tergal

Riding around my area there is a large hill, i hit 62km/hour before I chickened out and started breaking.



only afterwards did i remmber the legal speed limit for that street is 50km/hour. That would suck getting booked on a bike

tony_merlino

This area is pretty hilly. Back in the day (like 15 years ago), there was one hill I used ride down and hit speeds in the mid 50s of mph. (That's between 80 and 90 kph). At the bottom of the hill was a sharp right turn, a traffic light, and an intersection with a really busy street. I used to play chicken with myself, to see how late on the hill I could delay starting to brake.

I think back on that and realize I must have had a death wish, or at least had no sense of my own mortality/vulnerability. One good accident cured me of that. If you don't actually die instantly, getting smashed up REALLY hurts.

Seattle Forrest

I break the speed limit on my bike when I can. Speeding down hills is a great reward for having climbed them. If I ever get a speeding ticket while I'm riding my bike, I'll frame it.

I hit 42 mph in a 25 zone the other day.

TrojanHorse

I hit 38.8 yesterday and I was really hammering the pedals trying to get over 40... Strava will do that to you.

The speed limit was 50 mph though, so no dice on a ticket.

I hit 45 on a descent Sunday and the most interesting thoughts go through your head at 45 mph.
"Did I tighten the front wheel skewer"
"Are the brakes installed correctly"
"where's that part of the road where the tree roots are crumpling the pavement"
(I just built the bike up about 2 weeks ago)

I like the downside to hills, it's the upside I really don't care for.

ill.clyde

LOL @ Trojan ...

Fastest I've hit, so far, is around 36.

That's downhill with a tight right bend at the base of it, which usually has a fair amount of gravel strewn about the bottom.

That'll make ya pucker!

chefisaac

Mine is 32. I love the feeling yet I fear sliding, falling, or finding that I really suck with flipping!

Thats the plus side of being a clyde too. I can whiz down hills faster then the skinny people.

pdlamb

+1

There's a hill near here where some curmudgeonly cop supposedly writes tickets to speeding cyclists, but between the curves, the wind, the traffic, and the traffic light 100 ft past the bottom, I've never qualified.

Yet.

Seattle Forrest

Do the aero-tuck on your way down the hill.

Mr Sinister

This from the man who did not like Starva at first. My how we have changed after just a few rides.

Yo Spiff

Yup, a speeding ticket on the bike would get framed.

Mr Sinister

+ 1000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 0000000000000

I do that as often as I can. Have reached up around 46 mph using the tuck, while pedaling my @$$ off.

CraigB

The upside to hills.

Stop it, you're killing me.

Mr. Beanz

I've hit 46 on the single and 56 on the tandem, not trying.

But as I have said many times before the downhill doesn't interest me. Stange but I find the downhill boring.

Although I am a fairly good descender, many others wil hit a higher max speed on a descent but I can still beat most to the bottom if it's technical at all.

I maxed about 40 on this ride but with the switchbacks, riders cant really hit a tops speed.

He white car was holding me back. You can see it punch the gas at 25 seconds into the video.



This is the section of road in the video (GMR)

Seve

lol

TrojanHorse

I was tucked! It wasn't that steep of a hill because I was pedaling like mad to hit that. Like mad I say!

Caveat: I don't feel comfortable riding like that until I've seen the road at least once. Someday I'll have an ugly crash but I don't really worry about it.

And Sinister - yeah, how times change. It's not that I didn't like it, I just already had a bunch of ways to track my riding. "Starva" (is that a clyde reference? Hm?) just has a couple things that elevate it over the other generic phone tracker apps.

CommuteCommando

+1

I hit 42 last year, unfortunately the limit was 45, so nothing to frame.

Seattle Forrest

If it's any consolation, I have nothing to frame, either. Where's a cop when you need one?!?

Mr Sinister

I like Endomondo, as it gives me split times, by the mile. I can then download it to my computer, and transfer it to Strava. I really like that 1 feature over all the rest. I don't like iMapMyRide as they don't take out stoppage time.

CliftonGK1

Recorded 54.6mph on the 2008 Summits of Bothell ride coming down a clean, dry, 4 lane strip of asphalt with a great runout at the base before any stops or turns.
The speed limit on the road is 40mph.

aenlaasu

Scary! 32 MPH is my record which was over the speedlimit of the road. I didn't want to do much faster since right at the bottom of the hill the road ended in a T with a ditch and barbed wire fence on the other side.

CraigB

What are the zip ties and binder clips for?

indyfabz

Many years ago a guy on Cycle Oregon got a speeding ticket at Crater Lake.

CliftonGK1

Cue sheet holders.

Homeyba

Somewhere I have a picture of my speedo and it shows the max speed at 108. Of course that was on a brevet and the computer was reading in kilometers/hr. Looks real impressive though. My max speed ever was 72.4mph descending into Mexican Hat UT at 4:00 amish. That was pretty cool.

contango 

One advantage of cycling in the UK is that bikes aren't legally required to have a speedo so unless you're massively over the limit in a way that nobody would take a claim of not realising how fast you were going seriously the most a cop can usually do is have a word with you and tell you to cool it.

That said I remember one hill I discovered a while back. As I started to descend I had a car just a little too close behind me. Next thing I knew it had dropped way back. I figured it was nice of the driver to give me some space but I didn't need quite so much space. Then I realised - the road had a 30mph limit enforced with cameras and my speed had gone up to about 35-36 without even pedalling. Luckily it was a road where I had priority for a good couple of miles so I could take advantage of my momentum and cruise in the high 20s for a while.