New Video - my commute from Downtown Seattle

Actually just the first part of it; from downtown Seattle, just north of the Pike Place Market, in the southern end of the Belltown neighborhood, to my LBS in Fremont (another non-downtown neighborhood), SpeedyReedy Multisport and Tri Supply (they put up with me and my bikes graciously, despite the fact they're a tri shop). I wanted to see if the mechanic had time to swap back rear derailleurs on the TiCa - I've got an X9 derailleur on it right now that we swapped out for the X0 that was on it in an attempt to address a shifting problem. It turned out the problem was caused by a defective link in a brand new chain. It was on the inboard side of the chain, very hard to see. So, now I need to get the X0 derailler back on the bike, since there's nothing wrong with it, and I'm going to have them put this X9 guy on my new used CroMo M5 Lowracer, which is mostly destined to be a trainer bike (I'm a little leery of putting the TiCa's on the trainer, since the rear carbon stays are basically unobtainium).

Saul (the mechanic) was too busy to do the work, but it was a good place to stop the video, since I'd alread exceeded the 15 minute YouTube limit (I edited out a few stoplight waits to get it under).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjKySmMaENY

I took off early from work, in order to make sure the sun was out for the duration of the video; unfortunately, this means traffic was lighter than normal, so it doesn't demonstrate urban lowracer commuting as well as I'd like, but....doing it in the crepuscule was not gonna work.

So, here it is, with lots of examples of me taking the lane when appropriate, yielding to motorists when appropriate, waving furiously at motorists to make sure they see me, waiting patiently in line behind cars at stoplights, etc.....y'know all that Forester stuff about 'driving your bike like a vehicle'.

Twice, on this commute, I had motorists give me a grin and a big thumbs-up, and I was bummed out to find none of this shows on the video at all. One thing I'm struck by, given I reviewed the video right after experiencing the ride, is how much less visual info goes into the camera as compared to what is going into my brain through my eyes. I see a lot more than the camera does; I'd be terrified to do this if what shows on camera was all I could see. I'm still at a loss as to why folks think I would see more if I were up higher; I ride the same route on the time on my TiRush, and the main difference is that it's easier to turn my head to 160 degrees'ish on the more upright bike, plus the TiRush can turn a much tighter slow speed turn. But I can turn my head all 'round on the TiCa, too...it just takes more effort. My mirror situation is a little better on the lowracer than on the socked TiRush, where I'm limited to just my eyeglass Take-A-Look mirror. However, on that style bike, I could probably do the commute without too much trouble with no mirror at all, given the ease of turning my head, and the stock upright seating. In any case, it's all a matter of degree, and adaptation to the characteristics of each platform; the vehicular cycling principles are the same.

The biggest thing I can see that is risky on the lowracer is getting at all close to other cars; the lines of parked cars on the left on Blanchard in this video (during the first part), and the ones on the right on Dexter later on, are the biggest hazard. I am very, very aware of just how close I am to these vehicles, and where the vertical sight lines are for someone sitting in the driver's seat of them. It's second nature to constantly be gauging this. There's a big van parked on the left side early on in this video, and there was a real risk that some smaller car was hidden behind him; you better believe I was watching my speed, watching out, hand on the brake (that front disc brake is the bomb). Of course, bicycle height is a non-issue here; I could've been riding a penny-farthing and that van would still have effectively obscured me from view from a vehicle behind it.

Similarly, anyone at cross streets on Dexter is a potential problem, given the line of parked cars on the right, obscuring me from them. Again, my bike's height has nothing to do with this. It'd be exactly the same on a roadbike; the idea that they'd see my helmet (were I riding a roadbike, or something higher than the lowracer) bobbing above the line of parked cars is ludicrous. The best defense here is to be very, very aware, watching for this, to take the lane when I can (the further out into the center I am, the better they see me from the side), and I also do a lot of friendly waving (at least, it's my hope it's perceived as friendly, and mainly, that's it's perceived :)). I've ridden this road on my roadbike in years past, and the issues are identical. The idea that the sightline is better on a higher bike is a confused notion, once you examine the geometry.

(disclaimer: rank opinionated bloviation follows)

In any case, I have yet to have a close call on this commute (knock on wood). I give a lot of credit to Seattle motorists. It's de rigeur for cyclists to knock the motorists, but....it's my perception that Seattle motorists obey the law better and put up from sub-par behavior from Seattle cyclists much more than the other way around. I don't have a lot of patience for cyclists who use their vulnerability to cars as an excuse to engage in non-vehicular behaviors (running stoplights, hopping curbs, basically doing anything a car can't do because it's bigger). Of course, it's only my opinion, but...Washington state law is pretty clear on this subject, and that's not a matter of opinion. Folks who disagree can work to get it changed, but just to disobey it because they don't like it? I don't get why we as a society are so worried about prosecuting victimless crimes (I'll refrain from naming the obvious here; but read between the lines), yet traffic violations are somehow considered unimportant, misdemeanors that we mostly tolerate; we don't really want the police enforcing these.

I'm all for American's freedom, but...somehow I don't think freedom to violate the laws of the public roadways was what the Founders had in mind when we seceded from Great Britain.

(ok, enough editorializing).

My first YouTube videos

Well, I bought one of these Contour HD helmet cams, and I recorded my ride yesterday. I edited the footage, and uploaded to YouTube (surprisingly time consuming and boring). I observe a few salient points:

• Either I haven't figured out how to do audio, or the camera itself doesn't do it very well. It has to lay on its side to work with a vented helmet; maybe I'm blocking the mic. On the other hand, the actual audio of my ride was not very interesting (not saying the ride itself was interesting, either, frankly). If I had nothing but time, I'd compose some sort of music, and figure out how to score it; it'd be an interesting exercise to learn how to use Nuendo (digital audio workstation app by Steinberg, targets film scoring). But I don't care that much, I think.
• Watching the video of a ride that was enjoyable and interesting is not so much. It's kind of like watching paint dry. I did edit large parts of it out, both to meet YouTube requirements, and also just because it was just too boring and repetitive. But I wanted to show what urban lowracer riding is like in Seattle, because...
• ....I'm hoping the video will serve some sort of illustrative purpose at Bentrderonline.com; I'm going to post a pointer to this blog post. I'm hoping to illustrate that urban riding on the lowracer is really not suicidal; although my experience posting there has been that I don't really change many opinions with my posts (which is OK).
• The video is kind of dark. That's because...well....it is kind of dark in Seattle this time of year. This is just about what it looked like to me.
• Some viewers will think that pretty much all I do is ride from one coffee shop to another. That's pretty close to the truth :).

