Originally Posted by
StephenH
My observation is that this is highly variable from rider to rider. I know of recumbent riders that can climb faster than me, others that can't.
A couple of guys in the local randonneuring group are having fun with velomobiles, and you have the same issues there versus an unfaired recumbent that recumbents do vs upright bikes. You also have the identical issues with tandems, by the way, so you might question why they don't allow racing tandems while you're at it.
On the "any real speed or distance" item, you might note that the great majority of randonneurs ride upright bikes, even though the rules allow either.
Something else to keep in mind: My perception is that lowracers are faster than regular recumbents, which are in turn faster than trikes. Yet per recent posts, I find that lowracers have just about disappeared from the market, that regular 2-wheel recumbents have severely declined in market share, and that trikes are booming. So maybe it's not all about speed.
I think you're spot-on with your observations. It's hard to compare upright climbing to recumbent climbing not only because of those reasons, but because there's a lot of variability in the uprights too. Neither uprights nor recumbents are one monolithic group with similar characteristics across the board.
Highracers are still relatively available and are similar in speed to lowracers. Most people who want speed to to the highracers because they think being low is unsafe on the roads. I have not seen that to be true in over 15 years of riding lowracers.