Bicycles    +    (Bodies in motion)   =   Bicycle Fitting
    John Weirath, PT

    Athletic background:  

    I began running, biking and doing triathlons over 20 years ago.  I've competed in road racing, foot
    races up to 50K, triathlons (on and off-road) including a handful of Ironmans, and mountain bike
    races including a number of solo 24-hour races, and the Leadville 100 (in just under 9 hours
    thankfully).
       
    Education:  

    I was fortunate to get into physical therapy school at a young ago -- I was 19 years old at the time.  I
    attended The Chicago Medical School, and have now been a practicing physical therapist for over
    14 years, and have been doing bike fits for over 10 years.  

    Bike fitting:  

    This started with me helping friends with aches and pains.  When many of them had pain only when
    they were on the bike, or after a ride, it became a no-brainer to take a look at them on the bike.  I
    began reading everything I could about bike fitting, but found the information out there to be
    severely lacking.  There was too much "voodoo" involved.  Resigned to the fact that I was probably
    mostly on my own learning this, I just started doing basic fits for free.  Every fit I did, I learned
    something new.  Some small piece of the puzzle was added.  

    Why being a PT helps me as a bike fitter:

    I was also pleased to find that in my day job as a PT treating everyone from athletes to the elderly, I
    was able to "work the same diagnostic muscles" I needed to when doing a bike fit.  I was able to
    improve my bike fitting skills just by working every single day assessing complex biomechanical
    issues.  It reminds me of when I graduated from PT school, and a professor told me that it would
    take about 4 or 5 years before I felt like an expert.  And he was right.  (Visit this blog post to see why
    I think having about 5 years of intensive experience is needed -- I call it the "Malcolm Gladwell
    theory").  Only by doing something day in and day out and seeing all the variables and the possible
    outcomes (not just the ones that the books and research told you you'd see), could you become an
    expert in diagnosing and treating clients.


    Same thing goes for bike fitting; there is no substitute for the specificity of bike fitting -- if you want to
    get better at bike fitting you have to do them..... a lot.

    Interests:  

    I love to read, ride, and run.  But most of all, I am a homebody at heart and love spending weekends
    with my wife Kari, and son, Samuel.
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