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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [desert dude] [ In reply to ]
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desert dude wrote:
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air armwrestle with your sleeves rolled up like Arnie and Carl Weathers


You've obviously have never seen my biceps. They are the World's Most Aero Biceps (TM & patent pending) part of the reason I have ridden sub 4:59 on < 189w in an IM.

You don't work hard in the gym to get biceps like this! (copyright)

DD speaks the truth - I've seen better arms on a record player.

Mine are even more aero, but that's because they're more 404 Firecrest shaped.
His are like 101's.

I'm not in the market for a new whip, but I am interested in the results of this testing.
Assuming The Great Leader allows us to read it here.


float , hammer , and jog

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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [kileyay] [ In reply to ]
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 My sincere apologies if this has been covered somewhere and I'm just not seeing it. I'm not terribly studious at scouring these forums. But I'm curious, why is Dimond not a part of this test?
With the drastic difference between the P5X frame shape versus the Dimond, it seems like it would make sense. No?

Salton Sea Triathlon Club
“I swim to get to the bike. I run because nobody gives a shit about aquabike.â€
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [knighty76] [ In reply to ]
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knighty76 wrote:
Very chuffed this is happening.

Just donated the pittance I have left after taking the kids on holiday for a week. Look forward to the outcome.


I'll just never understand why some call this "the divorce sport"
😂

Salton Sea Triathlon Club
“I swim to get to the bike. I run because nobody gives a shit about aquabike.â€
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [getbarreled] [ In reply to ]
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A number of reasons:

First, Dimond was made aware of this test -- not by me, but by someone affiliated with them -- and they elected not to participate in terms of making equipment available. By contrast, Ventum and Premier offered equipment and substantial assistance setting up the equipment. Diamondback also came through in the clutch and prioritized deliverty of equipment (with just days to spare) and continue to provide intellectual support.

Others did offer to lend Dimond frames, but the only size that worked for me had issues. It had the old 3T fork, and if you believe Dimond's own data and claims, the Marquise frame and Super Fork (and stem cover) are massively faster -- 15+ watts faster. Using this old model would be tantamount to testing a classic P3 because we couldn't get a P5. Plus, this bike needed a new, longer seat post to hit my saddle height. That just wasn't in the budget.

Finally, we could not test everything as there are only so many hours in a day and so many dollars here.

We were lucky to obtain the bikes we have and grateful for a strong and representative slate.

-The Cervelo P5/P5-X need no introduction, especially given that the P5 is perhaps the most broadly tested frame in the last five years.

-The Ventum is widely rumored (on these boards) to be very very fast, and with test results to back it up -- which makes sense, given how fast the Lotus has tested and how relevant it has remained aerodynamically for decades.

-The Premier Tactical has no peer in price value at the high end of triathlon bikes, assuming it is fast enough to warrant its price point, which we want to find out.

-The Felt B series is old and slow -- or is it really, when you put a fast bar and fast brakes and set it up like your race depended on it (as I do)?

-And the Diamondback Andean is the other disc brake time trial bike that is claimed to be faster than the P5. Are disc brakes slow? Probably, but nobody really knows. The P5-X and the Andean will be the first thru axle bicycles to be tested at A2 -- as we speak, the team is working on fashioning a part to facilitate the assessment of these seminal bikes.

The Dimond and the Canyon were on deck and in the hole, respectively. Excluding them was no oversight, I assure you, but the product of finite resources and logistical tenabality.
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [kileyay] [ In reply to ]
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Thank you for such a thorough reply! Makes complete sense. Was hoping to see the Ventum beat it. ;)

Salton Sea Triathlon Club
“I swim to get to the bike. I run because nobody gives a shit about aquabike.â€
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [desert dude] [ In reply to ]
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desert dude wrote:

You've obviously have never seen my biceps. They are the World's Most Aero Biceps (TM & patent pending) part of the reason I have ridden sub 4:59 on < 189w in an IM.

So a 4:58 then?


--Chris
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [kileyay] [ In reply to ]
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as you broached the subject of bike sizing just above, i'm sure this is somewhere if i look for it, but i can't find it. what ARE the set ups? maybe these are in my in box, in an email brian sent me. but i'm not at my in box (i'm away from my office and i have client side email archiving).

one of the things i'm keenly interested in - which i think is different in scope than what heath and brian typically do to the best of my knowledge - is precisely how these bikes are set up. how did you go about choosing size, front end spec, extension shape, crank length, wheels, hydration and so forth.

Dan Empfield
aka Slowman
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [Slowman] [ In reply to ]
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Slowman wrote:
what ARE the set ups?

