Originally Posted by
livedarklions
MaximRecoil
Sorry, but the more I think about your rebuttal, the funnier it gets, so I can't resist a couple more points--
More irony from the guy who has conceded several times.
I said there is no such thing as a 500 pound bicycle, not "no one can move a cargo bike laden to 500 pounds".
So now you think there's a difference between a bike that's 500 pounds by itself and one that's 500 pounds because it's loaded with cargo? That's funny coming from the guy who said,
"And seriously, you have no answer that if you really think that you'll benefit by riding a bike that's 15 pounds heavier, all you need to do is add a 15 pound weight to the 15 pound bike." In any case, there's obviously no difference between a bike that weighs 500 pounds by itself and one that weighs 500 pounds due to being loaded with cargo, with regard to the force required to move it. Also, you said,
"obviously, no human being can accelerate a 500 pound bicycle," which is obviously false.
I stand by that--go ahead and show us a bicycle that, by itself unladen, weighs 500 pounds. That's a double-dog dare.
What are you talking about? I never said that such a thing exists. I have no idea whether such a thing exists or not, and neither do you. You claimed that they don't exist and I pointed out that you can add weight to a bike to make it 500 pounds.
I'm sure there's probably someone who might do this as a stunt, but so what?
You are? Previously you were sure that no human being could accelerate a 500-pound bike, which is funny, because an average guy could do it with low enough gearing.
This tells us absolutely nothing about the impact of your hypothetical 15 pound bicycle weight difference on the qualities of a workout.
Yes, it does, since differences don't just magically appear at a certain weight discrepancy.
Here's the begging the question fallacy you've committed--
Me and everyone else: "If you do the following, you equalize the workouts"
You: "Assume we can't do those, I win the argument."
Even if there were an accurate summary of what I've said (it's not), that still wouldn't fit the definition of "begging the question".
Assuming that all things being equal IS question begging if your basic argument is that things can't be made different to compensate for the difference in weight. All I've "conceded" is that if we assume you're right, then you are correct. I don't have any reason to assume this all things being equal has anything to do with reality, so I am not making that assumption, and am very clearly stating you are wrong.
Again, you don't understand the concept of "begging the question". First, all things being equal isn't an assumption, it's part of a hypothetical scenario. Even if it were an assumption (which could only happen if it were regarding a specific real event for which, without evidence, I assumed that everything except one thing was equal), it would only be begging the question if I said that the reason that all else is equal is because everything is equal except for one thing.
In any case, the "all else being equal" scenario isn't even necessary; it just helps to illustrate the point. As I said in my previous post, anything you do to try to 'equalize the workouts you get on unequal weight bikes' will be an approximation at best, and the greater the difference the weight is, the further from truly equal the approximation will be. And then there's the matter of inertia.
You've now had to concede that it's resistance, not weight per se, that matters
I haven't conceded any such thing, since that was never a point of contention in the first place.
that gears can alter the relationship of weight to resistance, that hills can do the same, that weight bench logic has nothing to do with bicycle riding logic because a bicycle itself is a set of levers and pulleys that can be adjusted to duplicate the resistance effects of added weight
Only to a certain point, since bikes don't have infinite gears, and there's a limit to how steep of a hill that can be climbed on a bike, and even up to a certain point, it will still be an approximation at best.
and that the relevant factor is actually time, not distance. (And that's not even accounting for the drastically increasing wind resistance when you ride at higher speeds).
Neither time nor distance has anything to do with my point. The only time I mentioned distance was in an example of work. You are thoroughly confused. You've already conceded that any change to any variable results in a different workout...
"Basically, though, your statement that it can't be the same workout is essentially meaningless, because that's always true, even if you're using the exact same bike for two workouts. Something will not be equal, whether it's how much water there is in your body, or wind direction, or ambient temperature affecting your abilities that day, or you got a flat that day, or..."
Yet at the same time you want to argue that you can equalize things between unequal weight bikes. In other words, you're continually contradicting yourself. After your concession above, you logically had nothing left to argue about, yet you continue.