So, here are the videos:

Part 1: From my house in Montlake (Seattle Neighborhood) to Leschi Starbucks, with some bits edited out. This part is probably most illustrative of what it's like riding through Seattle neighborhoods, with the twisty, narrow, relatively hilly streets. The riding here is done at sub threshold speeds, because I'm being careful.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1tOwusP_fRY

Part 2: From Leschi to Seward Park, and back. Large parts of the way back are edited out. I included a stop at Sayres Pit to stare at Lake Washington off a dock because it was pretty. On the way out, I was actually maintaining my (supposed) FTP wattage. That is, I was averaging the wattage that my FTP (Functional Threshold Power) test (from Training and Racing with a Power Meter by Coggins and Allen) results indicate. Whether this is really my FTP is anybody's guess. But....it's hard enough for me that I reckon an hour TT at that effort would be pretty darned grueling; so maybe it's close. Anyway, you can't see any of that effort in the video, it just seems like I'm casually pedaling down the road. Oh, well.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IASn4y0qlKw

Part 3: From Leschi Starbucks to Fuel (coffee shop in Montlake that's within walking distance of my house). I didn't bother to video the remainder to my home; I was fed up with it by this time. This part is interesting in that, as well as riding with motor traffic, I ran into a largish group of cyclists, on fixies and roadbikes, that demonstrate (to me) a number of poor cycling behaviors. I'll leave the viewer to judge for themselves, but....while I almost never have friction with motorists in my own riding, I can see why motorists would get impatient if they were behind this bunch. They ran two stop signs as a group during the short time I was behind them, too. Their behaviors sort of exemplify the reservations I have about group riding in general; I think group rides should display good Vehicular Cycling principles first, and the kinds of group cycling dynamic behaviors that exhibit when cyclists get together should explicitly defer to that. (I'm not sure we have an ironclad right to ride in formation like this in-city; motorists don't do it, except for funerals). Ah well....I can't change the world.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=66gD_moQ5v4

Carbent PowerTap testing with and without Aero wheels, plus C-Rush (for good measure)

Today's ride was motivated by two things. Firstly, I wanted to get back on the Carbent again; since I crashed on it (see my last post), I've been feeling a bit antsy about being that high off the ground and that reclined at the same time. It's ironic I've reached a place such that the lowracer (my M5 TiCa's) feels safer in traffic to me than a hiracer, given that conventional perception has that reversed. To some extent, perception is reality in these matters. If I am unable to ride the hiracer with confidence, I'll be unable to 'drive' it in traffic properly; it's necessary to have a certain amount of confidence and skill in my bike handling on a given platform for me to function effectively as a vehicular cyclist. I have good confidence and skills on my M5 lowracers, and on the EasyRacer's faired/socked format. I have no doubt the hiracer just requires skill and adaptation; it is not inherently any less safe or less effective in traffic (with the caveat that stops and starts are trickier for us short legged riders when the seat is extremely reclined), but clearly, it requires a commitment to put the miles on the hiracer to develop those skills and confidence.

So, one goal for today's rides was to put in a little down payment on that commitment. It was time. I either needed to get back on the bike, and prove to myself I was going to be able to get through this, psychologically, or....well...the alternative isn't pretty. I'd be pretty embarrassed to sell the Carbent just because I'm too lame to develop the skills for it. It was time to 'get back on the horse', so...today, I made myself do it. I was pretty wobbly at first; which was a big surprise to me. I have tens of thousands of recumbent miles in my legs, and really...plenty of hiracer miles (although I'm new to riding a hiracer at a 23 degree angle), and this was just an indicator of how badly this crash shook me up. I literally couldn't start the bike on the very mild uphill slope of the street in front of my house. I had to walk it somewhere flatter and get started. Of course, after a bit of riding, this all went away; it was all in my head, but still....very real, and daunting.

The second goal for today was to try to acquire some evidence to help ascertain how effective aero wheels (specifically, my Zipp 404's) are aerodynamically. I was waxing lyrical in a recent Bentrideronline thread about how I like these wheels, and how much faster I think they are than light wheels. A skeptic (Joel Dickman) piped up online, quoting a some-years-old Pete Penseyres article. The article isn't available on line, but the gist was that Pete found only a .5 mph benefit from the aero wheels of that day at 25 mph speeds. Joel's point was that, if this is so, for most of us, these very expensive aero wheels are a poor investment as a performance aid.

Of course, I knew this was wrong, right? I knew my fancy, expensive Zipp 404 rims were fast. This is actually a 28 spoke 'Clydesdale' set of Zipp 404 clinchers; the rear has been rebuilt onto a PowerTap hub. So I was set with aero wheels front and rear.

Of course, now I needed a set of non-aero 700c wheels, with PowerTap rear, to compare with, right? I got a good deal on Ebay for a PowerTap 'Elite' hub (the cheapest one) at 32 holes, and I got the seller to build it into a Velocity Aerohead rim. So now I had both non-aero and aero wheels with wattage measurement. I borrowed the front wheel from my roadbike; it's a Bontrager paired-spoke affair, very similar to the old Rolf Vector Pro wheels; of course, if I had my druthers, it would have been a 32 spoke 3 cross Aerohead rim, as 'conventional' as I could make it. However, this was what I had handy, so this is what got used.

All four wheels were mounted with Schwalbe Durano Plus tires on them (I don't care if the tire is a little slower than an Ultremo or other sub-250 gram race tire; I don't want flats). All four tires were pumped to exactly 120 psi (the Zipp rims have a max inflation spec of 125 psi).

Unlike my normal practice of riding from my door, I plopped the Carbent on the back of my beautiful 1999 Honda Civic CX with cheapo bike rack strapped to the hatchback, and drove to Leschi (Seattle neighborhood that's a convenient starting point for these tests). I started the runs with the conventional wheels. The test was my same old loop from Dearborne to Seward Park and back. It's about 8 miles or so of indifferent quality road, with a small amount of climbing.

A note about test rigor and repeatability: If I seriously wanted to establish rigorous certainty about this issue, multiple runs for each configuration are a requirement. In fact, possibly a better approach would be to use Robert Chung's Golden Cheetah software in a windless venue. This is one of the many things I haven't gotten around to, mainly because I can't figure out where/how to do windless testing. The thing about this 8 mile run is that it's an out and back, and the wind almost always is either a nearly direct headwind or tailwind. It's along the western edge of Lake Washington, 4 miles south, then turn around and return to the north. So my hope is that wind effects tend to cancel themselves out; not very rigorous or certain, I know. But that's the best I'm offering at this juncture :). This testing is mostly for me, and anyone else is welcome to derive whatever benefit they want to from it, but no warranties are expressed or implied; I'm just trying to make it obvious from the getgo that I'm aware my testing protocol is far from perfect. It is good enough to offer some value to me.