It's the right question. The answers are in your inbox, but I'm happy to expand upon them a bit and share with the community and public in advance. The report will have every component and setup annotated and delineated, and pictures of each test rig will be offered from the front, side, back, aerial, etc.

Broadly, the principal goal from the outset was to align as many variables as possible. I'll vomit up a lot of detail here for those who are inclined, but the tl;dr is that we thought of everything and have aligned almost everything as best as is practically possible.

Size: I feel comfortable riding anywhere between 560 and 575 on the stack, and anywhere between 465-480 on the reach. Because I am the rider on board, the sizes of each bike needed to allow for these ranges and needed to work vis-a-vis each other. This wasn't very ambiguous, because for most of these bikes -- the Andean, the Felt, the P5, the Ventum, and the Tactical -- only one size exists that worked or one size that worked without material modifications (like hacking the Tactical's extension placement, which was considered before we pushed back the test date) or huge amounts of spacer stack. I'm 5'8" 145 lbs and ride aggressively -- there simply aren't that many bikes that fit me in multiple sizes when I'm at the floor of 700c geo designs. The P5-X is unique -- it's one of the only bikes that I know of that fits me in its stock form in three sizes. Luckily the medium is what was made available and the medium is what makes the most sense to me. I'm at the bottom of the stack envelope there in the lowest configuration. It's the size I would buy were I to win the lottery and be able to afford the P5-X.

Despite my best efforts, prescribing final stack and reach values is a work in progress. I thought we had aligned on 565, but the P5 is at 570, so the reality is that we are going to need to bring the other bikes up to meet the highest (lowest?) common denominator in stack. I think we are good hitting 475-480 reach in all sizes.

In sum, the fit was partly input and partly output, but ultimately the key was to make sure everything was the same for the coordinates that matter. We have an x/y tool from SICI -- thanks Gary from Purely Custom coming through here -- which will true up any discrepancies between the fits.

Front End Spec: Every front end is stock except for the Felt B series, which has the Enve bar. The Enve bar is one of two bars available that allows me to hit my stack on that bike -- and both require undermount configuration. The non Enve one is no longer produced, and I have cracked two of them at that clamp, and ended up selling the third to fund the Enve purchase.

With Premier, P5-6, and Tactical, there is no other sensible option, and I couldn't think of a reason to swap the bar on the Ventum.

There are a number of after market bars that will fit the Andean, all of which I considered, but all of them were going to be inferior than the stock Corsair. It's hard to describe, but the way the stock Andean stem flairs out renders most bars non-starters, unless you want to take a hacksaw to it (like Jordan). The Andean's bento storage and hydration integration and the junction between the stock stem and the steerer/top tube are unique, and while you could use a third party bar/stem combo like the Zipp Vuka Stealth, it would look like garbage and likely be a dog aerodynamically -- which is also why Jordan is running the Vuka Bull with the hacked up stock stem, I presume.

Pads/Cups: Even though you didn't ask, others have and I wanted to touch on this. We are also trying to strike a balance between normalizing the shape of the pad and using the pad that provides for the closest match in reach and pad width. For example, the Andean pads are the stock Corsair ones, while the Felt B series pads are my preferred Profile Design pads. The incongruity here is acceptable because we think pad x/y is more important than totally consistent cup/pad architecture, as long as the frontal area of these cups/pads are quite similar. In this case, we needed to use the Corsair stock cups to hit my reach, but aerodynamically we think there will be no difference, as the shapes are almost identical to the PD version. We have multiple pairs of PD pads/cups and a few other options like them (with more holes) to facilitate equivalent setups on this.

Extensions: My preferred extensions are the Zipp Evo 110 Carbons. I don't know if they're fast, because I haven't dutifully tested, but they're comfortable. With the undermount setup on the Felt, they put my hands in a comfortable and eye-ball aero position. Because of how they are designed and how you can cut them, they are also a good choice for standardizing hand position across the board.

Anyways, all bikes except the Premier Tactical -- which has proprietary extensions/clamps -- will have these extensions. The cockpit length on all bikes will be identical. The rise above the pad will be as close as possible, given the obvious constraint of where the actual extension clamp sits on the front end in question. Even while the Tactical extensions will have a slightly different shape, we think the length and rise can be normalized to acceptable tolerances.

Cranksets: All 165mm 52/36 across the board. This was non negotiable. P5-X and P5 came with 170s -- non starter, so we have gone to considerable effort to swap BBs, etc. Position wise, I am sensitive to even minor changes in crank length, and of course a change in crank length changes the position. It's hard to imagine ring spec meaningfully impacts aerodynamics, but better safe than sorry here. We have four 165 52/36 cranks at our disposal, and all bikes are being set up to accept GXP.

