Why the pros are slowing down.

On Jul 26, 2:46*pm, Frank Krygowski
wrote:
DirtRoadie wrote:

The article is best read as a whole including the subjective portion
to help understand the context.

In other words, you want people to only pay attention to the "Gee whiz,
I sure like the feel of new stuff!" *IOW: *Forget the data!! Buy what's
advertised!!

Not much "tech" in that attitude.

Well... if the riders didn't have to shift, in a short uphill "drag
race", of course there's no advantage to having more gears or
handlebar shifting, cable or even looking toward the future when
everyone will be using "electric". Well, not *everyone* will be using
button shifting, of course.

Stiffness? Well (again), maybe stiffness per se isn't so important if
you're talking the difference between the Pinarello and the Lapierre,
where it might be important if you comparing a flexy-flier alu or ti
bike from the ancient past. But that is only on the uphill.

Let me say that again: that's only on the uphill. Did every single
rider (racer) in the test bust on the Pinarello for its comparably
poor handling at speed, especially downhill?
Including one racer from this group, Thibault Pinot, who won a tough
Stage 8 (seven climbs with a difficult final uphill) in this year's
Tour de France...?

I mean, even as a much younger rider, Mr. Pinot seems to have had some
expertise. He's got a pretty good list in his early palmares, too. You
could look him up.

I noted the one side of beef sprinter dude (180lbs!!!) didn't complain
about the flex with the Pinarello. Roughly 30 lbs. heavier than the
average for the group. Sounds like he has a smooth pedaling style g.

That leads to an observation: the test was only 3 km and on a 7.2%
grade. That's short, and pretty shallow, too. A snapshot, and since we
don't have robots riding the bikes (which would be the only way to
control power input to the bike), it's just a snapshot. And they used
two different power meters-- calibration?

I could say that in a race such as the Tour de France, this data would
very quickly fade into the noise, while those forced to ride
Pinarellos would be far, far behind on the Champs, at the conclusion
of the race. Well, I wouldn't risk life and limb trying to keep up on
the descents with racers on good-handling bikes. Make that "bikes with
far superior handling and far superior braking power and modulation".
And "Lots more gear combinations, wider range, vastly superior
shifting both in speed and precision".
Not to mention the danger involved in having to take a hand off the
bars to shift in the pack-- how many more would have fallen in that
first crash-filled week of the Tour, had they not brifters?

Dang, those racer dudes who spend the bucks to get bikes that work
better are looking smarter and smarter as I go along here.

If you're not racing, who cares? Ride what you like for whatever
reasons might apply, and be happy!
I mean, that seems like a much better use of precious time on Earth,
compared to cherry-picking suspect "data" from a rather informal road
test and using it to try to prove some kind of unsustainable point--
such as "Racing bicycles have not actually improved functionally in
the last 25 years".

I forget how long it's been since I asked-- if ever-- but Frank, have
you ridden a current-issue road bike? Say, a nice brushed titanium
frame (no paint to fall off and no rust if it did have paint to fall
off, but it's still made of metal), and perhaps a step back in
technology to the quite mature 10 speed platform? Say, something
Campagnolo, with the later, improved brifter internals that you can
still work on if needed?

I'm asking because it doesn't sound like you have-- and maybe you
should. And not just a 3 km ride up a 7.2% grade, either.

Sure, I could probably still slap-shift a double on a DT-shifter bike,
at least with a little warm-up, and I remember how to tighten the D-
ring on the right side before starting up a hill, and I can bend brake
arms to stop squeal, and I guess I could still squeeze an old-
fashioned brake lever hard enough to get stopped in an emergency, and
I still have a couple of old rear wheels around so I could easily swap
out to juggle gear ratios to some extent, at least, depending on the
ride plan (etc. etc.) but the point is, I don't have to do any of that
stuff anymore.

