Ah gotcha, my Strava analysis was flawed. So 17w for 1s of time. Also interesting how much higher of a max speed Dowsett hit vs. Mullen, although Strava has pulled odd data for my rides before regarding max speed.

And what is going to be your criteria/data point that proves the anti disc brake crowd was wrong? Honest question.

Is it based off what the mfg's are making? Is it based off number of disc brake bikes at races?

We all argue about this and each side wants to be right. But what's going to be the deciding factor on who's right?

Because at the end of the day we all know, we each want to win the argument. :)

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blog

You can really stop it with your thumb? If this video is true that what is the big story?

I am ready right now. My road bike is from 2000. The only things that have changed since then are two more gears 9 to 11, DI2, and Disc Brakes.
My tri bike is from 2008. 10 gears, no DI2.


Give me the new technology!
John

Permission from TriSpouse and appropriate cash in hand.

Here in New Zealand, the rain and sea spray make rubber rim brakes ornamental about half the year. I long for a whole quiver of hydraulic disc equipped bikes. I've even considered (shock horror) selling a bike to get money and space in the bike shed, for a disc equipped road bike. Hell, I might even sell one of my 3 tri bikes to upgrade to a disc tri bike too. but that would really mean I'd have to start racing again, and that might be what stops me :-)

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TriDork

"Happiness is a myth. All you can hope for is to get laid once in a while, drunk once in a while and to eat chocolate every day"

Sure you can stop it with your thumb...when it's like that. It's a totally different prospect during the actual use case and conditions.

Under the right conditions, you can gently press your thumb against a sharp knife blade and not have it cut you either...but, that doesn't mean it's perfectly safe to go flinging them around with mass (inertia) behind them, or to quickly jam your thumb (or other body parts) against it, now is it?

Physics really must be a hard thing for most people to understand...

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http://bikeblather.blogspot.com/

Probably when hell freezes over. But only b/c I'm cheap and want value out of my purchases. Heck, my training bike is a 1997 Cannondale CAAD3. Fits great. Must have 50,000 miles on that thing. Replaced the STI once, everything else (minus consumables and crash damaged bars) is as I built it in 1998 (purchased as a leftover frame/fork). Raced that until two years ago, and bought a 2009 QR CD 0.1 for racing. Why? Some bit lighter, way more aero and less hassle in swapping the special carbon-only pads before/after race day (the carbon wheels now stay on the dedicated race bike).

Well, I train on the QR a little and race on it a few time per year. It probably gets 500 miles per year. Based on my experience with the CAAD3, I guess that I could ride it for 100 years! BUT, not if we're all going to new technologies - 15 speed rear cassettes, thought-triggered shifting and, yes, disc brakes. Each of these advances costs $ to retrofit to existing bikes that operate *fine*. And I'm too slow to be seeking marginal gains as part of Team Sky. So, really, what is the advantage in a race bike for disc wheels? Sure, edge case of long descents on full carbon wheels. If I lived in the Alps... Better wet braking - ok. But neither of these has caused me any significant troubles in the past. Sorry, we are not heavy enough or fast enough to really justify disc brakes on race bikes in the same way that they make sense on motorcycles and cars/trucks. So, if you've got the $ and want the latest, go for it. Just sell me your three year old superbike for a few $100...

You didn't have to add the last sentence. That's just piling on.
Thanks for the perspective.
John

Well that illustrates the point. I've been hearing similar things about electronic shifting for... what... 8 years now. Like it matters...

It's like saying something nice about Windows on Slashdot. Or drawing a picture of Mohammed in front of an ISIS member. Not as drastic as saying something nice about tubulars around Tom A, mind you. :-), but right up there.

Well, the problem with those videos is people take them as "proof"...without thinking things through. It's just frustrating to have them posted over and over again...

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http://bikeblather.blogspot.com/

I don't hate tubulars...they're just OLD technology. We have newer/better tech. Why are pro cyclists still using that old-fashioned method of mounting tires when there's newer technology tires they could use? What other high-performance wheeled vehicles still GLUE tires onto rims?

Sound familiar? ;-)

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http://bikeblather.blogspot.com/

So you don't ever ride your tri-bike in traffic or the rain?

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'It never gets easier, you just get crazier.'

