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Tour De France Showcases Multitude Of Tech
whoda writes "When you think of a bicycle, you most likely think of 2 tires, a chain, some gearing of some sort, and other assorted mechanical bits. However, when Lance Armstrong, Jan Ullrich, and over 180 other riders get together to compete at the Tour de France every year, there is a lot of technology that comes along for the ride too. From Lance's Sunglass'/MP3 Player to the advanced use of composites seen on Tyler Hamilton's
time trial bike, there are many examples of
high technology making the racers faster through better training, materials and
aerodynamics."
The HPV world speed championships!
http://www.recumbents.com/whpsc2004.htm
Too bad there's not enough interest to really get some money into the development of these things.
Check out my website...
Of course, with a bike that old, they would have had to replace, well, just about everything in order to put in a new derailer. In fact it would be only slightly more to simply buy a new bycycle!
So I started looking at bikes. I could get a nice road bike for $800 (US) that was far superior to my existing bike. Then I started looking at the carbon composite bikes, like the Roubaix series. I really didn't think I'd feel the difference until I test-rode one.
Holy S*it! If the $800 bike was an order of magnitude better then my existing one, the Roubaix Comp (at $2600) was an order of magnitude better then the $800 bike. All carbon-composite construction, vibration dampening... the works. Unbelievably light, I could lift the whole bike with my pinky pretty much! Smooth ride, ultra smooth shifting, huge gearing range. The technology is really amazing.
-Matt
From the Sunglasses/MP3 Player link:
We have a little addendum to our Tech from the Tour de France feature from a couple of weeks ago: this special pair of Oakley sunglasses with a built-in MP3 player that Lance Armstrong was spotted wearing. No idea whether they're planning to ever sell these or not, but a little bit of research reveals that the sunglasses only have enough room on them for 35 songs, which makes us think that they probably have somewhere around 128MB of storage somwhere in there.
True, but that doesn't mean Lance plays only 35 songs for the entire Tour. Does anyone know if the Tour rules prohibit changing electronic media and so forth? He could play a new set of 35 songs every day. At least that would be interesting trivia, what songs did Armstrong listen to every day of the Tour..
Interestingly enough as well is the fact that there is a limit in the rules as to the minimum allowable weight of a bicycle. There are lighter bikes that have been proven to be faster that cannot be ridden in this race.
Haven't been able to decide how I feel about this yet...actually I wish it was one way or the other:
a) riders can use _any_ man powered 2 wheeled vehicle of whatever design they want...
OR
b) ALL riders ride the exact same bike.
Either technology is a factor, or it isn't. I think it's the middle ground stance that annoys me.
No Comment.
I totally agree.
;)
I've got a 3 year old $400(CDN) Peugeot mountain bike I bought just for casual riding at the time. This year I've gotten quite a bit more serious and have taken part in a number of cross-country relay races. Up until about a month ago, I was constantly looking at the 'other guys' $4000+ machines and trying to plan how and when I would upgrade.
I finally realized how stupid that would be.
a) most of the guys I ride with have expensive bikes.
b) i never get smoked by them.
c) their stuff breaks as much as mine does, but their parts are _way_ more expensive.
d) haven't had _my_ bike stolen.
e) I do it for FUN.
f) I will NEVER be taking it to the top level and thus will NEVER be able to actually reap the minute benefits one can get from really expensive bikes.
And unlike cars, where it's easy to argue that a bmw or mercedes is worth the money over a ford as they are more fun to drive, comfortable...blah blah whatever, I have NO problems with my bike and the expensive bikes I've ridden certainly don't feel special, and DEFFINATELY don't feel like they're worth more than 10x the price.
Now maybe if I broke the bank on a new bike I wouldn't be the only one with money to buy the beer after a good ride
Actually, if you wan't to get into a good useless waste of money tech discussion with a hardcore mountain-biker, pull out the v-brake vs disc-brake topic. Oh, I used to fall fully on the 'can't wait to have the cash to buy a nice set of disc-brakes' crowd...but a good slap with common sense brought me around.
Me: Gonna buy me a set of those real soon! (Disc Brakes)
Bike Shop Owner: Really? Why?
Me: Um, they're better...
Bike Shop Owner: Really? Why?
Me: Um, because they work better right?
Bike Shop Owner: Let me ask you this then, what problems are, or have you, had with your v-brake system?
Me: Um...
Bike Shop Owner: And of those problems, which will be solved by a higher price tag, more weight, more parts and generally more complexity?
Me: Since you put it like that, I guess I'm unsold thank you!
And as an interesting aside, the shop owner's success in _not_ selling me something has resulted in some darned solid customer loyalty.
No Comment.
One does wonder what other sorts of biochemistry are going on with riders(I've always thought it was kind of ironic that Lance was sponsored by a major pharmaceutical, and yes, I am deeply suspicious that Lance's chemo and related drugs somehow altered his body to make him much stronger; I don't think he would be stupid enough to be doping himself), seeing as how doping is rampant in virtually all other sports- and the message to little kids has been nothing of zero tolerance but instead "I'm a good guy, I couldn't have been doing drugs, even though my trainer was caught twice before doping his runners and I failed a drug test" etc etc.
Then there's the baseball players, who were TOLD AHEAD OF TIME they'd be tested. When they were tested- ONE QUARTER of them failed! Unbelievable! That's like telling everyone the answer to a one question quiz, and then having 25% fail!
I forget which bike race it was, but police did a raid on the rider's barracks one night, and it was like a scene from animal house- they had riders leaping out of windows in their underwear, hiding in the bushes, running off, etc. They found dozens upon dozens of drug vials, needles, pills, you name it. It was absolutely pathetic.
Please help metamoderate.
I'm actually most impressed by the technology involved in the television coverage. First, you've got about about 20 cameras on bicycles, showing images at race level (almost what the cyclists see themselves). They send the pictures to helicopters overhead, which in turn send the images to satellites. Let's also not forget the cameras on the helicopters themselves, and the beautiful display of flying and camera ability that brings gorgeous and rock-steady shots of 170 bicyclists zipping through fields of sunflowers.
Add to that GPS transmitters on every bike, which brings instant results at the end of the race to the 100th of a second, and (this year on OLN) up-to-the-second time gaps among the groups on the road (this'll really shine when they hit the mountains).
All this, plus entertaining commentary, live worldwide.