On Bicycles, and.... what else is there?

Here's a finish line photo of the final stage of the 2015 Amgen Tour of California: I love photo finish images because the "x-axis" which is usually position in most photographs, is time instead. There's only one spatial dimension. The camera records a slit image of what is crossing the finish line at a given time. So if you measure the "width" of a bike crossing the line, that's how much time it takes for the bike to cross the line. If I assume all bikes are the same length, then speed is inversely proportional to the amount of time taken to cross the finish. Here's a typical bike geometry chart, in this case for Trek's racing bikes, which have "H1" and "H2" geometry. Note the wheelbases vary from 97.4 to 101.8 mm, a range of 4.5%. In contrast the Specialized Tarmac goes from 970 mm to 1013 mm, a very similar range. Cannondale: 962 mm to 1012 mm. In all, wheelbases seem to vary by around 5% among bikes across t...

The Tour of California men's race is underway and so it's time for me to post my picks. So without any excess discussion, here's my picks: Andrew Talansky, Garmin-Cannondale Phil Gaimon, Optum Joe Dumbrowski, Garmin-Cannondale Darkhorse picks for the top 10 are the Morton brothers on Team Jelly Belly . Talansky is an established stage racer, and his teammate Dumbrowski did a breakthrough race here in 2012 ( story on Dumbrowski here ). Phil Gaimon honed his form with Garmin in the World Tour last year, and is focused on this race. He won the Redlands Classic fairly conclusively and knows what it takes to do well in California. A lot of the pack is here just for training or stage wins. So the battle for GC is fairly limited. So these are my top 3. Really funny with Gaimon: Diamondback had a special cookie-themed bike built for him for the race but they did it in the wrong size. That's perhaps the difference between the pro tour and pro-continental. I'm...

For the final stage of this year's Tour of California Cara had scored VIP passes for the finish in Santa Rosa. This was very exciting, and I must say this VIP thing could get addictive. After a leasurely tour of the expo, we headed to the tents for some appetizers, coffee (decaf), and alcoholic drinks for those who prefer them. Peter Sagan heads were a notable trend at this year's ATOC Members of the Champion Systems amateur team were there, since they were sponsored by the law firm which had rented the space. I talked with them about upcoming races and about the developments in the Tour of California, visible on a television in the tent. Participating in that race was the Champion Systems pro team, not sponsored by the law firm, but obviously affiliated. I also asked them about their bikes, which were anonymous Taiwanese frames painted with "Champion Systems". When I needed to use the porta-potty, I didn't need to use the porta-potty. Instead they had...

The Tour of California went from south-to-north this year for the first time this year, ending with a series of three critical-stages in the San Francisco Bay area. This made for the most significant racing in the region since the unfortunately defunct San Francisco Grand Prix. Friday was the time trial in San Jose, a combination of a course used there previously, climbing Willow Springs Road, and ending with the "Metcalf Mauler" : Metcalf Road. Low-Key did Metcalf in 2010 after years of it just missing the final cut due to its relative lack of total climbing. But what it lacks in endurance, it makes up for in intensity. I watched the time trial in short spurts from my cubical, as I had a pressing deadline I had to meet, and it was impressive watching Tejay spin up the climb in his time trial bike to win the stage and consolidate his GC lead. I haven't seen the split times for Metcalf, but there were Strava times . The best of the times posted to Strava was Mancebo...

Last year the Tour of California, for the first time, rode the east side of Patterson Pass, the last climb in the stage into Livermore. The result was domination of the Strava leader board as the group blasted over the climb, down the other side, into the city for a few finishing circuits, then to the sprint which was dominated by Peter Sagan. The Strava segment: Here's my rendering of the profile data: It begins gradually, traversing up the windmill-capped hill until the "oh-my-God" climb which leads to the pass. Although the view of this section is dramatic, the profile shows the grade is only 12%, which can cause distress but is not in the league of the steepest climbs in the Bay Area. Using my climb rating index , it rates 74% as high as Old La Honda Road. I've ridden this climb in two major events: the Devil Mountain Double and the Patterson Pass Road Race. In the former, it comes between Mount Diablo and climbing the west side of Mount Hamilton. It...

Last year California's Governor Jerry Brown pocketed SB910 , a bill which would have effectively banned drivers from passing cyclists with less than a 3-foot margin. Additionally it would have allowed drivers to cross the center-line when it was safe to do so in order to provide for that mandatory margin, which is a practice well over 99% of the drivers already exercise, anyway. His logic in pocketing the bill seemed inconsistent with the bill itself, as I described , bringing into question whether politics and influence was the actual motive. So another year brings another legislative session, and the California Bike Coalition continues, to its substantial credit, to push the matter. The Give Me Three campaign is not dead, not at all. Instead, SB910 has been replaced with SB1464 . This bill is a direct response to Brown's concern, in his own words: On streets with a speed limit of 35 or 45 mph, slowing to 15 mph to pass a cyclist could cause rear-end collisions. On t...