Anyway, as I said.....umm....multiple runs, yeah. I did one each of these 8 mile runs, maintaining 225w average according to the Garmin Edge 705. One run was done with the non-aero wheels, and one with the Zipp's. The Edge was calibrated to the power meter for the rear wheel prior to each run. Multiple runs would've been much better, but I was really happy to have performed these runs on the hiracer without wigging out, and I felt much better about things (as regards my relationship with the hiracer) when I was done, and I was also very ready to get off and get back on a bike I feel safer on :). I'll do a few more miles on the Carbent tomorrow; I think I'm doing well, and I'm keeping the bike (to all the folks in the peanut gallery hoping this was yet another bike I was going to sell at a loss to some lucky beneficiary) :).

So here are the results:

Time	Speed	Watts	Distance	Ascent
21:35	21.7	225	7.81	78
21:32	21.7	225	7.80	84

So...I'm not going to try to say this 'proves' anything, but I'm certainly not going to dispute it. I'm sure Joel (Dickman) will be amused, since it tends to support exactly what he was claiming (that aero wheels are a waste of money for most recumbent folks).

I am not convinced that this was enough runs to really establish certainty on this point, but I have to say that it certainly casts serious doubt on the proposition that a pair of Zipp 404 wheels are a hugely dramatic unambiguous performance win; I mean, the runs were a dead heat :). Oh well, this is just one more in a long list of things I've been wrong about in my life, most likely, although I am sure further repeats of this are necessary to understand just exactly what's going on here. And of course, if we really care, a windless venue for testing would be far preferable. But....at some point, when the testing becomes so much trouble to eliminate variables so you can even detect a difference, maybe this means things are so close that it's not worth worrying about, for us mere mortals who are just doing this recreationally (as opposed to folks who have money riding on the results of their race).

Next, I took a deep breath, thankful that I got through this test without mishap, put the Carbent back on my Honda, and drove it back home. I felt good about the threshold riding I'd done, and just didn't feel like pushing it any further.

I got on my EasyRacer's C-Rush (even newer than the Carbent), equipped with carbon/kevlar Double Bubble fairing, and bodysock, and rode from my door down to the same location. I'm an old hand on this style of bike, and am more comfortable riding this style of recumbent in traffic than any other style. So, just for grins, I thought I'd perform the same speed test one more time.

Here are the results:

Time	Speed	Watts	Distance	Ascent
21:20	21.9	225	7.78	87

This is pretty amusing, really. I doubt that many folks would believe the C-Rush, even faired and socked, is as fast or faster than the Carbent, but...today it was :). Note that I stuck the same Zipp 404 PowerTap wheel on the rear, calibrated to the same Edge 705 computer, and the front wheel is a HED 451 Jet 40 aero wheel (40 mm deep). I actually was interrupted twice by motor traffic on the C-Rush run, where I had to come to a dead stop for some car turning. There's no doubt, of course, that this was a little later in the day, very likely the wind was a little different (I couldn't really tell), and....y'know, none of this has very much rigor. From the getgo, I've stipulated that this is only as much rigor as I could muster today; it's far from optimum.

Some people will no doubt say that the C-Rush vs. the Carbent is not apples and apples, indeed, in HPV racing, the C-Rush would go into the 'SuperStreet' class (I believe), and the Carbent is 'stock'. There are no aerodynamic devices on the Carbent at all (unless the little Bentup Cycles seat bag counts as a rear fairing; perhaps in HPV racing I'd have to leave it off). The C-Rush would fare very poorly against other 'SuperStreet' vehicles that are faired to the limit of the HPV rules with no regard for how 'streetable' the vehicle actually is. For example, a hiracer with a Mueller XT fairing, Terracycle scaffold, and bodysock (these are now somewhat hard to come by), is a faster setup than the EasyRacer's socked/faired setup. But it's much less user-friendly, both in traffic, and in high crosswinds. On the EasyRacer's bike, the fairing and sock actually improve its behavior in a lot of ways, to my perception. Without a doubt, at low speeds, these LWB's tend to exhibit that 'uphill wobble' syndrome, modulo the skill and familiarity of the rider. The front fairing alone possibly exaggerates this, since it makes the front end 'heavier', and tend to 'flop' more. But put on the sock, and the steering is dampened such that it's much easier to go straight slowly up a hill. Just as an experiment, subsequent to this speed run, I put the C-Rush in its lowest gear, and toodled up a pedestrian/bike path near my house that's a double-digit grade. It crawled right up the hill with minimal wobble. Of course, I'm an experienced pilot for this platform, and it agrees with me; I know that not all will find it this way.

Still, for me, the EasyRacer's geometry represents an almost ideal tradeoff of all the various factors involved in producing a 'streetable' bike. Whether the bike is a little faster or a little slower than the Carbent, or my M5 TiCa's, the fact remains that, with the bodysock, it's really quite close in speed, close enough that it's going to be tough to figure out which platform is really fastest. And it is, without a doubt, a more 'streetable' platform than any other bike I've owned (which is saying something, I think).

All this is just my perceptions and opinions, and of course yours (dear reader) may be utterly different. Part of the beauty of bents is their diversity. But I was really quite surprised the C-Rush turned in my fastest performance today, for that 225w input.

Does this mean the C-Rush is 'fastest'. No, of course not. Much more testing would be necessary to figure out for certain which of my bikes is the fastest one. But one thing is clear; the Carbent, TiCa, and faired/socked C-Rush are all within spitting distance of each other.

Carbent crash report

I posted about this online at Bentrideronline.com, but....thought I should leave a note here. A week ago Tuesday, (July 6, 2010), I crashed on my Carbent; it appears in retrospect (it wasn't clear to me at the time) that this was 100% self-induced. I had changed handlebars out, and evidently needed to put in a longer front derailleur cable, plus I didn't cinch down what was there well enough; even though I rode it that way quite a bit, it wasn't until July 6 that it caught up with me; somehow my pedals (apparently, it's a little unclear to me; it happened quickly) got tangled up in the cable, ripped off the forward cable stop on the main tube; the whole affair up front became a tangled mess very quickly, and (I guess) the front wheel got locked up somehow. In any case, I went down on my left side, and ended up with the worst roadrash I have ever experienced. Most of the bottom of my left forearm, an area on my left hand, and a 6 inch circular patch on my left hip were sushi.

I'm almost healed up as I type this (July 15), mostly due to the miraculous powers of DuoDerm. I can't recommend this stuff enough. I found this report dated from 2003 by Dawn Richardson, M.D. at http://www.bikeforums.net/archive/index.php/t-195006.html.

I can't swear, of course, that I healed up much faster and better than I would have without DuoDerm, but...my hand was treated with 3M TegaDerm, which the post lists as a distinct second choice to DuoDerm. The hand is doing well, but the areas on the forearm and hip were much larger and deeper, and more concerning, and they (the hip and arm) have pinkish skin-like stuff (as opposed to raw meat or scab) on them now. Plus a profusion of tape adhesive residue and skin irritation from the tape (I can live with this, no problem).

