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With the state of my shoulder I’m currently unable to go out for decent length road rides. In fact, I’m not riding on the road at all. Consequently my fitness is at an all time low and I’ve stuck a load of weight on. In light of the impending winter and lockdown, I’m contemplating buying a wattbike to use with Trainer road and zwift.

Due to aforementioned shoulder I can’t ride a normal road position and need to have the bars really high. Does the Wattbike allow to for this? Anything I should keep an eye out for? Or any general opinions on them? I’m going to sell my road bikes as I just can’t get on with the position anymore and I fancy a change in the new year anyway so the sale of these will fund the purchase.

I am unable to answer your question about fit but wondered if you knew that you can hire a Watt bike before you buy. A month is £99 which sounds like a lot but it would go a long way to reassure you!

Think the wattbike atom tells you the max bat height on their website.

I’ve used the wattbike pro and they don’t go particularly high and if you are particularly tall then you end up in a really aggressive position with a massive saddle to bar drop.

A month is £99 which sounds like a lot but it would go a long way to reassure you!

Didn’t know that! Excellent work, I’ll look into hiring one then I think. Would be ideal to get me back up and riding properly.

I’ve used the wattbike pro and they don’t go particularly high and if you are particularly tall then you end up in a really aggressive position with a massive saddle to bar drop.

Not so good. Ok, I’ll have a look at what the maximum stack is – that’s the current limiting factor on me riding my road bikes

I have Atom and handlebar height is fairly well adjustable but it is worth noting that many use the TT bars a lot – they are maybe 5cm higher than actual handlebar. Shoulder issues might prevent that position though.

Can you try one in a gym or similar before you buy?

As an aside I found the Q-factor on the original Wattbike to be horribly wide – the Nuecleus is over 170mm and the Atom is 160mm.

Shimano road cranks are 146mm for reference.

Weirdly I can ride my boost MTB ok, guessing it’s because I run flat pedals and can move feet freely.

Used to use one in the gym, didn’t really like the ergonomics myself – deffo try before you buy.

Also didn’t like seeing how feeble my power output was – but that’s probably not the bike’s fault.

Some pics and a video to give you an idea of the watt bike at max setting.
Also for a reference a pic of normal bar set up. My saddle is a tad low and the pedals lift the stack up about .5cm. I normally wear spd’s on the other side of the peddle.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/xrZtg6bkqyPB6Zkr8

If you want any other measurements let me know. I can get the tape measure out if it helps.

Thanks Woodster, that’s really appreciated. Going off that I think I should be ok – I’m a bit T-rex like with short arms and long legs so that combined with a bad shoulder doesn’t make for an easy fit!

Appreciate all the responses, think I need to try one before committing to the big spend!