I wouldn't say pointless. Personal testing is really, really time consuming (and money-consuming if a wind tunnel is used). Both bike setup, and the # of trials it takes. And when considering the possible combinations of dozens of good frames, wheels, bars, bottles, tires, and other things, it's a combinatorial explosion of permutations where a full lifetime of personal testing couldn't burn through. And all that time is time that could be spent doing other important things. Like training.

Having a rough ordinal list allows management of that explosion. Start at a reasonable good place. Avoid things that are unlikely to work well. For example, start at combinations that will likely get you to, say, 0.2 or better. Then do the personal testing to work down to 0.19 (or whatever)

You might miss some freak interaction where only you achieve some magical benefit. But you're likely to miss that freak interaction anyway. And, generally, there aren't many freak interactions. Fast frames are fast. Fast wheels are fast. I know you love to repeat your bit about finding super special things that only you know about. But that's not the general experience of people who've tested.

Edit: The value is in basically being able to call B.S. on B.S. and not waste time on things that are very unlikely to be worth your time.

@trentnix, @grill, @whomever else.

everyone will be happy. the plan is to do both rider on and rider off.

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@adamwfurlong

Excellent. With rider-off, please control for saddle (same saddle on everything at the same saddle height) and control the bar setup (same armpad/stack and reach across the board).

The OP mentioned lots of different options which will require lots of different tests. Prioritizing is key, because you'll run out of time and money before you'll run out of things you want to test. We tested negative sweeps only on our modest (but crazy expensive) trip to the wind tunnel and that allowed us to do 35-40 runs before the clock ran out. We learned a lot, but mostly we learned how much we didn't know.

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Trent Nix
Owned and operated Tri Shop
F.I.S.T. Advanced Certified Fitter | Retul Master Certified Fitter (back when those were things)

edits added


you are right but not pragmatic enough.


most of what we have today is A. its a bunch of engineers writing rules and then playing a game by those rules and [spoiler!] winning.


what the P5x gave us was C. they assumed an amalgamated position (and luggage) and said "this is what you proles will experience".


what we want to do is B. we want to "find the bike that works best for MY (their) position ". this isn't feasible. I can't find my fit, buy a dozen bikes, with dozens of components, and dial it all in the wind tunnel. it would cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.


for the record, B has happened one time ever. it was Crowie before the 70.3 WC in Vegas. and he picked a Cervelo!!! LOL

How about even normalizing extension shape, bend and reach? Is that important?

Since thats also been done/considered.

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"One Line Robert"

It's absolutely important, and some extensions will test better than others without the rider's hands covering the extension. That bike that ships with ski bends instead of s-bends is going to be unfairly penalized. But then that requires a substantial amount of cost and effort to do. And down the rabbit hole we go...

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Trent Nix
Owned and operated Tri Shop
F.I.S.T. Advanced Certified Fitter | Retul Master Certified Fitter (back when those were things)

come on dude(s), seriously. Don't you think we thought about seats, bars, extension shapes about 89 emails, 15 phone calls and at least 6 weeks ago?

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Brian Stover USAT LII
Accelerate3 Coaching
Insta

Excellent. Glad to know the testing is in immensely capable hands.

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Trent Nix
Owned and operated Tri Shop
F.I.S.T. Advanced Certified Fitter | Retul Master Certified Fitter (back when those were things)

All bikes that accept standard extensions will have the same size, bend, shape, angle and length extensions. Lots of money and time have been spent to normalize as many variables as possible. I'd say beyond the degree we've seen from other manufacturer tests (the P5x using straight extensions for the SC as an example).

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"One Line Robert"

Donated.

This thread makes me LOL SO MUCH. I'm just glad One Line Robert and Kiley are BACK!!!!!!!!!!! Bill needs to get a chance to become Two Line Robert.

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Make Inside Out Sports your next online tri shop! http://www.insideoutsports.com/

Why not just post on TriRoost/TRS....will save a lot of headaches

No one reads TRS anymore.

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Make Inside Out Sports your next online tri shop! http://www.insideoutsports.com/

I'm just curious where your proverbial pitchfork has been stored for EVERY OTHER WIND TUNNEL REPORT EVERY POSTED ON SLOWTWITCH. You're normally pretty rational, so this is sort of surprising.

I would suggest creating a FACEBOOK page or something along those lines and just post it there if that is acceptable to you. If at some point, you are able to post here with less issues, you can get post it later. There are a fair number of people that are interested without all of the other BS attached.

Adding to Brian's assertion that this is actually not true. I've done multiple days with Specialized in their tunnel. According to Chris & Mark, my own ability to repeat my position is better than their ability to repeat a position with a mannequin. I was, at the time anyway, the "most repeatable" athlete they'd had in there, but still I'd doubt that I'm THAT "special."

There are two important things. The first is that there is human error with both mannequin and rider. It's a human putting the mannequin on the bike after all. And the second is that humans can use perceptual, visual, and auditory cues to repeat their own positions and to fine tune it while they are on the bike. With a mannequin, it's a much bigger process than to say, "oh, move a couple mm forward/back."