Wheels: There is only one firm in the industry that is producing an optimized disc brake rim and optimized rim brake rim of same depth, product spec, etc., and that's Enve. We are using the Enve 7.8 SES rim and Enve 7.8 SES disc. I have effort to acquire these, including selling my Zipps, even though I think the Zipps are superior.

Hydration/Storage: I think you saved the most challenging for last. This question has plagued me. I mean that literally -- I woke up with nightmares about second and third bottle setups one night last week.

Garmin and flat kit will be carried as I do/would (with very little aero penalty, presumably) for those bikes that have no accommodation in the design.

But the hydration issue is murkier. I am setting up front hydration on the Felt B Series, Andean, P5, P5-X, and Tactical either the way the manufacturer has recommended or the way I would, which are congruous here. Ventum's design is such that no additional hydration is necessary -- or for Ventum, advisable aerodynamically, even though they say that the BTA impact can swing either way depending on the individual.

Rear hydration is an even more challenging issue. As desert dude noted, Cervelo had problems setting up identical BTS systems from bike to bike (or did so in cases where it made little sense, like on the Ventum). The grimmer reality is that BTS setups can either help or hurt from bike to bike based on individual elements like slackness/steepness of saddle position; type of saddle; effective seat tube angle of the specific bike; protrusion and/or shape of the seat post; and even width of the rider's hips. So by tossing on rear hydration to all of these bikes (Ventum excepted), you don't actually know whether the BTS setup is helping or hurting, aerodynamically. You wouldn't actually know that unless you tested every single bike and setup as a kind of tournament, which we don't have the resources to facilitate (manufacturers don't either).

We are damned if we do, damned if we don't on second bottle/BTS inclusion. If we include it, we are introducing noise into answering the question of which bike is fastest. We are introducing a variable of which we don't know the impact. If we don't, we aren't lending support to the reality of the most typical long course setups. Ventum has a point about "race trim", after all.

The compromise goes like this. We hope to have time to test a limited sweep of BTS setups -- maybe only on two bikes. Perhaps we will have time for -5,0,5 but the hope is to have a full sweep for two bikes and two different BTS setups. We will simply not have time to test BTS setups on every bike. It's not happening without a serious donation. Failing that, and even possibly in addition to that, Brian and Heath have offered to let me scavenge their historical (anonymous) data from Aero Camp riders who have A/B/C tested this variable. Similar to error bars, we would inject into the model "BTS bars" if you will. So every bike except Ventum would get a range of CdA values both positive and negative by which a second or third bottle may impact their aerodynamics. I can work to make this more of a weighted average, or, if there is statistically significant data available, to identify covariates or explanatory variables to better apply these ranges on an individual basis. For instance, females (with larger, child bearing hips) often test better with two bottles BTA than the Stover's of the world. Sebastian Kienle runs two bottles and Frodo runs one -- do you think that's informed by chance or data?

Sorry to vomit words here, but I had a lot to say about this and I know there are at least a few nerds around here who are going to be into every last detail. I also didn't have time to proofread, so hope this makes sense.

Thanks again, everyone, for your support.
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [kileyay] [ In reply to ]
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Good luck !
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [kileyay] [ In reply to ]
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Did you decide on a minimum flat kit for all bikes?

Tactical, P5X and Andrean have flat/spare built in to the design....as Ventum has built in hydration.

Dan Kennison

facebook: @triPremierBike
http://www.PremierBike.com
http://www.PositionOneSports.com
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [Slowman] [ In reply to ]
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Great summary,

My 2c is that bikes should be tested as purchased. IE no hydration, no flat kit....if you want to draw your own conclusions on how you set things up, relative hip width etc then buy the bike you feel is best and go test those "INDIVIDUAL" set ups for yourself....my personal opinion and all that.

One question I have is BB drop, IE relative rider height to ground all else being equal. I honestly don't know how much it matters but if you are riding 165's then theoretically a lower BB drop is better.

Best of luck,

my 2c
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [kileyay] [ In reply to ]
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i think what you want to do on aerobars is normalize for width. if 80 percent of the drag is you, then variations of "you" will test louder than variations within the bike. so, i hear you on the bars that come stock on the bikes, but if one bar doesn't allow you to go wide and another does, i think you have to remain exactly the same in elbow width, even if it's not comfortable (even if you wish the width was wider).

you're going to need to take care and absolutely MEASURE your elbow width, bike to bike, and also stance width. there will be a little variation in stance width, i don't think you need necessarily to change cranks on every bike, but you ought to at least note it.

i bring up hydration because if you said, "no hydration!" that probably penalizes the ventum. but if you put hydration on the bikes, you risk penalizing the P5X because of one of its singular goals, which is not to host the most aerodynamic hydration, rather the hydration that most people resort to most of the time.

thorny issue.

