the realm of ‘Mandom’. This is a place most young men eventually get to when their Dad finally gets sick of them misplacing their tools and slowly over time buys them the various tools that you never knew you needed, until you unwrap them from recycled wrapping paper each successive Christmas day until after several years you have a full tool kit complete with Bike measuring essentials: tape measure, spirit level, allen keys and the all important piece of string with a bolt on the bottom (apparently experts call this a plumb line).

Any mechanic who’s ever worked with me with probably tell you I’m a pain in the arse, because like a lot of cyclists (you know who you are!) I am eternally fiddling with my bike. Putting the saddle forward two millimetres, twisting my handle bars down by three degrees or turning my levers in that little tiny bit. I genuinely have nightmares about my saddle never being straight, no matter how many times I tap it left or right it's always that little bit out of centre.

Anyway the reason I’m telling you all this is because I’ve just arrived in Norway today for the Tour of Norway (obviously!) And I spent most of yesterday measuring my training bike at home with all of my finest tools (string with heavy bolt and everything!), so that I could turn up here and get my race bike perfectly dialled-in. After a good 35 minutes of tinkering (and a few metaphorical calls for ‘Daaad’ that were answered by the team mechanic) I sat on my bike and felt as it should. Well nearly. I had to make one last adjustment and twist my handlebars down a little bit 5 minutes up the road, but after that it was perfect… Well at least perfect enough till the next time I think too long about it or go a few days without stretching.

It takes years to perfect. You never know true misery until your brake levers are a different height or one of your cleats it twisted just that fraction of a degree too much out of line. But without enduring the unhappiness of an ill-adjusted bike fit or setup, there are few better feelings than getting on your bike and it feeling completely at one with your extremities.

Arite, there are probably a few better feelings but it's a pretty good feeling either way.

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