Endurance Innovation

44 - Go Faster on the Bike Pt 3

Episode Summary

In the third installment of our 'Go Faster' series, Andrew and Michael revisit aerobars and crank length, look at ceramic bearing upgrades, 1x vs 2x drivetrains, and tires.

Episode Notes

• 3:00 custom, 3D printed aerobars
• 4:00 off-the-shelf, long-pad options
• 8:30 Morf bars
• 11:15 the advantages of shorter crank arms
• 13:15 crank length is part of your drive train
• 17:00 into the weeds we go about crank arm length!
• 20:00 Andrew’s thoughts on ceramic bearing upgrades: a lot of money for minor gains
• 21:30 where do you find bearings on a bike and how upgrading them to ceramic may be beneficial
• 23:15 the benefit of oversized jockey wheels
• 26:00 the benefit of a clean and lubricated chain
• 27:00 what does a squeaky drivetrain mean
• 28:00 pros and cons of dry lube
• 29:30 1x vs 2x drivetrains: 1x is simpler and a little more aerodynamic, but at the cost of higher friction drag
• 39:00 rewind to the cost of a full Ceramic Speed upgrade 
• 41:00 on tires, tire pressure, and rolling resistance
  • Continental Gatorskin @ 29kph & 100PSI has a rolling resistance of 20.2W / tire (40.4W per pair)
  • Continental GP5000 @ 29kph & 100PSI has a rolling resistance of 10.7W / tire (21.4W per pair)
• 48:00 tire pressure: hysteresis losses vs vibrational losses
• 51:45 max tire pressure: tire max vs rim max
• 54:15 wider tires will have a lower rolling resistance at the same air pressure as narrower tires
• 55:15 get a pump with a reliable pressure gauge 
• 56:00 butyl tubes vs latex tubes: latex tubes must be inflated more frequently, but come with a savings of ~2W per tire (4W total) when compared with butyl
• 58:15 the cost of poor cornering in a course with a 90deg turn every 1km 
  • If baseline for a confident bike handler, cornering at 0.8g is 240W
  • Then someone who is overly cautious and can only corner at 0.3g is 247W
• 1:04:00 revisiting rim vs disk brakes

Check out part 1 and part 2 of our series. The resources we sited in the episode were the 1x v 2x article, the excellent Bicycle Rolling Resistance site, and the FLO tire pressure article.