Anyway, this crash kind of made my life miserable for awhile, and I was kind of wigged out about getting back on the hiracer; I had a crash where I went down just as hard on the TiRush about a month earlier, and came out without any injuries. It was raining a bit, and I apparently hit a very slippery spot in the road; must've been braking the front wheel as I hit a greasy ragged broken spot in the road; I believe the wheel slipped on the sloped slippery edge of the road fracture. The difference in the outcome was because (I believe) I was protected by the Lexan fairing and Dryline bodysock. The fairing has some new scratches on it; but it's still perfectly serviceable.

This is not to criticize the hiracer format; all cycling is a series of managed risks, and it's up to each cyclist to decide what set of risks she's comfortable with. But I was left with kind of a psychological hurdle to overcome, getting back on the hiracer. I spent some time on the trainer with it, trying to get confident that whatever happened before was not going to recur (I realize how pathetic and futile this sounds, but....that's what I needed to do).

Then today, I took the Carbent out for some PowerTap speed tests. Results of this testing (the results are somewhat ambiguous) follow in a later post. I feel better about riding the Carbent again, though, which is a good thing. I really needed to 'get back on the horse'; it was time.

Carbent Raven ride report

We finally (!) had a nice day today (Saturday, June 5, 2010); it was beautiful. It's been mostly rainy most of the time for what seems like a long time now. I hadn't made up my mind what bike to ride today after lifting weights (my strength training routine is lackluster and unenthusiastic, but I try to get after it twice a week, in the interests of maintaining as much lean mass as possible as I wobble towards decreptitude), but I went downstairs to the bike room and found myself switching out the handlebars to the Carbent, which meant (I guess) that I was going to ride the thing :).

The Bacchetta bars that came on it were just on the edge of being too short. They were (just barely) fine on flats and downhills, but on climbs, for some reason, when I pushed back in the seat, they seemed to want to recede from my grasp. I'm having a hard time believing I'm capable of flexing the Carbent seat or frame such that the handlebar distance actually changes, but...whatever, that's what I was experiencing. I knew Dana, as a matter of course, swaps these handlebars out for ones that fit (I'm sure Bacchetta makes them in at least 3 sizes), but....who wants to wait for that, right? I happened to have a pair of these fine RANS HR 3-way hiracer handlebars (http://www.shoprans.com/proddetail.asp?prod=BPHB0079), so I went through all the necessary steps to install them. It was a bit of a pain, but in probably 45 minutes, I had handlebars that I could actually reach. They're actually a bit wider than I need, and the grips point down in a way that, while probably providing a more biomechanically neutral hand position, also tend to get in the way of my thighs a bit more on turns than straight bars (which I prefer). But bars that I'm not comfortably reaching are kind of a non-starter. In the process of swapping the bars, I had to snip off all the very nice neat ziptie cable fastenings that Saul (mechanic at SpeedyReedy, the LBS that did the final few steps of the build upon receiving the bike from Bent Up Cycles almost completely built) had very meticulously put on there. Saul likes this bike better than my other bikes :). It's more like an upright bike, more like the high-end roadbikes and TT bikes they sell at SpeedyReedy. He told me in test-riding it after assembly, that he found it more comfortable, and he thought it was the fastest of all my bikes. I think he's a little biased, but there's no doubt it's a fast bike; very comparable to my TiCa's. I won't know for sure until I repeat the hiracer/lowracer tests (like I did with the TiCa and Duncan Watson's Corsa) with as much rigor as possible, but my totally unreliable and subjective sense of it is that it's a tad faster than the TiCa with the ti mono disc fork (which gives up a little speed to be more practical) and is very close to the speed of my faster TiCa (the first one, which still has the M5 fork and light 18 spoke front wheel and so forth). Like I say, I won't know which one is faster without testing, and it wouldn't surprise me at all if they turn out to be so close that I can't reliably distinguish them (given all the variables and uncertainties that remain in my testing protocol; I've done my best, but....there ya go). My viewpoint is, if they're so close I can't tell the difference without refining my protocol, then for all intents and purposes, they're the same, as far as I care.

However, one thing is for sure, the Carbent feels slower than my lowracers. This is to be expected; being closer to the ground causes a subjective sense of greater speed that is a bit of an illusion. It's a bit hard to pull back on the Carbent, because I think I'm subjectively pushing to try to make it feel as fast as I'm used to, and it just doesn't ever get there. But when I look at the Garmin 705, it's a bit of a shock to see how fast I'm actually going. So....like I said, it's a fast bike.

When I took off on it this morning, I found it almost feeling like it was flexing back and forth with my pedaling. As I thought on it, I realized this was totally an illusion. The CB is a shorter wheelbase than the TiCa's, and there's very much a sense of the rear wheel being tucked underneath me, which I'm not sure I care for so much (compared with the M5's). The steering is really pretty quick, maybe even a little quicker than I prefer, although it is unquestionably stable and well-mannered. Disclaimer: I find the Lightning P-38 to be a bit quicker than I prefer, as a reference point, and in fact, most roadbikes are too quick for me. My old Colnago C40s (which I utterly adored) had a relatively slack 71.7 degree head angle, yet a normal 43mm rake fork, combined with a 130mm stem. This resulted in a bike with a lot of trail, for a roadbike, and a bit of wheel flop in front. I loved it; it was a very stable platform, and when I had a custom Calfee S&S coupler'ed Tetra Pro travel bike built, I had it spec'ed to the exact same geometry. Anyway, my point in all this is that I probably prefer a bit slower, more stable steering geometry than some folks do; what some folks call 'sporty', I'd probably call 'nervous'. However, the truth is, I get used to whatever the personality of any given bike is after awhile (as long as it's not pathological, and the Carbent's handling is most decidedly not that). Every time I've ridden the Carbent so far, by the time I've done ten miles or so, I'm utterly used to its steering manners, and I'm fine with it. As I say, it's a quality bike.