After watching Escape from Alcatraz triathlon (epic, epic, epic) I joined up with what portion of the Mission Cycling ride didn't flee south today and headed into Marin for a Paradise Loop. I wanted to work the kinks out of my legs after an over-enthusiastic 30 km road run yesterday. But to get into and out of Marin, we had to ride over the Golden Gate Bridge. Little did we know what horrors awaited... Starting May 31, the Golden Gate Transportation District shut down the western cycling path on the bridge for seismic retrofit work . As a result, cyclists must now share the eastern path with pedestrians for close to four months, the season of peak use of the bridge by both pedestrians and cyclists. The timing couldn't be any worse. I remember the first time I ever crossed the western path. It was quite a shock, leaving me with a survivors rush. But over time I got to know the western path, became familiar with the order behind the seeming randomness, and it be...

Quick post today..... I estimated the power taken for Contador to do the climb to Nevegal, which took him 20:58 from the checkpoint at the base of the climb to the summit: 600 meters climbed in 7.30 km for an average grade of 8.2%. For direct comparison with Horner's Sierra Road climb I used the same numbers: 65 kg body mass, 6.8 kg bike, 1.5 kg of other stuff, 0.32 m² CdA. I reduced rolling resistance from 3% to 2.5% since Contador was on time trial tires. I still assumed 3% drivetrain loss. I used a power-speed model including inertia. I assumed he started the climb at 40 kph. The result: 6.24 W/kg. This is lower than the 6.56 W/kg I had for Horner on Sierra Rd. Horner's VAM was 1916 m/hr while Contador was 1750 m/hr. Of course it's not a fair comparison as Contador had finished two brutally tough stages immediately preceding the rest week the day before, and may not have fully recovered. It seems riders aren't having rest days as productive as the...

After much speculation and indirect guessing, I finally got a time for Chris Horner climbing Sierra Road during stage 4 of the 2011 Amgen Tour of California. Recovox News VeloNews posted Rory Sutherland's power data , with analysis, for the climb. Rory started the climb in Horner's group and finished 1:15 behind. According to the article, Sutherland's time was an impressive 18:02. However that puts Horner's time at an amazing 16:47. I'd put maybe 2-second error bars on that number. For example, if Sutherland hit the base of the climb one second after Horner, then Horner's time would be one second longer. But I'll stick with this estimate. Sierra Road climbs 536 meters according to my numbers. So plugging that into Chris Horner's 0.280 hour ride and you get a VAM of 1916. Generally in the Tour de France if you see a VAM in excess of 1700 that's extraordinary. 1916? But in addition to overcoming gravity when you climb (producing ...

Tomorrow is only the third summit finish in the history of the Tour of California, the first two being the San Francisco prologue from 2006-2007 which finished on the top of Nob Hill. Tomorrow's climb is a bit tougher... 2007 Low-Key Hillclimbs I first encountered Sierra Road in Grant Peterson's fantastic Roads to Ride South, a book of route profiles of Bay area climbs from the 1990-era. It became for me an obvious candidate for the Low-Key Hillclimb series which Kevin Winterfield and I organized for the first time in 1995 . And the series will revisit it this year, in week 2 . My next encounter was when I did the Devil Mountain Double in 2000. That was quite a different experience, as it came after having already climbed Mount Diablo, Morgan Territory Road, Patterson Pass, Mines Road, and San Antonio Valley Road. Post-bonk, with tired, legs, it was an exercise in survival. But I did, and finished the 200 miles, albeit after dark. The Tour of California had the br...

I rode over Hwy 84, first misty, but then a steady rain at the summit, near Skylonda (but technically Woodside). 84 is normally too heavily trafficked to be popular with local cyclists, except as a descent where good riders can outpace most cars. It's the easiest route up to Skyline in the area: Old La Honda Road, Kings Mountain Road, and Page Mill Road (in order of increasing difficulty) all much-preferred. TOC tried to get Page and OLH, but residential resistance meant they had to go with 84. In any case, I rode 84 today in the spirit of the race. Fortunately, the skies cleared as I descended to the west, a long gradual downhill into the town of La Honda. after passing through, a left onto Pescadero at the "5 km to KOM" sign took me into the redwoods. A short rise, a bit of flat, then a right over the bridge marking the climb proper of Haskins Hill. Here it was chilly, the roads a bit damp, but thankfully no rain. This climb is the highlight of the annual Pescadero Road...

Steve Hill has proposed a preliminary route for stage 3 of the 2010 Tour of California . Check out his map here . However, this prediction is, well, a bit dull. Basically repeating what was done in 2009 with the exception of the crossing of the Golden Gate Bridge from Sausalito, We already know that there will be an extra climb on this year's route. This one actually has one less climb, omitting the climb out of Sausalito. So I propose an alternate. It adds only 8 km to Steve's route, from 194 km to 202 km. But it's more a quality thing than a quantity thing. Here's my map. Steve's route has riders turning right at the top of Tunitas Creek Road, climbing briefly on Skyline Blvd. before descending to Highway 84, then descending 84 and continuing the final 10 km of that road to the coast. Yawn.... Instead I propose they cross Skyline at the top of Tunitas, descend technical Kings Mountain Road, turn right on Highway 84, left on Portola Valley Road, right at ...