The other thing is that “Maximum Aero” isn’t the only thing that determines a “fast” ride; just your maximum speed, on a flat, straight-ish closed course (or low-traffic road). Sure, being aerodynamically efficient is important when you’re out by yourself in the wind; just look at Triathletes or long-distance riders like RAAM racers. They do it to ride as efficiently as possible, conserving energy is the goal, speed is the by-product.
Sure, the vintage TT bike is almost as fast as a ‘super bike’ on a short course, but what if you have to climb Mt Ventoux? The funny bike would get dropped at the bottom of the the hill. GCN has done a number of those old-v-new comparisons, they usually put the stronger rider on the old bike to see if the new tech bike gives the advantage to the lesser rider.
In the world of everyday riding, ie; not racing; there are a lot of factors that prevent us from simply pursuing Vmax for the entire duration of our ride, like traffic, turns/navigation, terrain features or surface transitions means that the most
effective bike may not be the fastest.
I posted a summary of my experience of what I’d found when I compared a couple years’ worth of rides commuting to work and the discovery that 3 of the 5 fastest times were recorded on the bike with the lowest top speed.
Since the professor said he didn’t understand what the significance of that was, let me elaborate:
The fastest bike, both in terms of elapsed time, and top speed, was (not surprising) my banned-by-the-UCI SoftRide road bike. (Recorded Vmax 25 mph)
What was surprisingly was the bike that held the remaining 3 of the 5 fastest rides; It wasn’t the vintage Bridgestone touring bike (Vmax 22 mph). It was, get this;
my mountain bike.
Despite running out of gears at 18.5 mph, it recorded a moving average speed within 0.5 mph of bikes that were able to attain higher peak speeds. Granted, it’s a Cannondale F-1000, a 90s era lightweight XC bike, which is very different from a modern ‘big wheel’ trail bike, but also very different from the 1970s touring bike and late 2000s road racer I used in my comparison.
Why is this significant? Because on a given ride, the bike capable of dealing with all the conditions one will encounter will be the most effective: “speed” will be the byproduct.
In my case, the route combined a number of segments of MUP with surface streets, and cut through a college campus, the MTBs ability to negotiate a carry speed through many sharp corners and surface transitions meant it lost less speed than the road bikes, and that Vmax was less of a factor in achieving a “good “ time for the route.