It's also a very stiff bike. This is both good and sometimes, something a little south of good. The 700c wheels definitely help out with smoothing out rougher road. There's a certain level of washboard-like quality in the road that it seems to tolerate quite well. I never ride on chipseal, in fact, I 'm a little fuzzy as to what chipseal actually is (given that nearly all my riding is in-city), but I have the sense that (for folks who do a lot of riding on county roads or whatever that employ this construction method) you get a bunch of closely spaced tiny little imperfections that result in higher rolling resistance and roadbuzz. I'm guessing the Raven's dual 700c wheels and carbon construction probably shrug this kind of thing off well. What it has a little more trouble with, are bigger imperfections, the kinds of road blemishes that are almost a pothole, but not quite (or are honest-to-goodness potholes). I'm finding myself needing to avoid things (in order to avoid feeling like I'm unnecessarily beating the bike up) that the TiCa's (with their rear wheel cantilevered out on flexy carbon stays much further rearward of the seat than the Carbent) would roll right over without much complaint. Actually, to be fair, the faster TiCa (with the skinny little M5 carbon fork and 18 spoke front wheel) kind of falls in the middle between the TiCa with the custom ti disc monofork and the Carbent. Right now I have a 28 spoke HED Jet aero wheel on the front of the TiCa with the custom monofork, and when I ride with a non-aero wheel, it's a 36 spoke Sun ICI-1 rim. Both front wheels are very strong, and the ti monofork, even thought it seems much stiffer than the M5 carbon fork, seems to just track straight and true without drama and, while I try to avoid road imperfections as much as possible, it just seems like (mostly) a non-event when I hit something unavoidable, and the compliant nature of the way the rear wheel is mounted means it can take some pretty big hits without a whimper. I find this less true on the TiCa with the M5 fork; I have managed to break spokes on both M5 wheels a couple of times, despite making every effort to steer around problems. The Carbent seems a little worse in this regard; I'm not worried about my 28 spoke Zipp 404 Clydesdale clinchers (well....I want to avoid denting the braking surface, but I'm not too worried about that), but....I just hate for the bike to take a beating. On the other hand, the fact is, this is the roll-wrapped, very stiff tube on this bike, and the thing is probably quite capable of taking these impacts; it just registers them to the ride more than the TiCa does. It's perfectly comfortable, but it certainly incents me to try to stay out of trouble even more.

However, the bike is less happy with the tree roots that the Burke-Gilman trail on the Seattle side seems to be rife with these days. I wasn't sure when I set out how far I was going to ride today; I usually just do a 20 mile loop on weekend days (my riding mileage is pretty light these days), but for some reason, on impulse I decided to loop Lake Washington (about 50 miles, maybe a little less). The bike certainly is fast enough and climbs well enough that 50 miles just isn't a big deal. (Site note: I'm sort of toying with the idea of doing the Flying Wheels summer century next weekend, just for grins; I haven't trained for it at all, but....50 miles was not a big deal today, I'm pretty sure I could have gone 75 as long as I stopped from time to time to eat. Flying Wheels is very hilly, but there's nothing saying I have to push very hard. I'm quite sure I could fit in with a group of riders who are going slowly enough that I wouldn't have to push very hard; as long as I stay a little bit sub-threshold, I think it'd be no problem). The loop around Lake Washington, taken counter-clockwise, means that for the last 15 or so miles I'm on the Burke-Gilman trail.

Man, the Carbent really doesn't like those tree roots! It really bounces around alarmingly on them. I guess I don't like them much either, they're not much fun on any of my bikes. I don't really like riding the BG trail much, but it just seems like over the years these tree roots have grown and grown (they probably have). The TiCa's handle them better, though, because the frame is so longitudinally compliant, I think. It's really astonishing to me how well the TiCa's (both of them) climb and sprint, given how flexy they are. They seem to be flexy when you need them to be, and stiff when you need them to be; I don't really get it. Part of it (I think) is the way the seat interface is really quite rigid, but the main frame tube and rear stays are free to flex as necessary to track the road properly. This is not what the Carbent is about at all. It is just plain stiff; like a high-end carbon roadbike. Of course, on a roadbike, you unweight the frame more, because your arms and legs are used as suspension. This isn't so possible on an extremely reclined, high BB recumbent, so...it's a tradeoff you have to accept. None of this is a criticism of the Carbent, you just have to accept the bike's personality. The Fujin SLII, which is a marvellous bike, is none too happy about that section of trail, either. I've actually had the chain de-idler (if that's a proper verb), i.e., come out of the chainkeeper and get jammed into the midship chain management hardware, in response to the extreme stuff on the trail, taken at speed. It's just a fact of life; that portion of the trail can be taken at a greater speed without incident on either the TiCa's or the EasyRacer's TiRush (which is a flexy titanium LWB, and is almost like having suspension) than on the Carbent or the Challenge Fujin. I think the main lesson here is to just stay off the trail as much as possible, and when I absolutely have to do it (like I want to loop the lake), just take it easy. There's lots of good reasons to just go slow through this stretch; save the bike, save me, avoid endangering people, etc. I normally try to take it easy here anyway, but....the syndrome I alluded to earlier (the way the Carbent feels slower than it really is) tends to get me pushing harder than I should.

Another issue that made itself very apparent today was the challenge of managing a highly reclined highracer at stops and starts. The Raven is as low a seat height as a dual 700c stick bike can possibly be. The seat is bonded right on top of the main tube; you just can't get it any lower than it is. And it really is low enough for me. When I'm leaned back into the seat, I can reach the ground on one side with a bit of tippy-toe going on. Obviously, this is to some degree self-inflicted; if I'd ordered the bike at 25 degrees, it would be less of an issue, and if I'd chosen the dual 650c SeaDragon as opposed to the 700c Raven, it would be utterly a non-issue. I actually sat on a guy's SeaDragon down at the Leschi Starbucks one day a few months ago; I could sit utterly flat-footed on it. But I wanted dual 700c wheels, for lots of good reasons, and I wanted the bike to be as reclined as possible, because I wanted it to be competitive, speed-wise, with my TiCa's (or better yet, be faster :)). My old 700/20 Carbent's, which were set to a 30 degree seat angle (because I hadn't worked out my neckrest issues in those days) were just slow enough that I didn't really like riding them, compared to the Velokraft VK2 I had in those days, or the faired-and-socked Calfee Stiletto. The 30 degree Carbent climbed very well, but it just didn't pay back when trying to lay the smack down on the flats.

This bike (the Raven) gives back what I put into it, in spades. A little wattage into the pedals, and it just hurtles down the road at breakneck speed quite satisfyingly (well, it's satisfying when I look at the cyclometer, anyway....it doesn't necessarily subjectively feel all that fast, but it really is). As I said, if it's any slower than my fastest TiCa, it ain't by much (and it well may be faster; more testing is called for).

So, I'm content with taking the bike on its own terms. I'm just in that phase where I'm figuring out what those terms actually are. The drama on big bumps is no surprise, the 700/20 guys were the same. It's my sense that the Raven actually tolerates more of this kind of stuff, up to a point, but at the point it doesn't, well....it's pretty clear when I messed up and needed to have avoided something. One consequence of being as reclined as it is (combined with my less than stellar eyesight) is that I'm having a bit of trouble seeing road decay. I've heard it said that you see the road better on a hiracer than on a lowracer. Boy, for me this statement is about as far from the truth as possible. There is absolutely no question that I'm better able to tell what's going on with the TiCa's, especially the one with the M5 fork, which has a lower BB than the one with the ti monofork. The TiRush is in some ways worse about this; I don't see the road close up to front wheel at all (due to the fairing and sock), but....it's a heckuva lot better equipped to take this kind of thing, given the lightly loaded front wheel, and the LWB flexiness.

