Cobbled Classics 2021 ** Spoilers**

dish_dash

ddraver said:

Girls setting up for a 'Classics Sprint'...

Edit - Shattered by the final cobbled section at 3.5 to go

edit edit - Came back together and Lotte Kopecky took it from Emma Norsgarden (sp?) in a loooong sprint.

Fun last 10 km.

Some GB interest from Anna Henderson who animated the last 1.5 km albeit the teams with sprinters had it on lockdown again by then. Finished 8th in the end.

Yay for Anna! She trains on my local roads...

jimmythecuckoo

I like Le Samyn, but it's not as good when its not raining and howling a gale.

m.r.m.

rick_chasey said:

ddraver said:

Pross said:

I do love spoiler threads with lots of cryptic posts but minor details like what actually happened at the end or who won missing.

I wasn't under the impression anyone read these threads when I wrote what was happening...

I try my best to do them but I am often having to wrestle a toddler.

Tough when the opponent has a height and reach advantage. 😛

ddraver

ddraver said:

gweeds said:

MDVP bars snapped - oops

😶

https://twitter.com/cyclingtips/status/1366793021375700994?s=20

Big deal...

https://www.bikeradar.com/news/canyon-aeroad-snapped-handlebar/

RichN95.

https://twitter.com/MielTheunis/status/1367231523993354243

In other news the laptop I spilt red wine over a couple of weeks ago doesn't work anymore. Recall Hewlett Packards.

blazing_saddles

Canyon issues ‘stop ride’ notice to Aeroad owners following Mathieu van der Poel handlebar incident.

https://www.cyclingweekly.com/news/product-news/canyon-issues-stop-ride-following-mathieu-van-der-poel-handlebar-incident-492398

gweeds

And now his Dad is saying he rode the same bike/bars into a car a couple of days earlier....

rick_chasey

"shut up dad, you're making it worse"

dish_dash

So this is a clever idea but I see the potential problem... particularly on rough roads and the screws on the underside!

ddraver

blazing_saddles said:

Canyon issues ‘stop ride’ notice to Aeroad owners following Mathieu van der Poel handlebar incident.

https://www.cyclingweekly.com/news/product-news/canyon-issues-stop-ride-following-mathieu-van-der-poel-handlebar-incident-492398

Am I a joke to you???

Dorset_Boy

dish_dash said:

So this is a clever idea but I see the potential problem... particularly on rough roads and the screws on the underside!

Thats not where the issue was on MvdP's bike though.

feelgoodlost

Peak Torque's intersting take (for those who love their nerdy engineering) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0CwTwspUaKI&t=708s

ddraver

I don't know if the guy knows what he's talking about at all but that method of measuring your bars @ 6.15 has revolutionised my handlebar set up 😳

focuszing723

Considering the UCI limit I can't see the problem with aluminium bars, especially the amount of time pro's spend hitting the deck.

ddraver

Blimey, I didn't realise he'd carried on afterwards!

https://www.instagram.com/reel/CL9sZLBBisc/?igshid=mldjnnia8yps

dish_dash

Dorset_Boy said:

dish_dash said:

So this is a clever idea but I see the potential problem... particularly on rough roads and the screws on the underside!

Thats not where the issue was on MvdP's bike though.

yeah... I see that now. Still not convinced I'd want my handlebars to dismantle like that! Get Chris Froome in to give his handlebar flex view on them...

dish_dash

feelgoodlost said:

Peak Torque's intersting take (for those who love their nerdy engineering) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0CwTwspUaKI&t=708s

This is interesting, though, as an aside, who has time to spend 13 mins watching all of that?! You could summarise it in about 3 paragraphs and a couple of pictures, non?

m.r.m.

focuszing723 said:

Considering the UCI limit I can't see the problem with aluminium bars, especially the amount of time pro's spend hitting the deck.

Most bikes with disc brakes and wheels deeper than 50 mm are above the 6.8 kg weight limit. Aluminium bars would require reduction of wheel depth.

bobmcstuff

The Specialized Aethos disc weighs 5.9 kilos as a commercial build. With deep wheels it might be 6.3 or 6.4 - someone built one at 4.94 (with pedals) recently.

Interestingly the Aethos has a UCI sticker on it even though you would have to attach weights to it to get it under the limit.

These things are clearly possible, but with the 6.8 kilo limit there's not much incentive to do it. On the plus side you can get a nice aero bike with discs at 7ish kilos these days.

Also most builds GCN has weighed on their pro bikes thing come in a decent bit above 6.8 (7.5 or so) even when the bike could easily be built bang on 6.8 (or less, but obviously they don't do that).

m.r.m.