Very rarely in traffic or rain, and never with 20+ extra pounds of pannier luggage on board.

I definitely agree my disc brake bike has superior braking performance, and I suppose if you offered to wave a magic wand and convert my tri bike and race wheels to discs, I'd take you up on it. It's just not such a priority that I'd go out and buy a new tri bike and wheels just to get better braking.

To be honest, I am not really sure.
But it was an interesting demo.
But it's not one that I am going to run out and replicate ... because I like my thumb.

To summarize, there are 3 completely separate issues with disc brakes, and there is a lot of confusion on the the conflicting data avail, and the issues all get mixed up (here and other places) constantly:

1) Can a state of the art TT/Tri bike include disc brakes, and is such a bike truly more aero than a optimized rim brake TT bike?

2) Are disc brakes truly more effective and more safe (safe in braking action) than optimized rim brakes for ROAD use? (There is little argument that disc brakes work great off road, mostly because rim brakes are crap off road, it is in high speed and high kinetic energy ROAD applications that disc brakes can have some unfortunate and scary failure modes ... )

3) Then, finally, are disc brakes safe (safe in impact or crashing) in peloton racing or training?

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Advanced Aero TopTube Storage for Road, Gravel, & Tri...ZeroSlip & Direct-mount, made in the USA.
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This really needs to stop being said. The P5, Speed Concept, Felt IA, etc. are all OPTIMIZED for rim brakes.

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I think I was not 100% clear.

I did not mean, a TT bike optimized FOR rim brakes.

I meant, a fully OTHERWISE OPTIMIZED TT bike with rim brakes.

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Advanced Aero TopTube Storage for Road, Gravel, & Tri...ZeroSlip & Direct-mount, made in the USA.
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What does that even mean? Everyone keeps saying that with no ability to define what that means. The front ends of these bikes are all designed around that rim brake. Therefore, it is optimized for rim brakes.

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

To start,

An optimized disc brake TT bike would be designed to be as aero as possible using a state of the art disc brakes, an optimized disc brake frameset, and an optimized disc brake wheelset (with appropriate rims, hubs, spokes, and spoke count), etc.

An optimized rim brake TT bike would be designed to be as aero as possible using a state of the art rim brakes, an optimized rim brake frameset, and an optimized rim brake wheelset (with appropriate rims, hubs, spokes, and spoke count), etc.

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We....already have all of that.

The P5-X and Andean were designed to be faster than rim brake bikes. You can argue all day long about the test protocol but I'm going by the charts.

Magura brakes are not state of the art? P5 or Speed Concept is not optimized? Zipp 808 NSW and Disc is not optimized rim brake wheels?

We are already at the optimized rim brake bikes and wheels.

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I am not saying that we do not have rim brake optimized bikes.

What I am saying is that, to the best of my knowledge, good 'apples-to-apples' aero equipment comparisons have not been done (in the public data realm).

The P5X and Andean are cool, but they not like any other bikes previously, so it is very hard to compare them to other state of the art rim brake TT bikes. If you change a lot of design variables at the same time with new bikes, it is really hard to know what makes it faster or slower (based on public data, of course).

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If you think the bike companies have enough money to separately develop a "state of the art rim brake" bike and a disc brake bike, you would be wrong.

The test protocol from Cervelo is the best test setup data we currently have. Comparing the P5-X to the P5 is a fair comparison and represents the best of what Cervelo has.

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Wait...isn't there a YouTube video with the designer of the Andean admitting it would be faster if it had been designed with rim brakes in mind?

And are you really hanging your hat on the P5X being faster than other bikes, when tested with random gels taped to stems?

The true believer is gonna believe, I guess :-/

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Sure, you can compare the P5 to the P5X aerodynamically. Yes, they are totally different bikes, but a comparison is completely fair. You are comparing old tech to new tech.

But you can't use the bike comparisons (at least not fairly) as an indicator as whether or not a disc brake TT bike is aerodynamically superior or not.

That is what I am trying to say.

Greg

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Yes, you can. When do you draw the line? Even if Cervelo released an updated P5 in 2017, then released a P5-X in 2020, you would still hear the same arguments. The P5 was Cervelo's best effort at rim brakes from 2009-2012. The P5-X was designed from 2013-2016. You have to draw a line somewhere and say "we are going disc brakes".

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