Anyway, as I say, this is not a flaw of the Raven; it's just what the bike requires of the rider. I'm learning its ways. The issue of seat height is actually the biggest issue I'm having. During the 50 mile loop this morning, there were many, many points where I was stopped at stoplights, in traffic, crunched forward with my torso skyward so my right foot could hit the ground better; I'd watch until the other direction's light went yellow, then lean back into the seat and hold my position on my tippy-toe, then push off when it went green. I'm still trying to get the hang of getting clipped into that right pedal quickly; it's a lot easier on the TiRush, where my right foot is flat on the ground at stops, and of course on the lowracers I never clip out (one handed trackstand).

I'm also having a harder time with situational awareness on the bike, compared to the TiCa's or the TiRush; I have a hard time seeing behind me at 150 degrees when I'm stopped, because of the contortions I'm going through to reach the ground; when I'm in the lowracer trackstand position, I am free to twist around in all directions and see what's happening. I totally don't get how people think they see things better on a hiracer in traffic; nothing could be further from the case for me. And of course, the EasyRacer's bike is unmatched in this regard; I personally think there is no better design for urban riding.

I'm also finding myself not giving hand gestures and directions a much as normal, because I'm a little uncomfortable with the quick steering and being up that high. I actually had a guy on his roadbike crash into me on the trail from behind, because I stopped at a cross street for a car. We both ended up sprawled in the road, and he said, "don't you know they have a yield sign there?". Oops. But.....I dunno if I would have barreled through, even if I'd realized the motorist had a yield sign; that was exactly what happened in my big bike vs. car in April 2000 - the motorist waited until I was totally committed, then ran the yield sign. I think the real problem here was that I failed to give the hand-pointing-down signal that indicates folks in the rear need to slow down, because I'm still a little uncomfortable taking one hand off the Raven's handlebars. It's not like I don't signal, but....I probably don't do it as much. This will undoubtedly get better as I get more acclimated.

(N.B. I'm pretty convinced the bike suffered no damage here; the handlebars were a bit askew; I straightened them right up. The handlebars and my body took the brunt; I'm pretty sure the main tube and seatstays were untouched by the bike and ground. But of course, now I need to leave the bike with my LBS for a complete inspection, bummer. As I said, I'm pretty certain it's fine, but better safe than sorry.)

I am convinced that most of this is just unfamiliarity with the hiracer. It's just part of its nature. I know that a lot of people might say that the bike is not intended for city riding, it's for the open roads; of course....that means I shouldn't be riding it at all. But lots of folks seem to think the lowracer is unsafe in city riding, also....and I just totally disagree. I know Dana commutes on his Raven to work in Van Nuys basically daily, and he has no longer legs than I (I'm not sure whether Dana's bike is 23 or 25 degrees, but....there's really very little difference). Just as I got comfortable with the challenges of commuting on the lowracer, I'm convinced I'll get comfortable with the stop/start business on the Raven. I'm just not there yet.

It's true that I instantly connected with the TiCa, in a way I haven't yet with the Raven, but...it's also true that I had already gone through the whole experience of getting to a point with the Velokraft VK-2 where I was really comfortable. It sure wasn't that way in the beginning. Heck, I actually bought the VK-2 three times from Dana. I would buy it and try it, and sell it, convinced I couldn't get comfortable on it. It wasn't until the 2nd or 3rd bike that, at some point, the gestalt happened, and suddenly I was one with the bike. Even then, it took a lot of riding in city traffic until I finally figured out how to set it up such that I was always seen by the motorists, and such that I really understood, at a really cellular level, how to manage the bike instinctively in traffic. I have a whole host of 'lowracer-in-traffic' coping mechanisms now that are just totally automatic, and I don't have to think about them; I just do them. I most definitely haven't gotten there with the 22 degree hiracer.

Still, if do Flying Wheels next Saturday, maybe I'll do it on the Raven. It certainly would require as little effort to do it as any bike I have (and less than most), and it might make a dent in the required riding I need to do to get my hiracer skills up to snuff. On a century like this, of course, no one will be stopping at stoplights at all, for the most part. Despite my best efforts, and despite the fact that I normally never blow through stoplights, I won't have much choice in a group ride like this; when you're surrounded by bikes, the important thing is to conform as much possible so as not to take anybody down. In any case, while I'm personally more comfortable riding at close quarters with roadbikes on the Stiletto or TiRush, hiracers are renowned for being suitable for this kind of thing, and I have a bit of an itch to see how well this could turn out. We'll see; I may be too slammed with work to be doing this kind of thing.

How do you measure seat angle?

So this is kinda supplemental to the April 19th (http://bentdreams.blogspot.com/2010/04/given-same-seat-angle-hiracers-are-just.html) entry.

I recently received my CarBent HPV Raven dual 700c hiracer from BentUp Cycles. Beautiful bike, of course, very well executed. But I was surprised to find that, using the same method of measuring seat angle as I did in the earlier article, that it measures about 19 degrees (!). My bike is supposed to be approximately 23 degrees seat angle. So, I called Dana (owner of BentUp Cycles and CarBent HPV), and chatted about it.

It turns out Dana measures seat angle by putting a straightedge on the bottom of the seat, and measuring that angle, in order to factor out the ambiguity caused by the lumbar curve present in most of these 'potato-chip' style seats. I did the same on my CarBent, and indeed, it comes out at 22 degrees on my little iPhone app. I need to get a straightedge of my own to measure the TiCa, but the bottom line is that, using my somewhat less precise method on both the CarBent and the TiCa in question yields a 23 degree seat angle for the TiCa, and an 18-19 degree angle for the CarBent.

The TiCa in question came with a medium M5 seat. This is really a little small for me (I have a long torso), so I had replaced it (or rather, my LBS replaced it) with a large Velokraft seat I had lying about. The thing is, the original M5 seat has a V-shaped cutout at the front of the seat to accomodate the TiCa's main tube, and this allow the seat to be positioned further forward (where M5 intends it to be); when the Velokraft seat was installed, it got forced back a bit. It's not really a problem, I just shorten the boom, and all is well. But it has the effect of lessening the seat angle to 23 degrees, as measured on my iPhone. I speculate that using Dana's method, if it can be done accurately on the TiCa (I need to get a straightedge and see what if there is nothing obstructing measurement underneath the bike), we'd probably get 26 degrees, I reckon.