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"Non est ad astra mollis e terris via." - Seneca | rappstar.com | FB - Rappstar Racing | IG - @jordanrapp

James Haycraft wrote:

I'm just curious where your proverbial pitchfork has been stored for EVERY OTHER WIND TUNNEL REPORT EVERY POSTED ON SLOWTWITCH. You're normally pretty rational, so this is sort of surprising.

I think I'm being pretty rational right now, but opinions may differ! And I'm fine with that.

I honestly never participated in those discussions because I either didn't see them or didn't feel like I knew enough to add my voice. My participation on this forum is actually pretty recent, to be honest, and it's somewhat sparse as well.

But what I do see, at least in this discussion, are three perilous signs:

1. The OP, despite what I believe are good intentions in this case, is a noted polemic. It becomes hard not to be skeptical that the results of this testing will be used in a fair and appropriate manner. Especially when statements like "first of its kind in many ways" are made. Especially when the questions the testing is supposed to answer are complex.
2. Statements by individuals involved that seem upset they aren't getting the deference they believe they deserve.
3. Comment after comment on the GoFundMe say things suggesting they expect the results to help inform them on which bike they should buy.

I'm participating in this thread, trying to bring a bit of skepticism to the exercise, because I've made the exact same mistakes myself. I paid $6k, plus salaries, plus transportation, to do our own testing. And I was guilty of all three of the things I mentioned above.

I thought we'd be able to "wade through marketing" and get to the !truth!. I was convinced that all my planning and thinking and previous trips to the tunnel made me well-equipped to get real answers. And I was convinced that since I was spending my own money, my testing would be without bias. I thought we would be able to answer the "what to buy?" questions. And ultimately I found out I didn't know much about wind tunnels and aerodynamics at all.

No mistake, our trip was valuable, we learned a lot, and we plan on going back. But we've tempered our expectations about what kind of questions we can definitively answer and what we can really learn from wind tunnel testing. We've learned how much more we have to learn to even be competent in giving advice about aerodynamics. And we continue to try and equip ourselves better so we can speak to customers confidently and help them make informed purchasing decisions.

Ryan Cooper with Best Bike Split is coming to the shop this Friday and Saturday to do presentations and talk aerodynamics. Every time I see the poor guy, I gnaw his ear off trying to extract as much knowledge out of his head as possible. His presentations are free and anyone reading is welcome to come and join us.

Every time I talk to Mat Steinmetz I hit him with question after question trying to learn more, until he finally walks away just so he can be left alone.

I do the same with John Cobb. I do the same with Dave Ripley. And on and on. And one common thing I continue to learn from all of these people is that skepticism is healthy when it comes to wind tunnel analysis.

This stuff is really, really hard. I admire anyone putting as much time and energy into this as you guys are. And I look forward to the results. But you'll have to pardon my apprehension as to whether the efforts will accomplish the mission described in the OP.

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Trent Nix
Owned and operated Tri Shop
F.I.S.T. Advanced Certified Fitter | Retul Master Certified Fitter (back when those were things)

I want to address a few points.

I am / we are working and will work with Dan to hopefully gain his comfort with this testing. It's an exceptionally difficult task, and I can understand his skepticism not having seen how much time and effort and other resources have gone into planning for this day. I hope he will become comfortable with it, and I'm open to his ideas and thoughts. Like the many other experts whose feedback we've received and valued, his can also improve the testing. As can others who are commenting here. So I appreciate the questions and feedback -- that's the point of this thread.

The testing is of a rider on and rider of nature of five bikes (or six) from five manufacturers. I will be the rider on board, and the reason for that is practical. I already have two of these bicycles pre-configured identically, and I have been able to, with help from lots of others, obtain a slate of identical components to work towards consistency across the board.

Most of you have no idea how difficult this is. Even with our best efforts, not everything can be normalized entirely. For instance, the Tactical comes with one shape of extensions and one shape only -- they cannot be replaced. So unless we were to use the Tactical as the common denominator and purchase 22.2 extensions that are of similar shape, we are going to have some differences. Even if we had identical extensions to the Tactical, the clamps for those extensions will differ from bike to bikes, and the location of the clamp will differ slightly relative to pad center. Still, we will come close, or as close as we can.

I/we considered a mannequin. I traded emails with Mat Steinmetz almost two months ago, and he was going to work towards borrowing the same (very expensive) mannequin Cervelo used to facilitate their testing. The reality was that if we were to use that mannequin then neither of my two bikes would have been an option. Manny is two sizes up from my bikes. So in order to effectuate this testing I would have needed to come up with five new bikes. That just wasn't going to happen. Moreover, the mannequin needs to be bolted into the pads, so if you want to amass a slate of pads and cups -- as I have, to best normalize the ergonomics of that variable -- they aren't going to be much use after the testing. And then, if you use manny -- after all that -- there's still this question of does the static position of Manny really adequately capture the nature of the drive side slow for a pedaling rider? The Andean and the P5-X both have very different designs in this area, than say, Ventum.

