Taping helmet vents allowed?

oliwade

Good evening,

I am riding a stage race from Saturday, representing my island, however whilst I've been given the oppurtunity to use top end kit by my team (S-Works Tarmac, Zipp Wheels etc) I have been left with my usual road helmet. It's light, but the least aero dynamic helmet ever..

As there is a prologue tt using only road kit for stage 1, I was wondering if it was legal to tape over helmet vents? It's a British Cycling sanctioned event however I am unable to find anything on their site concerning this.

Many thanks

sungod

removable helmet covers aren't allowed under uci rules, which i think are a subset of the bc ones

but i think it'd be more likely to come down to the rule barring equipment modification, afaik taping over things isn't allowed, so if someone wanted to be picky on the day you could find yourself disqualified

taping may not even improve things, aerodynamics is complicated

john1967

Yep its mostly about the shape of the helmet and adding tape could even increase drag.

foggymike

That's a no then

nferrar

Which helmet? Might not be as bad as you think, if it is you could probably just try and borrow another?

pippi_langsamer-2

Specialized Prevail for example, despite not looking aero at all but very light, fared better in a recent aero helmet test than some other dedicated aero lids didn't it?