When using my method, it's really less sloppy than it sounds like. You get about a 2-3 degree variation when you push the iPhone to one extreme of the lumbar curve to the other. Putting the iPhone kinda in the middle and eyeballing it so there's the same amount of 'gap' (which is quite tiny) on one side or the other results in a number that's exactly between the two extremes. so....good enough for me. Or at least, it's my opinion that this is as close as is meaningful to measure, given that the seat shapes themselves differ somewhat, i.e. we're kind of down to the 'noise' level of measurement, I think.

I was kind of excited to pit the CarBent and TiCa against each other. However, it looks like the only way to get them to be more-or-less the same seat angle is to pop the M5 seat back on my TiCa. This I have done, and it now measures 18-19 degrees (using my iPhone top-of-seat method), just like the CarBent.

When we get a dry day, and I'm not too shot otherwise, I'll repeat the same tests, but with CarBent and TiCa. I expect to get somewhat faster speeds than the earlier test, given the lower seat angles, but we shall see. I'll do a general ride report on the CarBent Raven in another post (it's a super nice bike, of course).

Oh....Robert Chung (from BROL) has given me access to a build of his Golden Eagle software for measuring drag - a protocol using this potentially is (hopefully) more precise and (certainly) a lot less physical effort to implement than my method. However, since I seem to be struggling with the software a bit, and just for consistency with the earlier test, I'll probably duplicate my earlier protocol once more. At least that's my current plan. Hopefully, at some point, I'll get it together with the Golden Eagle software, and render these 225W runs unnecessary.

I will note that, among the many uncertainties my test was rife with, there was the issue of using a different PowerTap/rear wheel on each bike. We assume they read the same, but....it'd be nice to be able to remove that assumption. For that matter, it would'be been nice to have exactly the same seat on both bikes, measuring at exactly the same angle via whatever method is used. Unfortunately, I seem to be able to get closer to the same seat angle (between CarBent and TiCa) using the M5 seat on the TiCa, so....this is probably the closest I can get to minimizing this variable. I plan to explore getting my LBS to cut a notch in the Velokraft seat; if that works, perhaps I can revisit this. In any case, I'll have the benefit of being able to use exactly the same rear wheel and PowerTap on each bike, which would be nice.

When I did the Corsa vs. TiCa tests, perceived effort on the Corsa was greater for managing 225W. Possible explanations:

• It's all in my head.
• I'm more used to the TiCa, and more easily able to generate power.
• The EuroMesh seat/frame interface is not as stiff, and it takes more effort to get the same wattage delivered to the rear wheel.
• The 2 PowerTaps vary a little bit.
• Something else I've failed to conceive of.

In any case, using the same wheel on both bikes will eliminate one small uncertainty.

Oh, and lastly....there was at least one person on BROL asking about tire pressures. All tires in the previous test, front and rear, were pumped to exactly 120 psi. The Zipp clinchers spec a max of 125 psi, and the Stelvio on the front of the TiCa is a max 120 psi spec. I'm not sure if 120 psi on the 23 psi 650c front tire of the Corsa is "equal" to the 120 psi of the Stelvio 28/451 front tire on the TiCa, but....that's the assumption I was operating under, for good or ill.

Given the same seat angle, hiracers are just as aerodynamic as lowracers

So, the title sorta says it all: this thesis (that if you lower the seat angle on a hiracer, it'll go as fast as a lowracer at the same agnel) has been articulated by various folks at various times over the years. Usually the person positing this goes on to say how hiracers are 'faster over real-world roads' because they have a larger front wheel (or in some cases, both wheels are larger; dual 20 inch wheel lowracers exist, although I've never ridden one). Usually some claims about 'being able to see your front wheel better' or 'seeing road obstacles (e.g. potholes) better' get thrown in there, and finally, usually the poster points to some impressive race results by either a person or a team that rides hiracers. RAAM results are often used to support this contention; i.e., some person or persons on a hiracer turned in a better race than some person or persons on a lowracer.

Now.....I would think that most people can see that using race results as an indicator of the superiority of one bike platform over another is obviously inherently utterly devoid of any logic. In the upright world, they do this sort of thing all the time; I remember Colnago (whose bikes I adore, by the way) claiming various 'wins' for the C40. But really, folks....this is completely illogical. Riders ride bikes, not the other way around. If you put me on the fastest bike in the world next to the slowest rider in the pro peloton on the slowest bike you can imagine, I'm going to lose, most likely (well, maybe if you put him on a BikeE and me on my TiCa, I might have a shot, maybe). The variance of riders, even elite ones, in any given race, is just too great. In short, using anybody's race result as evidence of a bike's superiority vs. another one is just not very useful; it's a well intended fallacy at best, and sycophantic hero worship at worst. The truth is, it's just not interesting to know how well (name your favorite racer) did on a given bike, for the purposes of determining how well that bike will do for you or me.

Then there are wind tunnel tests. You ought to be able to measure the varying drag signatures of respective bikes this way, right? Except....no recumbent manufacturer can afford this kind of thing, with rare exceptions (I seem to recall John Schlitter getting some time one year on a Ti Aero in a wind tunnel, but still....). And there is some controversy as to how valid this is: David (don't know the last name), the owner of Nimble wheels (www.nimble.net), a maker of high quality boutique aerodynamic aftermarket wheels, maintains that wind tunnel testing is completely invalid for bikes and bike gear, because they (wind tunnels) were designed for airplanes.

Well, how about rolldowns? Except....what are we measuring? How much does the respective rolling resistance of bikes with varying wheel size play a part? What about the weight of the bike/rider package?

It just seems hard to get a grip on this stuff, and really give a fair test. I know which bikes I think are the fastest that I've ridden, but....often my perceptions are at variance with others', and heck, I'm at least as subject to bias and prejudice about these matters as anyone.