Will there be more noise in the "rider on" (vs. "rider off") output data -- yes! The data will need to have larger error bars. Even with the rider on testing we are working to eliminate variables. I will not be wearing a helmet, for instance, because that's a variable that makes the head position variably doubly difficult to control (helmet moves and head moves). My plan is to look straight down for the duration, which is also not something that is practical, but it helps reduce the noise.

trentnix's logic taken to the extreme becomes absurd. You could be Specialized and have a wind tunnel in your office and still not come close to scratching the surface in terms of the interacting variables across bikes, sizes, riders, components, hydration setups, cockpit length (the list is endless). As Haycraft said, at a certain point you need to pick a protocol, simplify where necessary, and properly caveat the results on the back end. The point is to make absolute claims that in every case these results apply to you! They may, or they may not. But if we find large differences between certain frames (or don't) then I think we can say with confidence that this learning could apply more broadly.

Finally, I want to address accusations of bias. If I do have bias, I don't know in which way I would be biased. As an equal opportunity critic, Publius said bad things about every single one of these bicycles (and many more). The whole Publius thing was meant to take one kernel of an opinion and present it in a way that would stimulate engagement and discussion on that issue. I THOUGHT THAT WAS OBVIOUS. That worked until it stopped working and now it's done. RIP Publius. I'm sorry he hurt your feelings. Can we move on?

The perception that the wind tunnel is some mysterious voodoo magic place is hilarious to me.

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Make Inside Out Sports your next online tri shop! http://www.insideoutsports.com/

 
what aspects of the upcoming test changed your mind going from offering front page space for the original test to kind of not wanting to even allow it on the forum ?

Massive mistake from your side. This is a god-damn forum, not pubmed for Christ's sake. Do you ask all the site sponsors to provide peer reviewed studies on all their marketing claims? The implications are that you can spread Marketing BS as long as you sponsor the site. But you can't publish data that can make the sponsors look bad unless your data is backed by methods approved by the site owner.

So much for freedom of speech!

This statement is not true. Nobody ever read TRS.

However, there is a home for this publication over there should Dan not allow it here.

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Internet User

Just because it irks me, "freedom of speech" is a right guaranteed by The US Constitution from infringement by the GOVERNMENT. Private enterprise is allowed - and does - restrict freedom of speech all the damn time. There is (almost) nothing that makes you look more foolish than complaining about "Freedom of Speech" on a forum like this.

Second, and related the above, we - meaning Slowtwitch - are potentially liable for anything written/posted here that could be considered harmful/libelous/defamatory/etc. There is an obvious, logical, and implied skepticism when Cervelo presents its own data. When someone else is presenting data that is seemingly objective, that same skepticism may be withheld. This has the potential to be problematic. Let's take this a step further. In addition to wind tunnel testing, Kiley might also be proposing to subject these frames to impact testing to judge their "safety." The implications of such testing are massive. This was part of a "debate" I had with Publius (RIP) on another thread. The impact of negative information is outsize relative to positive data.

Negative data is typically viewed as more truthful. It would take a lot of positive data points to offset one negative data point. The damage that can be done to the reputation of a company is massive. Outside of any potential legal liability, Dan is a long time pillar of the triathlon community and is understandably reticent to allow someone who has shown a penchant for cutting down companies to present his "data" on this forum without some vetting of that information. Why should Slowtwitch enable someone who has - at least superficially - demonstrated that they have an axe to grind tear into those companies who actually support this sport?

Trolls have in fact won the internet. https://theoutline.com/...-the-trolls-have-won

And the response is always the same from most of these people, who - in person - are decent enough. "I thought it was obvious I was just playing a role; I was just being a devil's advocate..." Bullshit. You're sniping from the cheap seats. All these companies have real skin in the game. And if you don't think as a part of this community that you have some responsibility to support the companies that help make this sport possible, I'm sorry. We here at Slowtwitch feel that we do have that responsibility.

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"Non est ad astra mollis e terris via." - Seneca | rappstar.com | FB - Rappstar Racing | IG - @jordanrapp

You touch on it briefly here, but one thing that is missing from ALL "whitepapers" (along with error bars, which I hope you include) is a section on possible sources of error. All of these engineers know this. No professor ever would have approved a paper without a acknowledgement of possible sources of error. I think it would be well worth your time - and would speak to your credibility - if you put a section together on that. Things like the extensions on the Premier Tactical, why you didn't use a mannequin, etc.

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"Non est ad astra mollis e terris via." - Seneca | rappstar.com | FB - Rappstar Racing | IG - @jordanrapp

Just a small note/suggestion: I have a Selle SMP road saddle with very little padding that I use for my field testing and I also took it with me to A2. The unique shape of the saddle coupled with the fact that it has no padding and I prefer clothing with basically no chamois means that there is really only "one" position for my rear. If I move forward or back on that saddle I get significant "feedback" (lol). If one were to look at variability for a rider in a wind tunnel or field testing, I'd hazard to guess the rider moving fore/aft on the saddle is one of the larger causes.