So far, my budget and Scot sense of monetary propriety has prevented
me from owning cf. But I have ridden cf. The ti and steel (!!! my
climber bike with the Triple on it) bikes I have are just fine, but
I'm not kidding myself or worse, sour-graping (sour cherry-picking?)
the better-performing material.
--D-y

On 27/07/12 06:25, thirty-six wrote:
On Jul 24, 9:17 pm, Frank
wrote:


(At least, until "Newton's Law of Stiff But Compliant" is discovered.)

How about a variable stiffness rear triangle chosen (two or three
settings) according to cadence and effort?

Frank should try riding a full suspension downhill MTB out of the
saddle. Pushing on a pogo stick with a damper is not good for powering
the back wheel.

--
JS.

wrote:
On Jul 26, 2:46 pm, Frank
wrote:
DirtRoadie wrote:

The article is best read as a whole including the subjective portion
to help understand the context.

In other words, you want people to only pay attention to the "Gee whiz,
I sure like the feel of new stuff!" IOW: Forget the data!! Buy what's
advertised!!

Not much "tech" in that attitude.

Well... if the riders didn't have to shift, in a short uphill "drag
race", of course there's no advantage to having more gears or
handlebar shifting, cable or even looking toward the future when
everyone will be using "electric". Well, not *everyone* will be using
button shifting, of course.

Stiffness? Well (again), maybe stiffness per se isn't so important if
you're talking the difference between the Pinarello and the Lapierre,
where it might be important if you comparing a flexy-flier alu or ti
bike from the ancient past. But that is only on the uphill.

Let me say that again: that's only on the uphill. Did every single
rider (racer) in the test bust on the Pinarello for its comparably
poor handling at speed, especially downhill?
Including one racer from this group, Thibault Pinot, who won a tough
Stage 8 (seven climbs with a difficult final uphill) in this year's
Tour de France...?

I mean, even as a much younger rider, Mr. Pinot seems to have had some
expertise. He's got a pretty good list in his early palmares, too. You
could look him up.

I noted the one side of beef sprinter dude (180lbs!!!) didn't complain
about the flex with the Pinarello. Roughly 30 lbs. heavier than the
average for the group. Sounds like he has a smooth pedaling styleg.

That leads to an observation: the test was only 3 km and on a 7.2%
grade. That's short, and pretty shallow, too. A snapshot, and since we
don't have robots riding the bikes (which would be the only way to
control power input to the bike), it's just a snapshot. And they used
two different power meters-- calibration?

Well, I suppose we could say that perhaps the test wasn't sufficient to
demonstrate the benefits of any feature but reduced weight.

What's odd about that is that then, we've got to disagree with the
writers of the magazine, the designers of the test, and the guys who
rode the bikes. That's the crew that set the entire thing up, and when
they (and the magazine's owners) started shelling out money to do this
test, you can bet they were sure it would be valid. And when
publication time came around, they weree convinced that they'd really
proven something!

I think a lot of people underestimate the effort needed to do a good job
on things like this. There must have been no small effort involved in
just acquiring the bikes (esp. the Pinarello with NOS equipment) and the
power meters and the riders and the test location, etc. etc.

But really, isn't it sort of a matter of faith to say a longer, more
thorough test would demonstrate tremendous benefit that didn't appear in
this test? Based on these results, we really don't know that.

If we really wanted a more thorough test, I guess we could look at the
speed data from, say, some classic pro race that's been run over the
same route year after year, and see how much its speed has increased
over the decades.

Oh wait... we did that, didn't we? ;-)

(And what was the title of this thread again?)

--
- Frank Krygowski

Op 27-7-2012 5:26, Frank Krygowski schreef:


Oh wait... we did that, didn't we? ;-)

(And what was the title of this thread again?)

First there is talent,
then training/nutricion,
after that medical 'enhancemments',
and last equipment.

To test equipment you have to make the first three equal and over the
years that is not possible with the third valuable in the equation.

Lou

On 27/07/12 13:26, Frank Krygowski wrote:
wrote:
On Jul 26, 2:46 pm, Frank
wrote:
DirtRoadie wrote:

The article is best read as a whole including the subjective portion
to help understand the context.

In other words, you want people to only pay attention to the "Gee whiz,
I sure like the feel of new stuff!" IOW: Forget the data!! Buy what's
advertised!!