So, I set out to try to generate some data. It seemed to me (and still seems to me) that the nearest thing to getting any sort of 'truth' about how well a given bike platform will serve me is to test both bikes with power measurement hardware, over the same course, at a constant wattage average. Ideally, we'd do lots and lots of runs, over different days, with different wind conditions, trying to equalize the bike setups and conditions as much as possible. It'd be great to do this on lots of different courses, with varying degrees of road roughness and climbing, etc. Ideally, I'd be able to put enough wattage into these bikes so that we really get into the area where aerodynamic drag is the big limiter. M5 likes to use the 250W value, as some sort of constant for comparing different platforms (I'd like to know where they come up with those values for different platforms e.g. http://www.m5-ligfietsen.nl/uploads/Itemizer/1591.1.gif

However, life is short, and so is my patience for this kind of thing. Also, I had to borrow the highracer, from a very kind and patient acquaintance (DuncanJames on Bentrideronline), a Bacchetta aluminum Corsa. Once I had gotten the bike from the good Duncan, I had to figure out how to equalize (as much as possible) things between the Corsa and one of my M5 TiCa's (the lowracer in question) so as to conduct a fair test. With that in mind, I did the following:

• Both bikes have a Zipp 404 clincher rim equipped with a PowerTap wireless hub. The Corsa wheel is 650c, the TiCa 700c.
• Both bikes needed to have their seats set to the same angle. This proved problematic. The TiCa has a basically unadjustable seat angle (you can change it, but only by swapping in a different set of Delrin seat risers; since I only have the one set, it's effectively unadjustable). The Corsa seat angle is adjustable, but.....I couldn't get Duncan's bike anywhere near as low as my TiCa. Finally, I called Dale Clark at AngleLake Cyclery, asking him if he shorter seat struts were available; he confirmed they were, and was good enough to give me a pair; he dropped them off at my front door, gratis (wow!). But then I needed to get a more rigorous measurement than just eyeballing. How does one do this? It turned out the LBS around the corner (Montlake Cycles) had an 'angle-finder' device. I brought the TiCa over and they measured it at 23 degrees (this bike is set up at the highest angle). But they also told me about an iPhone app that does the same thing. I downloaded it and re-measured the TiCa and got the same result (23 degrees). So I set up the EuroMesh seat on the Corsa to read the same, fiddling with the interactions between seatstays and the seat slider on the bottom until I got the same 23 degree number but still had proper extension for my legs. I jumped on the bike, and whoa, highracers are not all that easy to ride at 23 degrees with a 30 inch inseam. Still...just for one test....and after 5-10 miles, I started getting used to is. I have a CarBent coming from BentUp Cycles that's going to be set to 23 degrees; this experience removed some uncertainty about my ability to ride the bike at that angle; I know the CarBent is a little lower to the ground than the Corsa, so it should be good.
  
• Both bikes used a Schwalbe Ultremo on the rear (the only thing that was available from my LBS in both wheel sizes).
• The Corsa used a 'conventional' paired-spoke wheel on the front with a Vittoria Corsa Evo tire; the TiCa has the proprietary M5 front wheel; it's 18 spokes, and not particularly aerodynamic, and has a Schwalbe Stelvio 451 on it.
• I used my Garmin Edge 705 computer to read the PowerTap readings for both bikes. It uses the 'ANT+' protocol to talk to the hubs. For each bike, I completely re-detected the rear wheel, and calibrated the hub to the computer.
• I had a conversation with customer support at Saris (PowerTap) this morning, who confirmed that I had done everything reasonably possible to equalize the values between the wheels.
  

So, with all that done (what a hassle!), I was ready to test. I rode the Corsa out to a spot on Lake Washington Blvd that I had chosen; it's a run from the intersection of Dearborne St. and Lake Wa Blvd . to Seward Park and back. I chose it for the following reasons:

• While is has motor traffic, it's a favorite spot for cyclists; the motorists are used to cyclists time-trialing and doing intervals and threshold work there.
• It has a mix of smooth roads and washboard ones.
• It's mostly flat, but has a little climbing (maybe 150 ft. gain over 7.8 miles).
• It goes mostly north and south, but wends east and west for shorter periods. The wind usually blows either north or south there, and the fact that I was doing an out and back tends to equalize varying wind conditions, although optimally this would all be done in dead calm wind (fat chance).
  
• It's hopefully long enough (7.8 miles) to show a significant difference between the bikes (assuming there is any difference), and not so long that it's beyond my meager athletic abilities to hold a substantial wattage average. From past experience, I knew I could hold 225 watts over this course without blowing up; of course, I was going to have to do this 4 times, since I wanted at least 2 runs from each bike to reduce the chance of something anomalous screwing up the data. Of course, 2 runs is a paltry sample, but....I also had to compromise with the tensions of time, life, my athletic ability, logistics, and the fact that I need to get the Corsa back to it's owner within a reasonable length of time. It ate up a bunch of time just preparing for all this, getting the seat struts, etc. In addition, it was about 5-7 miles from my house to the test spot; before the test spot were too many stop signs, etc.. I lack a vehicle which can haul both bikes, so I'm going to be getting an extra 20-30 miles of riding just setting things up; this all had to happen in one day, so....

So yesterday (April 18, 2010) everything came together. I got the seat angles equalized, it was a sunny day, and the wind was a steady 5 mph.

OK, enough setup; here's the results:

Corsa:

Split	Time	Distance	Avg Speed	Avg Power
1	0:21:56	7.78	21.3	225
3	0:22:03	7.82	21.3	225

TiCa:

Split	Time	Distance	Avg Speed	Avg Power
2	0:21:16	7.79	22	225
4	0:21:18	7.82	22	225

So, the TiCa was faster. Both bikes turned in basically identical performances from one run to the next, and the TiCa was somewhat faster, although not dramatically so.

So, what does this "prove"? Ummm.....it's pretty murky, actually. I would say that it is evidence that lowracers are somewhat faster than hiracers at the same seat angle over 'real world' roads. It isn't 'proof', by any means. If it proves anything, it proves the TiCa (a very fast lowracer) was faster than the Corsa (which is not Bacchetta's flagship, although it has been ridden very successfully to multiple race wins) on this day, with this rider, with every reasonable attempt made to make the tests fair.

Some may ask about climbing. Well.....climbing is difficult to quantify; you can do multiple hill repeats on each bike, but....you can't equalize out the variables of rider exhaustion, varying fitness from day to day (not to mention weight fluctuation), and the inherent advantage of whichever bike gets to go first in the test. Doing a constant average wattage would probably just favor the lightest bike; there's also the question of which bike allows the rider to deliver the most wattage climbing (since climbing is more of a 'peak output' activity, this seems more part of the question than on the more varied course I picked for the test).

Anyway, all I can offer is anecdotal 'evidence' (my experience). I seem to climb much better on the TiCa than the Corsa. Most of my climbing yesterday was on the way to and from the test locations (also complete with lots of stopsigns; not a good area to test). The Corsa had the advantage of being first, but.....it was significantly easier to climb on the TiCa. This probably says more about my adaptation to that bike (thousands of miles) than any inherent climbing advantage to the bike.

That's it for now. Since it turns out my TiCa is 23 degrees, and the CarBent I've got coming is also going to be 23 degrees; I may have more opportunities to do some comparative testing. And it'll be a somewhat better test, since I can use the very same wheel for each bike (I'm getting a dual 700c Raven). Also, since I have a Zipp 404 front wheel for the Raven, I'll be able to contrast that with the HED Jet 40 wheel I have on my other TiCa, which also has a non-aero Ti from fork, etc. It'll be interesting to see if any of these things are significant.