how many Cevrelo's have you owned? I love the company and have ownsed the PC3, P4, R4 and S3.

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Dan Kennison

facebook: @triPremierBike
http://www.PremierBike.com
http://www.PositionOneSports.com

ERO will do it. We're completely independent, and already test a bunch of product for various manufacturers. I would want to do it at the A2 tunnel (price and quality of results) and, if we're going to test with a rider, would also want to pick the athlete (are you reading this James Haycraft?). In fact, two riders would be even better (Heath, you ready?)

It's difficult to get fair, consistent results when testing frames with a rider aboard. Everything has to be in the same position down to the millimeter, and multiple sweeps are necessary with each bike to average the results. Even when extreme care is taken, it's a challenge to insure the results are fair since the smallest changes in body/head/hand position, helmet position, or the way clothing moves on the rider between runs can have significant effects on results. This is why we need multiple runs, and athletes with experience product testing who understand these challenges.

Then there's the question of wheels, which will impact the overall results differently from frame-to-frame. Perhaps you test with a few different wheelsets, but now you're getting into quite a few runs likely over 2-3 days and things are getting very expensive. On the other hand, just settling on a specific wheelset commonly used by many triathletes might make more sense. A 404/808-type combo, for instance.

I think using the collective knowledge of Slowtwitch would be smart to set up testing protocols. Let's be transparent and open to suggestions. I think live-tweeting such and event would be quite compelling.

To remain completely independent, I would donate my time for this. I would only ask for transportation costs to be covered and, of course, someone would need to pay for tunnel time.

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Jim Manton / ERO Sports

Jim
I hope something like this will happen as well. I have some ideas but will remain quiet until the re designed culprit Legend is ready to be verified publicly. This year, we will re release the bike, it will be a one of a kind.

Actually, the little quibbles aren't so little: The P4 was the only bike tested with straight extensions, the others had ski bends or S bends. The aero bar on the P4 required a modification to work (hacksawing off the back of the Ventus stem). The Speed Concept was sized too small, should have been a size larger. The Plasma was also sized too small and required a dummy stem to work.

There's aren't nits, they can have a significant effect on the results, and these items bias the test in favor of Cervelo. Cervelo has been a great innovator in the realm of aerodynamics but to cite this test as an example of near-perfection is off the mark.

"The chances that it is truly faster with rider on it than the top bikes from the big manufacturers is basically zero. But good on you for wishful thinking."

It's all well and good to be skeptical, but what data do you have to be claim they can't be faster? No data has been yet made available as it's still under development, so you have no more basis to claim it can't be faster than you would have for making any specific claim as to the actual aero performance of the bike. We should by all means reserve judgement until we have data and that cuts both ways.

I agree. There are some things that I want to test that are very subtle. But, to the best of my knowledge, no aero testing firms that offer services to athletes or small companies have a plastic dummy available to use instead of (problematic) human riders. Might ERO have a dummy someday?

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Advanced Aero TopTube Storage for Road, Gravel, & Tri...ZeroSlip & Direct-mount, made in the USA.
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Can you ask some of the guys from there to come to the forum and contribute and answer questions. Many industry contributors have gone that route. Guys like Damon Rinard, Superdave, MITAerobike and many more, have all been big contributors to the community in general, outside of answering questions on their specific brands/bike/equipment. It would be nice to see these guys take the same route as their industry peers.

In the last question they provided this answer

ST: Is there anything else we should know?

Diaa: Yes. First of all, thank you for doing this. We value feedback from the community, even if we can't answer every single question posed via the Slowtwitch forums. We are well aware that we have set expectations very high, but rest assured that we are working tirelessly to build the world's fastest triathlon bicycle. That is our mission and we will see it through.

...I guess my question is why can't they answer some questions. If the answer is, "we don't have the data and have to get it" then that is fair, just answer with that. I use that answer all the time with customers when I don't have the data "yet".

In any case, some answers via a front page article are good, but forum involvement would be better. It is also a more interactive means for winning future consumers over because they are not hiding behind a company wall behind a press release or front page article at arms length from the consumer. They are with us or more aptly, they become part of us. Wit an availability claimed for this fall for consumers, that gives them 6 months to get hooked into the community and help build brand momentum. Right now they may be blowing it by staying at arms length....I fully understand that the market is much bigger than this community too.

Just as a clarification, companies send me products upfront, but I return virtually everything to the companies after I'm done reviewing it. There are extremely rare cases where something just costs too much to ship back (a triathlon rack comes to mind), and I just gave that to the local tri club here in Paris (it would have cost more to send back than it was worth). I then go out and re-acquire everything through normal retail channels.

As for trips, I pay all those myself. Interbike, CES, MWC, Eurobike, trips to company product launches, etc... That last category is notable, as most other bike publications will have their travel costs covered.

The site is funded by reader support through supporting through two retailers (Amazon/Clever Training), I obviously get a small bit back there based on whatever you purchase. Additionally, there's a small amount of ads, primarily from Google Adsense. But, I block anyone that's actually relevant to the page from advertising, so the total ad revenue is pretty small since I'm basically blocking my own target market. That's fine though.

Obviously, on the retailer relationship, someone could argue that would sway me to writing only positive things, but I feel like I'm proven time and again I'm happy to crap all over a crappy product - regardless of who it's made by or who they sell through. And also true one could argue I'd be nicer to preserve that relationship, but despite me being incredibly critical on certain products, the same companies continue to provide early access. For companies that don't like my opinion...shrug...they lose out on the visibility for their launch, as I almost never write about products unless I've touched them - since that's basically just marketing. But eventually if the product is worthy I'll just buy it anyway and review it, so...yeah.

Anyway...just for clarity on how it works.

(Edit to fix quotation formatting fail on my part)

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My tiny little slice of the internets: dcrainmaker.com

Cool, thanks for the clarification Ray.

I guess another requirement would be "popular/well-funded enough to do reviews as a full-time job", seeing as how busy with real life you seem to be on your blog.

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STAC Zero Trainer - Zero noise, zero tire contact, zero moving parts. Suffer in Silence starting fall 2016

I'm convinced Ray has insomnia.

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I would love to be a test subject. I think if we were to use James we'd need someone closer to his size. I ride a bike two sizes bigger than him. I'm happy to help with the testing and wrenching though. I think James would be a good subject for this as he has spent a lot of time at A2 when he was doing marketing/testing for them. His data is very stable.

Honestly we could get in and out of there fairly quickly. We'd just have to make sure all the bike measurements were set-up prior to walking in the door. Switching the bikes would be the most time consuming. Anyway, fun stuff to think about.

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Heath Dotson
HD Coaching:Website |Twitter: 140 Characters or Less|Facebook:Follow us on Facebook

Hmmmm I'm roughly James's size.

I vote for me!

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Brian Stover USAT LII
Accelerate3 Coaching
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