No one rides such bikes at the actual races. I'm not saying it isn't possible to get bikes below 6.8 kg. I'm saying it's not possible without making significant compromises elsewhere. Usually that is in the aero department (like the Aethos which is extremely un-aero as a frame, like the Emonda. Round tubes are structurally very sound and can thus be made thin while maintaining rigidity while being very light. They are terrible in the aero department though). On pretty much every single GCN pro bike video you see that every bike with medium or deep section wheels is significantly above 6.8 kg.
Even the S-works Tarmac sl7 with their own Roval Rapide wheels comes in at around 7.15 kg (depending on paint job in a size 52, with SRAM AXS, Ceramicspeed etc.). The Ineos team uses Lightweight Meilensteins on their mountain days where they sacrifice aero for weight savings; and they don't even use disc brakes.

The belief that it's easy to go below 6.8 kg while maintaining a decent balance between aero and weight is simply false.


pic from Rhino's workshop from weightweenies

ddraver

From the website attached to this forum... - https://www.bikeradar.com/features/pro-bike/2021-pro-bike-tech-trends/

I know we're conditioned to hate UCI tech restrictions in Britain cos Obree but I'm actually not that bothered about French Conti teams being able to scrape competitive bikes together with quite old equipment so I'm in no hurry to see the weight limit lowered. I don't really see that it would make for any better racing and companies still seem to be willing to do silly light (or silly aero) R&D in the meantime...

m.r.m.

With a lowered weight limit you would simply see 2 combinations chosen mostly. Aero frame (Dogma, Madone, Tarmac sl7, Oltre etc.) with wheels 40 mm and lower or un-aero frame (Emonda, Aethos, Specialissima etc.) with deeper section wheels.
On mountain days it would be super shallow wheels.
Pro's prefer to prioritize weight mostly. Engineers running the numbers tell them aero is mostly more important.

rick_chasey

m.r.m. said:

With a lowered weight limit you would simply see 2 combinations chosen mostly. Aero frame (Dogma, Madone, Tarmac sl7, Oltre etc.) with wheels 40 mm and lower or un-aero frame (Emonda, Aethos, Specialissima etc.) with deeper section wheels.
On mountain days it would be super shallow wheels.
Pro's prefer to prioritize weight mostly. Engineers running the numbers tell them aero is mostly more important.

In the context of drafting in a peloton before smashing it uphill, I can see why a lot of pros would prioritise weight over drag. Might be different if you're TdG, but if you're Roglic how much are you actually going to see the wind?

dish_dash

New Emonda is meant to be fairly aero isn't it?

rick_chasey

dish_dash said:

New Emonda is meant to be fairly aero isn't it?

It's all relative but yeah. I had anticipated aero bikes being below the limit by 2020 anyway, but it will eventually get there.

bobmcstuff

m.r.m. said:

No one rides such bikes at the actual races. I'm not saying it isn't possible to get bikes below 6.8 kg. I'm saying it's not possible without making significant compromises elsewhere. Usually that is in the aero department (like the Aethos which is extremely un-aero as a frame, like the Emonda. Round tubes are structurally very sound and can thus be made thin while maintaining rigidity while being very light. They are terrible in the aero department though). On pretty much every single GCN pro bike video you see that every bike with medium or deep section wheels is significantly above 6.8 kg.
Even the S-works Tarmac sl7 with their own Roval Rapide wheels comes in at around 7.15 kg (depending on paint job in a size 52, with SRAM AXS, Ceramicspeed etc.). The Ineos team uses Lightweight Meilensteins on their mountain days where they sacrifice aero for weight savings; and they don't even use disc brakes.

The belief that it's easy to go below 6.8 kg while maintaining a decent balance between aero and weight is simply false.


pic from Rhino's workshop from weightweenies

But with a weight limit of 6.8 and some allowance for discrepancy in the UCI's scales, isn't 7.15 about as low as you would want to go?

As I said, on the GCN pro bikes thing I don't think I have ever seen them weigh a bike under 7, even on a mountain day.

yorkshireraw

dish_dash said:

New Emonda is meant to be fairly aero isn't it?

Yes - got a mate who was looking at a Madone but went for the new Emonda in the end as it was a better all round option for him.

ddraver

I rode an Emonda a few times when I did a Summer Season in the Alps and I have to say I thought it was an exceptional bike...

(I know we all love our own bikes but...ooofff)

m.r.m.

dish_dash said:

New Emonda is meant to be fairly aero isn't it?

The non-dropped seatstays and partially still roundish tubing beg to differ somewhat, but it's all about the balance of it all. It will be more aero than the previous Emonda and less than the Madone. Probably less than the Tarmac sl7, but more than the Tarmac sl6, less than the Pinarello Dogma F12, but lighter for that etc etc.
There is a 95 page thread on weightweenies. I scanned it, but haven't found any aero testing with actual numbers. Usual bike website articles are more like infomercials for the companies, so who actually knows what's best?
It's hard to even figure out what all the carbon names mean (Fact 12r, OCLV 800, Torayca 1100 Dreamcarbon, Bianchi's carbon + counterveil technology - which sounds awesome in theory actually, but some people report a sluggish dead ride...) and how they relate to each other.

dish_dash

Yeah, the new emonda's not a madone. But its still more aero than the previous version. It's def more aero than a speccialisima.

And fwiw I like countervail... Makes a difference