What’s the general opinion here. Does the person out front do more work with somebody drafting them than they would do if there wasn’t somebody drafting?
Definitely. The person in the front might be psychologically affected by the drafter. Plus the drafter can block the tailwind. In the later scenario, the person in front would do more work because he/she (must be politically correct those days…) wouldn’t get the benefit from the foreward force of the wind.
They have actually done studies of this, and there is a slight positive effect from having a rider on your wheel. It decreases your drag numbers slightly, but measureably.
With someone on your wheel your drag is reduced slightly so you would be doing less work with someone drafting behind you. Try it, you will see.
jaretj
**Does the person out front do more work with somebody drafting them than they would do if there wasn’t somebody drafting? **
Get outta my head, dammit. I was going to ask that.
Went for a ride yesterday and caught up with a guy, and after a couple of minutes of idle chatter, I volunteered to let him draft off me- which wouldn’t normally happen, but he had ridden 80 miles the day before. Anyway, I was a little surprised at our speed while riding together- definitely faster than I would have been by myself.
that’s interesting. can you please explain me how it reduces your drag if you are riding in the front?
My guess would be that it reduces turbulence which is a component of drag. Also, wouldn’t it be similar to the longer length in water being more efficient theory (as read in TI -note: not a troll!)?
Not so sure about the longer length theory moving over to aerodynamics. Actually, I’m not all that familiar for why this is true in hydrodynamics, and I’m not convinced that this transfers over to swimmers like it does from boats.
I also am not so sure a rider in back would “reduce” turbulence, but it will change the way (slightly) the flow moves over the rider in front. Disturbances in the flow will propogate upstream in flow until you hit the speed of sound. This is easily shown by your buddy hearing you when you yell something to him as he is riding in front of you.
I’d like to see the studies where this was shown (lower drag on rider in front) or some references as well, as I’m not 100% convinced that this is true. It is convievable, however.
As far as theswiss’ comments earlier about the rider behind blocking a tailwind, this just won’t happen in most cases. As long as the tailwind is slower than the riders velocity, which pretty much always happens unless you are in some crazy conditions, there will be an effective headwind. With a 10 mph tailwind I can cruise in the upper 20’s, giving me an effective headwind of 7 or so mph. The problem is when you have a 10 mph headwind, which gives you an effective headwind of almost 30 mph.
Don’t know the actual studies…but it is TRUE…you WILL be faster with a drafter behind you. AND the more the merrier!
I’m definitely faster, but how much of that is due to an increase of aerodynamics is the question 
.
I’ve wasted some time following NASCAR and, at least for stock cars, 2 cars (or more) in line are quite a bit faster than a single car. They draft from the front as much as from behind. This is because the following cars reduce the turbulence off the back end of the car in front which is where a siginficant amount of the aero drag comes from on a stock car. Thus, several cars in line have much less drag than a single car. In stock car racing, a faster car will often “wait” for a slower car behind to catch up to take advantage of this effect.
In theory this could apply to cyclists too but even when cyclists are drafting close, their bodies are pretty far apart so I’m not sure this effect would exist to any noticable degree on a bike.
I’m taking a guess here. Imagine a suction type action. It’s not only sucking what’s behind it but it’s pushing what’s in front of it. We normally concentrate on the pushing in front of us when we think of the work we are doing. Now if another suction device was put inbetween what’s being sucked and the first suction device how much easier would it be for the first suction device?
It seems kind of obvious to me now when I think of it in this way. I wonder if anybody can put actual numbers to this though. For example, how much faster would somebody be on a straight away that normally sustains 22mph be with somebody drafting behind him?
Does Lance Armstrong always ride with a teammate drafting him?
Does the person out front do more work with somebody drafting them than they would do if there wasn’t somebody drafting?
This is one of the myths and lore of bicycling, and is not true. Humans on bicycles are too slow, and too far apart (a following cyclist is many multiples of body diameter behind the leading cyclist) for there to be any measurable effect by the following cyclist on the turbulence of the lead cyclist.
Don’t believe it.
**Humans on bicycles are too slow, and too far apart (a following cyclist is many multiples of body diameter behind the leading cyclist) for there to be any measurable effect by the following cyclist on the turbulence of the lead cyclist. **
Many multiples of body diameter? Huh? The lead cyclist is likely not sitting straight upright, so wouldn’t the thing to look at here be torso length? How many multiples of torso length back is the second rider?
Any wind tunnel tests on this?
I just went cross-eyed reading your post.
I assure you, the place to be is behind, not in front (until you cross the line).