This image is from the new 20 meter draft thread. Imagine you’re someone who knows nothing about cycling and you saw this - WTF? IMHO, Cycling’s perception in the US is pretty poor without us looking like this!
Don’t get me wrong - I love my Scott Plasma with aerobars, and I find the whole “cheating the wind” subject absolutely fascinating (bike, wheels, helmet, clothing, the whole thing), but let’s face it, we look silly!
Then there’s the safety issue - more than a few have been seriously injured because of not looking where they are going. I believe some countries have banned aerobars for Junior competitions because of this.
I realize it’s too late to put the Genie back in the bottle. Did the Undo Cycling Innovation miss the boat on this one - should they have clamped down on aerobars right from the get-go? I wonder what they would do if they had access to a time machine?
Again, my real concern is the public’s perception of cycling.
If triathon decided that no one was allowed to use them on the amateur level, I would be totally fine with it. I don’t care about how it looks, I only care about the safety. And more specifically, while I can choose not to use them myself, others using them (and the safety issues that they cause) does effect all of us.
Aerobars aren’t unsafe, it’s the people riding them, and the bike setups with them that are.
By that inherently the risks come from not having the hands on the brakes, losing control, and colliding with something. The last is just inattention, with a side order of position and helmet choice, the stability is taking an already forward weighted position and adding loads of bottles that potentially are sloshing around amplifying the instability. Note a normal road bike setup is inherently stable.
And then the rider, and we’re making that worse with all the indoor training that means people turn up on startlines without the time actually spent controlling the bike.
Note that I am 100% pointing the finger at myself for the last. I came from a background of riding 400km a week across 6 club rides/races including the 100+ saturday ride hail wind or shine, to now rarely venturing outside when it’s not a race. Even with the background I had then it’s now a significant focus as we (myself and coach) saw this had become a limiter.
The aerobar ‘risk’ is far overstated. Yes, it occurs, but I’ll bet the sheer number of aerobar-induced accidents is 10-1000x less than the number of bike accidents that occur while the rider is COMPLETELY STOPPED. (Plenty of broken wrists, elbows, head traumas while tipping over on a bike while completely stopped.)
People who aren’t comfortable on aerobars just don’t ride in them. On curvy descents, I’ll stay out of my aerobars because it’s beyond my comfort zone with all those curves.
And nothing looks weird to me about that photo with a row of cyclist in aerobars. In fact, ask random non-cyclists who watch TdF stages, and their eyes bug out when they see the team TT, with their awesome aerobars, aerohelmets, and aeropositions that make them look out of this world.
FWIW as well, I think triathlon would have been better off had aerobars not been legal - it adds to the cost barrier of an already expensive sport and probably turns off not an insignificant group of budding triathletes who are just too intimidated by the concept of buying an aerobar bike.
Who cares about “public perception” ? Triathletes riding bikes with aerobars make up a tiny portion of the general cycling public and I think because you are a Triathlete you notice them far more than the average person on the street.
In 40 years of my time in this sport the only issue/accidents I have seen specifically from aerobar use is bolt failure with clip on bars mostly due to poor maintenance.
I find it absolutely fascinating that there are people who devote their energy to worrying about what other people might think about how they look while participating in a sport they enjoy.
As a 62 year old man – I know how I look while in a wetsuit, on a bike in aero, and on the run in a tri suit. And I know many people think I look “silly”. And, on the list of things I worry about in life, it’s so far down the list that I’m not sure I could find it with an oil drilling rig.
I understand what you are saying and where you are coming from, but there are plenty of studies that show cyclists are considered “less than human” by people driving cars precisely because of how they look so it’s a reasonable thing to worry about.
Over the decades I have had all kinds of issues with motorists here in Oz throwing things at me,spitting at me,running me off the road,etc,etc,etc. The hatred for cyclists is real (I trace it down to lycra induced homophobia ) but one day I had a thought.
I was riding to my very casual job working for my mates Aircraft Engineering company in Cairns when I passed a guy riding a beater bike wearing “Tradie Gear” (Hi Vis workers clothes) . I thought “I wonder if this bloke gets shit from drivers “ so I asked him. He told me nope,gets lots of thumbs up and joking shit about having to ride ‘cause he must have lost his license.
It got me thinking,maybe motorists wouldn’t hate me so much if I wasn’t totally decked out in lycra . I remember how I was treated differently when bike touring,so went to K-Mart in Cairns and bought a $10 flouro “Tradie T-shirt” and started wearing it riding.The abuse stopped immediately and I haven’t worn a cycling jersey outside of a race in almost 20 years. I don’t even own one now. I no longer get shit from motorists.
It is even better now that I only ride my touring bike and I get near VIP treatment when my trailer is attached.
Same, experience touring has been way more positive when touring. Not sure why. Still some twattery, but seems less frequent even accounting for the lower number of passing cars/trucks. I do fear that most of the time it seems that the idiot drivers are doing it to show off and when touring there’s no-one to ‘impress’.
Yeah I wish I understood why under-educated red necked Billy Bobs in jacked up 4WD penis substitute pick up trucks are so triggered by the mere sight of a few geriatric guys like me pedaling along the side of the road in spandex. I can’t think of many things that could, in reality, be less threatening…
I probably wouldn’t enter any triathlon where an aero bar configuration was outlawed. I started out on road bikes with the clamp on bars. Even then, it was less about “getting aero” and more about having positioning options. Today, I ride tri bikes 99% of the time. I have a hard time even remembering the last time I took one of my roadies out. And every one of them has clamp on aero bars. And if you had ever seen me down on my aero bars, you would understand, at least for me, it has almost nothing to do with aero. Even down on the bars, I have the drag coefficient of a brick wall.
Over 300 triathlons. Never wanted / needed a TT bike. Road bike with clip-ons since 1989. You can go pretty far with that. Train hard. Pedal hard. Tweak the aero / power / comfort triangle.
Yes, but my road bike isn’t as great either. Made the mistake of buying wide integrated bar bike. I also get beat on descents. Climbing is my only strength. Point is the aerobar bike makes amatures a bit lazy at training, thinking the bars do the work
