/RANT
I’m having some misgivings about the F-GT lite seat now. IMO, it’s nowhere near as easy as they make out to readjust it. Partially this is because I have my seat in quite a small space (to be fair, it was an ok space with the old chair, but this thing is gigantic) so I can’t just walk around to either side and unlock hubs in a relaxed manner, I have to reach across awkwardly to unlock everything and then try and grab all the loose elements of the seat with all 6 of my hands in case it collapses as I try and adjust, say, the backrest without moving the back legs. Because the thing is so damn heavy, if it all goes wrong, it goes badly wrong and you have to spend a lot of energy trying to get back to where you were.
I’ve been trying to find a good position where my arms aren’t fully extended on the wheel, which in turn should allow me to react better. The consensus seems to be that if you can rest your wrists on top of the steering wheel in a relaxed manner then you’re good to go. That way you shouldn’t really have to use any of the larger muscle groups to move the wheel, it’s all low effort, quick reaction stuff. I wanted to do this because I noticed I was actually physically shifting my torso to move the wheel to its extent, which is tiring and slow, which is why I wanted to just quickly (HA!) try a different position.
It’s taken me an hour and a half of tears and sweat to get it where I want it, and I’m not likely to want to do that again in a hurry. There’s no way I could easily fold that thing up again after I finished racing and certainly wouldn’t find it easy to find the right position again if I had to. IMO, despite it’s flexibilty, each notch on the hub moves its respective elements about twice as far as I want. So finding a good position often involves shifting the back too far, and then shifting the feet, wheels and pedal positions to compensate.
Don’t forget you have to get in the seat with wheel attached; and the wheel bar doesn’t open all the way, to test the position, then extract yourself when it isn’t right and go again. I’ve found it super frustrating.
There’s is one other factor; which is my neuro issues, which I would make some allowances for, but I’ve been walking, doing VR workouts, and recently I’ve started doing relatively strenuous kettlebell workouts as well. I’m no stranger to hard physical work. I understand what it means to make an effort. Yet none of those things has triggered a flare-up in me. Adjusting that bloody chair has.
With all that said. All the things that have made moving it around a pain, are what make it a real pleasure to drive in. It’s really solid. Now that I have the position I like, I’m very comfortable due to its adjustability. And I don’t overheat because it has a mesh back. I just think they’ve vastly oversold the whole “simply and easily go from F1 position to GT position” and the whole easy-to-pack away thing is not entirely true.
If I had the luxury of buying again, I’d buy the next playseat up. The one with the actual car seat. I’ve ended up with something I’m not going to fold away anyway.
