Hobie Cat Forums

Dewatto Beach to Scenic Beach on the Hood Canal.
No wind so we had to peddle the whole way.
With out the Torqeedo Motor and an extra battery
my poor old knees would have been sore today
Thank you Steve.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=po2NBqjisuk

Beautiful video and sublime scenery LBYak. I didn't know Camp Grenada was up that way (sorry Ponchielli). Very timely with everyone debating the best placement of the new Hobie motor.

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Glorious scenery and tasteful selection of background music.
All good for the soul

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Mickey
2011 AI Golden Papaya
2011 TI Golden Papaya

Thank you. Very well done.

As a Recumbent Cyclist, which means sitting in the same position as an AI, I know that Knee Pain usually only occurs when the leg-length is incorrect for the pedaller.

There should only be a slight angle in your knee joint when your leg is fully extended, if it's not right you will awake in the middle of the night with knee pain, even just 3/4" too short/long can cause this.

Pain in the Front of your knee means the length is too short, pain behind the knee means its over-extending.
When setting up remember that measuring the leg-length on land is different from actual pedalling for a period, this is because you tend to "settle" in the seat and slide forward slightly over time which moves your hips closer to the pedals.

Another tip for comfort, try loosening the foot-strap so you can insert your foot in further and pedalling on the flat of your foot instead of the Ball, (toes), this reduces movement and strain on your ankle and reduces fatigue, also wear some kind of footwear that has some stiffness so the load is distributed evenly over your whole foot.
There is no real advantage in "Ball-Pedalling" unless you are in The Tour.

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Fair Skies, Max.

Nice adjustment description skymax. Mind if I use this is the MirageDrive FAQ?

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Matt Miller
Director of Parts and Accessory Sales
Hobie Cat USA

Like skymax says, I've also usually adjusted my pedal positionsby chosing the one where my knee is only slightly bent when the pedal is pushed forward as far as possible, and it has worked fine for me so far. I've also done this adjustment for others when they ride with me but my spouse, who is only 5' tall, has still complained of knee pain from time to time.

I think the reason is that adjusting the pedal position this way assumes that you'll use the full stroke length, and for a person with very short legs even having an almost fully extended leg in the bottom position might still result in the knee in the top position being to bent. The solution might thus be to simply adjust the pedals forward a notch and stop trying to pedal full length strokes. It would be the equivalent of changing crank arm length instead of saddle height on a bicycle

We haven't had the opportunity to try this in practice to see if it will alleviate the problem but it seems as it should work and it might be of interest to other people with the same problem.

Thanks for that LBYak, I really enjoyed it. Pretty impressed with your editing and would appreciate it if you could fill us in on the package that you used, I'm guessing Photoshop.

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Don't take life too seriously................it ain't permanent.