Not much "tech" in that attitude.

Well... if the riders didn't have to shift, in a short uphill "drag
race", of course there's no advantage to having more gears or
handlebar shifting, cable or even looking toward the future when
everyone will be using "electric". Well, not *everyone* will be using
button shifting, of course.

Stiffness? Well (again), maybe stiffness per se isn't so important if
you're talking the difference between the Pinarello and the Lapierre,
where it might be important if you comparing a flexy-flier alu or ti
bike from the ancient past. But that is only on the uphill.

Let me say that again: that's only on the uphill. Did every single
rider (racer) in the test bust on the Pinarello for its comparably
poor handling at speed, especially downhill?
Including one racer from this group, Thibault Pinot, who won a tough
Stage 8 (seven climbs with a difficult final uphill) in this year's
Tour de France...?

I mean, even as a much younger rider, Mr. Pinot seems to have had some
expertise. He's got a pretty good list in his early palmares, too. You
could look him up.

I noted the one side of beef sprinter dude (180lbs!!!) didn't complain
about the flex with the Pinarello. Roughly 30 lbs. heavier than the
average for the group. Sounds like he has a smooth pedaling styleg.

That leads to an observation: the test was only 3 km and on a 7.2%
grade. That's short, and pretty shallow, too. A snapshot, and since we
don't have robots riding the bikes (which would be the only way to
control power input to the bike), it's just a snapshot. And they used
two different power meters-- calibration?

Well, I suppose we could say that perhaps the test wasn't sufficient to
demonstrate the benefits of any feature but reduced weight.

I'm surprised it took you this long to reach a conclusion I'm sure many
others had reached long ago.

But hang on, didn't all the riders say the old leather saddle was more
comfortable? Is comfort a measurable thing?

Come to think of it, how do you measure handling? Is there a
handling-o-meter you can use to measure it? No, of course not, we have
to rely on feed back from people using it. I think that is what they
tried to do.

How on earth can we make decisions when we have to rely on peoples
feelings about stuff, and not measured values? Heaven forbid.

What's odd about that is that then, we've got to disagree with the
writers of the magazine, the designers of the test, and the guys who
rode the bikes. That's the crew that set the entire thing up, and when
they (and the magazine's owners) started shelling out money to do this
test, you can bet they were sure it would be valid. And when publication
time came around, they weree convinced that they'd really proven something!

BS. Straw.

I think a lot of people underestimate the effort needed to do a good job
on things like this. There must have been no small effort involved in
just acquiring the bikes (esp. the Pinarello with NOS equipment) and the
power meters and the riders and the test location, etc. etc.

You need someone to pay for it.

But really, isn't it sort of a matter of faith to say a longer, more
thorough test would demonstrate tremendous benefit that didn't appear in
this test? Based on these results, we really don't know that.

For those who have actually used the old and the new, they can probably
decide for themselves, and don't need study results to prove anything.
The only ones who seem to need proof are those that don't have experience.

--
JS.

On 7/26/2012 6:58 PM, wrote:
On Jul 26, 2:46 pm, Frank
wrote:
DirtRoadie wrote:

The article is best read as a whole including the subjective portion
to help understand the context.
In other words, you want people to only pay attention to the "Gee whiz,
I sure like the feel of new stuff!" IOW: Forget the data!! Buy what's
advertised!!

Not much "tech" in that attitude.
Well... if the riders didn't have to shift, in a short uphill "drag
race", of course there's no advantage to having more gears or
handlebar shifting, cable or even looking toward the future when
everyone will be using "electric". Well, not *everyone* will be using
button shifting, of course.

Stiffness? Well (again), maybe stiffness per se isn't so important if
you're talking the difference between the Pinarello and the Lapierre,
where it might be important if you comparing a flexy-flier alu or ti
bike from the ancient past. But that is only on the uphill.

Let me say that again: that's only on the uphill. Did every single
rider (racer) in the test bust on the Pinarello for its comparably
poor handling at speed, especially downhill?
Including one racer from this group, Thibault Pinot, who won a tough
Stage 8 (seven climbs with a difficult final uphill) in this year's
Tour de France...?

