I just got back from my second outdoor ride of the season(I’m in MA), and it was really depressing. Don’t get me wrong, it was a very nice ride, despite being in the 30’s with 20-30 mph winds, but my average speed was awful. I averaged a little over 16 mph.
The reason for this is that between the traffic, the terrible pavement, the lights, and the wind, I spent almost no time in the aerobars, and not even that much time in the drops. There were a few sections where I got into the aerobars and cruised for a few miles, but mostly not. I spent most of my time trying to keep my tires pointing toward relatively smooth surfaces.
It’s kind of depressing, since I spent most of the winter on the Computrainer building strength and cadence, and I am really comfortable in the aerobars now.
So I’m curious how much time you get to spend riding in your aerobars.
I’m in Boston too, this winter has been so long. I still need to go out more since I’ve been doing mainly spinning and indoor training. Oh well, I usually go on the minute man trail so I can be in the aerobars most of the time. I don’t think I would be on them in the road to be honest. Kind of scary without dem brakes.
The time I spend in the aerobar is much less than the time I spend reading about aerobars on the internet. In the winter I take them off and work on my base training using my road bike. In the beginning of April I fit a clip-on on the road bike and do some speed work in the aero position. I can only spend 15 minutes before I am on the hoods again for a few minutes. In the TT/Tri bike I can go for 50-60 minutes before I need to stretch a bit.
This is a good question jmorrissey, but I am sorry to hear about your rotten ride.
It is pretty typical (as you already know) for rides to
become more enjoyble as the weather breaks.
On our 7:00 AM -9:00 Am weekday rides Mike Aderhold and I ride our road bikes with no aero bars. We are just doing casual riding right now- base level exertions.
When I go out by myself I am on my Cervelo P3 getting used to the new, lower “Bjorn” style handlebar position. I do focus on staying in the aero position but, as you pointed out with traffic and bad pavement, sometimes you simply can’t do it.
West and north of here we have some roads where you can cruise for quite a while in the aero position, so out there I am aero most of the time.
I actually have spent no time in my aero bars recently. However, I do have a pair that I have been meaning to put on e-Bay. In the meantime they have been on my bedroom floor for the past 2 weeks. Somehow they ended up in my bed last night, realizing this at 6:00am today. I do not know if it was the cats that brought them up or if it was a house guest of mine that was pulling a shenanigan.
Again, no riding with them, but I potentially slept 7 hours with a pair of Deda Clip Black carbon bar with the TT bars, last night.
I know that it is not PC to post sale items on this page, but the story transitioned into a sale…sorry slowman and friends… Because I am tired of sleeping with them, we are looking at ROCK BOTTOM prices!!!
I’ve also found waiting for winter to end a bit frustrating, but I have the opposite experience. I find it much easier to stay aero on the roads (assuming not many obstacles) than on the trainer. I just get too fidgety on the trainer.
I’ve found riding loops out of Concord Center can get you onto roads with not much traffic or other interference, though I wish the sand and muck that has accumulated for the past five months would go.
During my weekday rides, I pratically live in my aero bars. I work in the morning and school in the evening so I can get in a long weekday ride. I’ve gone on 80 mile rides on the Tri bike in the aero bars almost the whole way, maybe 20 minutes total out of the bars, mostly because of the occasional stop lights and signs.
Of course, I live in CA, where I ride outdoors year around, I’ve been meaning to get a trainer but why bother. And I live on the very edge of town so I can ride 40-50 miles without seeing a stop light.
I spend quite a bit of time riding in the aerobars unless I’m riding with other people (usually no more than one ride each week). Today in southern Ontario is was very windy and about 6 degrees C where I live. This is only my 3rd outdoor ride of the season so my back is not 100% used to the aerobars but I probably spent about half the ride down in the bars to help fight the wind. Also, as for ride times early in the season … ignore them until you spend some more time in the saddle. I went out for a ride a week ago and the loop is 36km long with a long climb halfway around. I told my wife I’d be back in “just over an hour” since just prior to IMFL last fall I was riding it that fast … I ended up averaging just over 28km/h in the winds and by the time I got home dinner was ready (not necessarily a bad thing depending on whose persepctive you look at it from).
Thanks for the advice. I think you’re right. After all this time on the trainer, actual riding feels really different. It’s interesting to actually feel the surge of speed when you start to hammer, as opposed to just seeing the little readout on your computer go up.
I think that my expectations were a little exaggerated based on people telling me that the Computrainer is harder than real life, but the CT doesn’t take into consideration all the factors I mentioned above. Besides, my first ride outside it was pouring rain, and today was really windy(probably 20-30 mph winds.)
I know I’m a lot stronger now than last summer, but I was 20 minutes slower today than when I rode this course last summer.
You need to join us for Saturday morning ride in the thumb area. We ride in the aerobars for almost the entire 80 miles. Very few cars, fewer stop signs, no lights, lots of wind. Ask Todd Briggs, came up and rode last weekend, great time had by all.
I ride aero pretty much all the time. The few exceptions are when I am in a congested area or if I’m riding with others (and chit chatting). However, since I train 99% of the time alone, I ride aero most of the time. Its race specific and its fast.
I would love to, that really sounds nice. Unfortunately, I have two fits per hour scheduled every SAturday for the next three Saturdays (unitl May) and next weekend I will be working as a mechanic and bike fitter at the U.S. Olympic Trials Triathlon in Waikiki, Hawaii.
Otherwise, I would be there- I could use the miles. Thank you for the invite though!
You wrote that you were “really comfortable in aerobars from riding the computrainer” all winter. That doesn’t work, as I found out a month or so ago. I’d been doing the same - riding in the aerobars on the trainer and it was easy. But it took 2 weeks and about 6/7 road rides to get comfortable actually balancing yourself while looking ahead on the road. Now I can easily handle higher winds, go around cracks and debris etc. staying the 'bars for over 90% of the ride. When the back of your neck stops hurting, then you know you’re really acclimatized.
I spend 85-95% of the time in the aerobars on most of my rides. Where I live in West Michigan I don’t have to worry too much about city traffic. I’ve worked hard to be comfortable in the aero postition. It also helps a lot having the right position and equipment. An postition update last week and new seat (Arione) from Tom D. and it is even more comfortable. The position update was due to increased flexibility and a 10# loss of weight.
ps Tom doesn’t pay me for the plugs ;)- I’m just sold on his shop’s ability to make me comfortable!
I’d shop there too if he wasn’t 710 miles away. The amount of information that he gives away is truly impressive. Most other sites either do it explicitly for money(i.e. bicycling.com) or as part of their e-commerce strategy(read out articles and buy online).