Also, that your calculation of the differences in work between the bikes was all wrong
You should petition the, e.g., International Olympics Committee to start adding body weight to the results of squatting. After all, they aren't just squatting that heavy object on their shoulders, they're also squatting their body weight, right? That could change some of the competition results. Of course, for most people, body weight goes without saying, and it's not factored in when discussing how much weight someone has lifted or moved.
A 120 tooth chain ring and an 11 tooth cog.
No, that doesn't work, even if it were based on real calculations instead of something you pulled out of thin air, because a 15-pound bike doesn't have anywhere near the amount of inertia as a 300-pound bike. Also, just keeping it balanced, both while riding and especially when stopping for e.g., traffic, will work muscles that won't get worked the same with a 15-pound bike.
Next stupid question.
Maybe you should provide a valid answer to the first question before moving on to the next question.
Hate to break it to you, but everyone's workout routines involve approximations of one kind or another. You really claiming that if there's a rounding error mistake in the approximation of resistance, it has serious or even noticeable impact on the results of the workout?
I haven't made any claims at all about seriousness or noticeability.
You went off into lala land with your first statement of the case, and no amount of tap dancing and misdirection is going to get anyone to believe you know what you're talking about.
Your non sequitur is dismissed.
And by the way, "quality" in this sense is referring to the nature of, not whether it's good or bad. So, whether it's primarily aerobic vs. resistance/weight training.
Not only was there nothing in the context to indicate that you had an unusual (for that particular sentence) sense of the word "quality" in mind, but "quality" is commonly used as an adjective for workout to mean that it's a good workout. Do a Google search for "quality workout" and tell me how many of the results are using "the nature of" sense of the word.
We'll add dictionaries to the list of items you're obviously unfamiliar with.
More irony from the guy who thinks "effort" and the physics sense of "work" are synonymous.
Originally Posted by Badger6
Buy a power meter, use that to structure your workouts. 250W is 250W no matter how much the bike+rider system weighs, how hard the wind is blowing, and in what direction, how much sleep you had, if you're hungover, or sick. Watts are watts.
Originally Posted by burnthesheep
Exactly. The poster above arguing into the ground doesn't get this. This is a fundamental concept of physics class that really befuddles a lot of people. Drawing boundaries around systems to analyze.
It doesn't work that way. Anything you do can be measured in watts. It tells you nothing about which muscles are being worked, and how they are being worked.
Originally Posted by UniChris
No, I didn't. I said your definition of "effort" was dubious.
You said:
"Dubious. It's unclear how you are defining effort but you seem to be forgetting the distance component of work, which is the half of it you did get right above."
And then you went on to say:
"Work is something you just can't cheat at - use more leverage and you can apply less force, but you'll also move the load proportionally less against its force, than you move your end of the lever against yours. You can do your work more quickly or slowly but it's still the same amount of physics work.You can do your work more quickly or slowly but it's still the same amount of physics work."
In order for that to be true, machines would have to be 100% efficient, which they obviously aren't. In other words, I was right to begin with and your attempted refutation was wrong.
Though you persist in making a fool of yourself
Comical irony coming from the guy who thinks machines are 100% efficient.
using a wrong defintion of work.
Already refuted, but here's another citation for you:
Work is defined as force (weight) times distance. If force is measured in lbs., and distance in ft. then the units for work are ft.-lbs.
Why do you think that when you calculate work, you use a unit of weight to represent the amount of force?
And that practically matters, because as repeatedly explained doing work against gravity is NOT where most of your energy goes in cycling.
Utterly irrelevant, i.e., it doesn't change the fact that either weight or force is correct.
That leads you to say things like this howler of ignorance:
See above (in multiple places). Also: Comical Irony Alert: Part II.
What's your proposal for equalizing the workout between the same rider on the same bike on the same route, on two days with different weather? Or between getting enough sleep the night before and not? Or between the light halfway up the big climb being red and with actual cross traffic or not?
Why would I have a proposal for that? I'm not the one who said that things can be equalized.