I mean, even as a much younger rider, Mr. Pinot seems to have had some
expertise. He's got a pretty good list in his early palmares, too. You
could look him up.

I noted the one side of beef sprinter dude (180lbs!!!) didn't complain
about the flex with the Pinarello. Roughly 30 lbs. heavier than the
average for the group. Sounds like he has a smooth pedaling styleg.

That leads to an observation: the test was only 3 km and on a 7.2%
grade. That's short, and pretty shallow, too. A snapshot, and since we
don't have robots riding the bikes (which would be the only way to
control power input to the bike), it's just a snapshot. And they used
two different power meters-- calibration?

I could say that in a race such as the Tour de France, this data would
very quickly fade into the noise, while those forced to ride
Pinarellos would be far, far behind on the Champs, at the conclusion
of the race. Well, I wouldn't risk life and limb trying to keep up on
the descents with racers on good-handling bikes. Make that "bikes with
far superior handling and far superior braking power and modulation".
And "Lots more gear combinations, wider range, vastly superior
shifting both in speed and precision".
Not to mention the danger involved in having to take a hand off the
bars to shift in the pack-- how many more would have fallen in that
first crash-filled week of the Tour, had they not brifters?
But aren't we scoffing at a mere 1 second speed increase in a 7 minute
climb?
If you're talking about the TDF I can't imagine that any of the riders
(or their sponsors)
wouldn't pay dearly for that.

That nonsense about not taking a hand off the bar is someone that has
never descended
at speed into a curve.



Dang, those racer dudes who spend the bucks to get bikes that work
better are looking smarter and smarter as I go along here.

Yeah, if the tech matters, it's worth the money.
If you're not racing, who cares? Ride what you like for whatever
reasons might apply, and be happy!
I mean, that seems like a much better use of precious time on Earth,
compared to cherry-picking suspect "data" from a rather informal road
test and using it to try to prove some kind of unsustainable point--
such as "Racing bicycles have not actually improved functionally in
the last 25 years".
+1

Actually Frank once told me that there has been no measurable
improvement in bicycles
since the penny farthing.


snip

On Wednesday, July 18, 2012 9:39:16 PM UTC-4, James wrote:
http://www.sportsscientists.com/

Very interesting article - WITH DATA!! (Frank will be so overjoyed).

Nothing to do with pedals, helmets or the colour of their leotards.

--
JS.

Something I've often wondered about regarding top speeds. I've read that to go twice the speed you use four times the energy. I think that a lightweight bike and aero components would mean that the rider would be using less energy to get to and to maintain their top speed. That would man they are less fatigued at the end of the day which in turn would mean that they would have an easier recovery for te next day. I think that on a multi-day race that saved energy could really add up.

Cheers

On 07/27/2012 08:57 AM, wrote:
On Wednesday, July 18, 2012 9:39:16 PM UTC-4, James wrote:
http://www.sportsscientists.com/

Very interesting article - WITH DATA!! (Frank will be so overjoyed).

Nothing to do with pedals, helmets or the colour of their leotards.

--
JS.

Something I've often wondered about regarding top speeds. I've read that to go twice the speed you use four times the energy. I think that a lightweight bike and aero components would mean that the rider would be using less energy to get to and to maintain their top speed. That would man they are less fatigued at the end of the day which in turn would mean that they would have an easier recovery for te next day. I think that on a multi-day race that saved energy could really add up.

You have to be careful with Aero wheels. I'm just having a discussion
with a friend that is riding in a charity race from Toronto to Montreal.
It's in 3 stages over 3 days. He has aero wheels and their group
leader advised him to swap them for this race. The idea being that
fighting the crosswinds is going to tire him more than the gain of the
aeros. I know I've ridden his bike and it's like a kite when the wind
is from the side.

Otherwise, I think that you're right and any energy saved in a
multi-stage race is going to make recovery easier. Color of the
leotards notwithstanding.