Dan Empfield
aka Slowman
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [kileyay] [ In reply to ]
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I'll say this; I come to Slowtwitch for information and entertainment. This thread and the upcoming Shootout deliver both.

You've done a good job introducing a healthy aspect of skepticism into how I view the information we receive from the industry. I think you've called out more than one naked emperor. Ironically, Dan's initial skepticism and subsequent endorsement of your project added the credibility necessary for the Shootout to gain traction. I hope I am witnessing an evolution at Slowtwitch towards this type of collaboration and away from the vitriol that generally prevents innovation and progress.

Best of luck Tuesday! Do your best to remain transparent and objective. I trust BryanD will keep us entertained and you will keep us informed.

Scott
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [Slowman] [ In reply to ]
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So, here is a thought. Have you considered making the Shootout an annual and official event for Slowtwitch?

You could form a committee of users to define the specs (hydration for example), invite the manufacturers to optimize their products around those specs and have this forum's members finance the independent testing. I know that is easier said than done, but wanted to share the thought while you are here. Seems like it could be a game-changer.


Scott
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [kileyay] [ In reply to ]
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kileyay wrote:
The compromise goes like this. We hope to have time to test a limited sweep of BTS setups

I assume for the B2 you're going to run the Torhans bottle all the time no matter what (even if it's just called a "flat kit?") I've never seen anyone not use it, since, like the Cervelo P4, it's faster with that bottle.

I think your compromise is reasonable. I just spent like 40 minutes trying to come up with something brilliant. But there are dragons and snakes lurking in every option. I

But I think it can be stipulated that it's possible to set up a BTS in such a way that it's nearly aero neutral. So I don't think much is learned by spending a ton of time actually doing so in a perfectly normalized, verified way. For transparency I think you just have to explicitly call out the Ventum's results with asterisks highlighting its tremendous hydration flexibility. Everyone already knows this, but just to avoid appearance of bias against Ventum. Normalizing around the Ventrum's integrated capacity for the other 4 bikes just adds too much risk and cost. (IMO)
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [Slowman] [ In reply to ]
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Dan - I'm not understanding your last post with respect to hydration et. al.- but also in a larger sense.

We definitely need to normalize the bikes from a geometry perspective but I don't want to normalize the design out of the bikes. Example: My elbow cups are a low profile but they are comfortable - just because my competitor can't figure out how to make smaller profile elbow pads comfortable I don't want to normalize for that. Position yes I agree.

One reason I think we are testing and comparing bikes is because each manufacturer has designed a bike that they feel answers complete system issues better than the alternative offers. In this test "better" is defined as more aero - other consideration should and will be considered by consumers.

Fit, comfort, efficiency (aero), hydration, storage, price.

If PremierBike changes the extension (for the test) that we spent X hours designing for comfort and aero in conjunction with the best hydration for our bike, I don't want to normalize it - just say its faster or slower and we like it or we hate it. We made a calculated bet on hand position, comfort and aero-drag.

I don't want Ventum to add a hydration bottle between the arms because everyone else needs too - they solved that issue and may benefit aero wise because of it.

If Diamondback and Cervelo (P5X) think saving watts by putting things inside the bike [flat kit, nutrition etc.] is a good idea they weighed the trade off and may have a weight and high yaw disadvantage for the mass; which can be evaluated. The Tactical spent a lot of time to find out what hydration worked with our front end (FC-35 saves our athletes 3.2 Watts vs no hydration at all.) Tactical also knows that the rear storage saves 1.2 Watts while storing tubes, CO2, tubes, tire levers etc. I want the Ventum to put a flat kit somewhere. We know the Cervelo P5X and Andrean have storage for that.

All the bikes have advantages and some :-) may have disadvantages but that is what this is all about.

We can weigh positives in many ways. Price, Comfort, Aero- Drag, Features,

Stack, reach, elbow pad width, seat height - yes, but innovation not sure the best way to highlight that and not Frankenstein the bikes. How about as sold next time? I'm very comfortable in that space.

