Originally Posted by Doug Fattic

Lbxpdx, let me give you my impressions of your bike and fit as a fitter/builder/painter/teacher. It is possible to make almost any bike work by swapping out posts and stems until a position is found to make it ridable. You could do a lot better with a different frame. Your trouble starts with your 74º/74º angles. Let me explain. Your high handlebar position shows you prefer a comfort or "gentleman's fit". In other words your bike position goal is to ride comfortably instead of trying to get another mile per hour faster on your regular bike route. On the other hand performance 1st riders want to be sure they are as aerodynamic and biomechanically efficient as possible and are willing to sacrifice comfort to achieve speed. That usually means they have a lot of distance drop between the height of their seat and their handlebars.

The amount of drop is related to seat angle. The more the handlebar drop, the steeper the seat angle should be. The higher the handlebars the swallower the seat angle needs to be. If we take it to the extremes a tri bike has a really steep seat angle and a Dutch style bike with upright handlebars has a very swallow seat angle. A 74 parallel frame is a copy of a criterium bicycle where the racer is almost always in the drops going fast in circles. I don't think that is the kind of riding you are doing. This kind of design was popular some years ago in the States when they were marketing to the go fast crowd. Races in the States tended to be crits instead of long road races where a different geometry is preferred.

If you were placed on a fitting bike that didn't restrict your saddle's fore/aft position, you would discover that there is a point going rearward where your body became balanced over the pedals. This more rearward saddle position magically takes the strain of holding up your body with your forearms and hands off of the handlebars. It is much more comfortable. However you also need to raise your handlebars when your saddle goes rearward.

I think it is possible that your tilted seat is related to an attempt to take your body weight off of your hands. What I recommend is ditching the bike you have and looking for a frame that has more relaxed angles like 72º/72º angles that can position your saddle much more reward. Your 74º seat angle will always be a problem. You will also want to look for a frame that is as big as you can comfortably straddle . That results in less stem length sticking out above the head tube. That isn't a performance difference but less stem extension doesn't look as out of proportion.