On Jul 27, 5:28*am, Duane Hebert wrote:
On 7/26/2012 6:58 PM, wrote:


Yeah, if the tech matters, it's worth the money. If you're not racing, who cares? Ride what you like for whatever
reasons might apply, and be happy!
I mean, that seems like a much better use of precious time on Earth,
compared to cherry-picking suspect "data" from a rather informal road
test and using it to try to prove some kind of unsustainable point--
such as "Racing bicycles have not actually improved functionally in
the last 25 years".

+1

Actually Frank once told me that there has been no measurable
improvement in bicycles
since the penny farthing.

snip

That would undoubtedly have been true if all bike engineers/designers
had historically had the same lack of vision and understanding as
Frank.
DR

On Jul 26, 8:26*pm, Frank Krygowski
wrote:
wrote:
On Jul 26, 2:46 pm, Frank
wrote:
DirtRoadie wrote:

The article is best read as a whole including the subjective portion
to help understand the context.

In other words, you want people to only pay attention to the "Gee whiz,
I sure like the feel of new stuff!" *IOW: *Forget the data!! Buy what's
advertised!!

Not much "tech" in that attitude.

Well... if the riders didn't have to shift, in a short uphill "drag
race", of course there's no advantage to having more gears or
handlebar shifting, cable or even looking toward the future when
everyone will be using "electric". Well, not *everyone* will be using
button shifting, of course.

Stiffness? Well (again), maybe stiffness per se isn't so important if
you're talking the difference between the Pinarello and the Lapierre,
where it might be important if you comparing a flexy-flier alu or ti
bike from the ancient past. But that is only on the uphill.

Let me say that again: that's only on the uphill. Did every single
rider (racer) in the test bust on the Pinarello for its comparably
poor handling at speed, especially downhill?
Including one racer from this group, Thibault Pinot, who won a tough
Stage 8 (seven climbs with a difficult final uphill) in this year's
Tour de France...?

I mean, even as a much younger rider, Mr. Pinot seems to have had some
expertise. He's got a pretty good list in his early palmares, too. You
could look him up.

I noted the one side of beef sprinter dude (180lbs!!!) didn't complain
about the flex with the Pinarello. Roughly 30 lbs. heavier than the
average for the group. Sounds like he has a smooth pedaling styleg.

That leads to an observation: the test was only 3 km and on a 7.2%
grade. That's short, and pretty shallow, too. A snapshot, and since we
don't have robots riding the bikes (which would be the only way to
control power input to the bike), it's just a snapshot. And they used
two different power meters-- calibration?

Well, I suppose we could say that perhaps the test wasn't sufficient to
demonstrate the benefits of any feature but reduced weight.

What's odd about that is that then, we've got to disagree with the
writers of the magazine, the designers of the test, and the guys who
rode the bikes. *That's the crew that set the entire thing up, and when
they (and the magazine's owners) started shelling out money to do this
test, you can bet they were sure it would be valid. *And when
publication time came around, they weree convinced that they'd really
proven something!

I think a lot of people underestimate the effort needed to do a good job
on things like this. *There must have been no small effort involved in
just acquiring the bikes (esp. the Pinarello with NOS equipment) and the
power meters and the riders and the test location, etc. etc.

But really, isn't it sort of a matter of faith to say a longer, more
thorough test would demonstrate tremendous benefit that didn't appear in
this test? *Based on these results, we really don't know that.

If we really wanted a more thorough test, I guess we could look at the
speed data from, say, some classic pro race that's been run over the
same route year after year, and see how much its speed has increased
over the decades.

Oh wait... we did that, didn't we? *;-)

Am I missing something? Didn't the article conclude with a statement
that the Lantern Rouge rider in a recent TdF had a faster average time
than Fignon when he won? I thought it was already determined that
riders are faster now than 20-30 years ago. The question was "why."

I think Lou covers the "why" pretty well. The bike does matter --
it's just a question of how and how much. I switch between bikes
frequently but ride the same routes and get pushed by faster riders,
and there is no question in my mind that the bike matters, but hey,
that's just me. I'm sure it's psychosomatic.

-- Jay Beattie.