141–150 of 307 posts
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The last time I bought a new bicycle, I had to try a lot of them before I found one I really enjoyed. I'd imagine world-class cyclists are even pickier than I am.
The biggest differentiator is height. I assume taller people have more muscle power hence should be put in different category.
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I've got about 150 Watt Hours from a ~900g battery on my cheater bike. (link below) I dunno how much ballast a really lightly built race bike has to carry these days, but even a quarter of that energy would likely make a dramatic difference - at 25W of assistance (which is something like 10% of a rider's total long-term output) a battery 1/4 the size/weight of mine would provide 90mins of assistance. Would that be "w…
Why do you need a cheater bike?
(I do _occasionally_ enjoy passing mamils on bikes that weigh less then their brekfast going uphill on my way to work.)
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I have to agree with you here. The thermal camera footage they did show was just shockingly weak. They had one instance where there was higher than average temperatures coming off of the cogset. Which coincidentally enough is a rotating joint with the weight of a grown man pressing down on it for an entire race. Seeing heat here is not surprising.
Apparently you missed the part where they have this footage for just 2 racers out of an entire peloton.
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Why ban steroids? Why ban amphetamines? Whyban surgical modification? Why ban genetic engineering? Why ban motorised exo skeletons and nano technology? (I just read a great short story along these lines called ""Slipping" by Lauren Brookes - from the EFF'S PWNING TOMORROW short fiction anthology...)
The same question applies to all of those. If we allow technological enhancements, why is one enhancement too far? You couldn't run the course as fast as you can cycle it, after all. The same argument applies to all those other things - if we allow them then the playing field needs to stay absolutely level otherwise the person who can afford the strongest drugs, the newest gene-splicing, and the most efficient exoske…
Bicycle racing, whose equipment is required to have only one source of power, a certain minimum weight, and no disc brakes (and maybe a couple others) is probably one of the less-constrained pro sports.
Just take the bike out of the race entirely. Declare a year in advance that the bike will be XYZ model Q so people can train on them, and the race maintains custody of all race bikes, spares, etc. It's already a money-competition to see who can buy the best super-bike. Yes, you have to have a minimum weight, but that just means that you can take a superbike and spend the extra weight applying aerodynamic fairings whe…
All the bikes are identical in spec (single speed, coaster brake, flat pedals).
This is the race that features in the movie Breaking Away. I wish more were like it, but I guess part of its charm is its uniqueness.
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> Technology is an intrinsic part of the sport, but it is not allowed to play a dominant role. I can't make any sense of this. Any bicycle is 100% a product of technology. I can't think of anything that plays a more dominant role in bicycle racing than... bicycles.
I fairly sure the cyclist has a fair amount to do with it. You can't just buy a £10k rig and win the Tour.
You can have a bicycle race without cyclists; you can't have one without technology. Technology is playing a dominating role.
I tend to suspect that jdietrich didn't mean to include things like metallurgy, rubber, and gears under the umbrella of "technology", but there is no actual line between the use of gears and the use of motors.
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Why do you need a cheater bike?
To clarify, my cheater bike" is a $50 eBay 2nd hand mountain bike that I use to commute to work - not something I ride dressed in lycra pretending to be faster than other people... I call it my "cheater bike", 'cause that what it _feels_ like riding it up hills... It makes me laugh everytime I ride it. (I do _occasionally_ enjoy passing mamils on bikes that weigh less then their brekfast going uphill on my way to wor…
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Why do you need a cheater bike?
To clarify, my cheater bike" is a $50 eBay 2nd hand mountain bike that I use to commute to work - not something I ride dressed in lycra pretending to be faster than other people... I call it my "cheater bike", 'cause that what it _feels_ like riding it up hills... It makes me laugh everytime I ride it. (I do _occasionally_ enjoy passing mamils on bikes that weigh less then their brekfast going uphill on my way to wor…
Not aimed at you personally, but in my commute I'm not happy with all these motorized bicycles on the bike lane nowadays. They're usually ridden by people who don't race seriously, and are now riding 30+ km/h, but doing it as though they're still going 15 km/h: not looking behind them before passing or turning, immediately ringing their bell if you're in front of them, without first looking if maybe there's a reason why you're slowing down, not keeping distance. One slammed into me when I stopped to yield for traffic. Yield? Why would one yield?
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To clarify, my cheater bike" is a $50 eBay 2nd hand mountain bike that I use to commute to work - not something I ride dressed in lycra pretending to be faster than other people... I call it my "cheater bike", 'cause that what it _feels_ like riding it up hills... It makes me laugh everytime I ride it. (I do _occasionally_ enjoy passing mamils on bikes that weigh less then their brekfast going uphill on my way to wor…
Doesn't that kind of defeat the purpose? Why not ride a scooter? Not aimed at you personally, but in my commute I'm not happy with all these motorized bicycles on the bike lane nowadays. They're usually ridden by people who don't race seriously, and are now riding 30+ km/h, but doing it as though they're still going 15 km/h: not looking behind them before passing or turning, immediately ringing their bell if you're i…