Dan Kennison

facebook: @triPremierBike
http://www.PremierBike.com
http://www.PositionOneSports.com
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [Slowman] [ In reply to ]
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Slowman wrote:
i bring up hydration because if you said, "no hydration!" that probably penalizes the ventum. but if you put hydration on the bikes, you risk penalizing the P5X because of one of its singular goals, which is not to host the most aerodynamic hydration, rather the hydration that most people resort to most of the time.

thorny issue.

i personally think in this age where "integration" is such a feature of many of the latest bikes you have to give them a chance to show the benefit of that. and it is true that most of us ride our bikes with some water, some food and some repair kit so to test otherwise is to fail to replicate the real world. what you need to avoid is the cervelo style taping gels on the outside, next to the integrated bento box ;) decide on a standard amount of gear to carry eg what one of you took on your last long course race, and then mount that as well as you can on each bike using whatever features it provides, according to common ST wisdom. this does introduce more variables but otherwise you're not answering any meaningful question. surely one of the key questions here is to see whether a fully loaded P5X is really faster than an equally loaded P5?

i can also see that point that BTA and BTS bottles are more or less aero-neutral so it only adds possible noise to use them but that leaves P5X, ventum and andean fans claiming to have the upper hand no matter what the results and nobody knowing whether that level of integration really has benefit to the informed triathlete
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [kileyay] [ In reply to ]
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I am hardly an expert in these matters but this approach makes much more sense to me; sure it introduces more variables but those are the variables that each company choose to focus on (or ignore) in designing not only the frame but also storage and hydration (or lack thereof)
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [kileyay] [ In reply to ]
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Please weigh each bike, as tested.

Thanks
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [dkennison] [ In reply to ]
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what i'm saying is that we need to neutralize the effect of the rider. if your bike allows the rider to ride with very wide elbows, and that's how he wants to ride, and chooses that option, that penalizes your bike if other bikes don't allow for a wide elbow position. their limitation would in this case actually help them win the test, not because the bike is more aero, it forces the rider to ride more aero (regardless of how that affects his power, breathing, comfort).

i just think the rider should ride in the exact same position on every bike.

as for hydration, ventum has a really great, really stylish system. but it has a limitation. riders who rely on bottles along the way would have to put a cage somewhere on the ventum. this is the conundrum. the P5X (as an example) is optimized for one style of hydration. the ventum for another. and the kit to change a flat is (as you point out) another element. how do you not penalize a P5X or an andean if you don't place the flat repair kit somewhere on all of the bikes?

these are just the issues that make the protocol and decisions for this kind of test tricky for the folks producing it.

Dan Empfield
aka Slowman
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [GreatScott] [ In reply to ]
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"Have you considered making the Shootout an annual and official event for Slowtwitch?"

next year? i don't know what i'm doing next week.

Dan Empfield
aka Slowman
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [Slowman] [ In reply to ]
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Fair enough. Maybe I'll see you out on the trail.

Scott
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [Slowman] [ In reply to ]
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Quote:
we need to neutralize the effect of the rider
Quote:
put a cage somewhere on the ventum

Those was about 82 emails, 15 phone calls and 7 weeks ago that we figured those out. width will be harder but should be solved by moving cups.

As you know, you can always email me your concerns

Brian Stover USAT LII
Accelerate3 Coaching
Insta

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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [Slowman] [ In reply to ]
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A flat repair kit of a tube, tire lever, co2 cartridge and co2 inflator can be bounded up nice and small and installed under the seat and above the top of the seat post. This allows one to carry these items pretty much hidden from the wind.

Also, for these tests to have the most relevance to the most triathletes/TTers I would hope they don't test it for a person who wants to self support themselves through a 112 mile ride, but someone who might be doing a 12 or 24 or 56 mile ride and any ride longer than 90 minutes has refueling options. I would look at the top cycling Tri pros for suggestions (at various distances), not the 6 hour rider packing for tour de slow who can't tolerate any provided refueling options.

Neutralizing identical (body and bike) positions, of course top of mind, neutralizing the ability to carry 8+ gels or 3+bottles, not relevant to the majority of folks looking for their next TT or tri bike.
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Re: The Aero Bike Shootout: New vs. Old; Rim vs. Disc; Direct to Consumer vs. Retailer; Beam vs. Double Diamond (*an update*) [wetswimmer99] [ In reply to ]
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If you read through Kiley's posts you'll see we are testing with 2 things in mind. How Kiley would race as a FOP athlete (multiple top 3 OV amateur at 70.3 races) and how FOP athletes tend to set up their bikes for a race.

I have not been given any indication that we're gearing this towards those that prefer to carry 3,4 or more bottles at the start of an IM or 70.3.

It's partly about how the avg FOP athlete set up not how the average triathlete sets up which is how some recent testing was done.

Brian Stover USAT LII
Accelerate3 Coaching
Insta

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