calliebear9

It has been a looooong time since my last physics class….I was out on a ride this weekend and met a really nice couple. In talking to them they said they used to have bikes like mine (I ride a Jamis Coda) but when they switched to a road bike they got much faster instantly. I have been riding for a year+ and my rides are up at 2 hours and I am looking to go above and further. So I am considering making the switch over to a road bike- obviously any suggestions are appreciated…more on that later….

But my question is, why or how is the road bike faster? My weight stays the same (which sucks but is accurate). The bike might be a little lighter but not enough to add 2-3 mph. Is it really the tires? I have 700 x 32 not nobby. Does having the skinnier tires make it faster? How? The diameter of the tire is the same and the cadence is the same, so doesn't that mean I cover the same amount of distance per spin? I would imagine the aerodynamic nature of leaning more forward would help…But enough to increase speed that much instantly?

Sorry I probably sound uneducated and I apologize, just really curious as to why.

Also re: a road bike- I would be looking for something that is around or less than $2k, is not aggressive/racing, is comfortable for longer rides and for a big girl. I need the really low gears to haul my butt up the hills. And can accommodate a heavy weight female rider. Is there a time of year that bikes go on sale- like last year models? Similar to cars. Any suggestions greatly appreciated.

damian.garcia83

You're overlooking the biggest factor in speed and that is efficiency of turning watts into forward motion. By lowering yourself a little bit you cut aerodynamic drag for higher efficiency of your pedaling motion into forward motion. By having a stiffer frame, as most road bikes do, same thing. And with the tires you get less rolling resistance, hence more efficiency. I get where it might seem a little confusing, but it is actually straightforward efficiency that matters most when it comes to speed and the ability to hold it for longer times for less energy expended. Make sense?

For your other questions, you can get road bikes with triple cranksets that will give you all the gears you can ever need. If you buy something relatively new, and with your budget you can, then you will have at least 27 gears with a road triple, but even a compact (50/34) crankset can give enough low gear to get up pretty much anything. Your best bet would be to go to a knowledgable LBS and they should be able to set you up just right.

Damian

bbeasley

Yea, it's not the weight so much as the aero drag. I took a big jump in speed when my belly got small enough so I could ride in the drops and breath at the same time.

chaadster

First, it's important to note that a hybrid is not necessarily a flat bar road bike, and I think there is an important distinction to be made between the two categories. That's a matter for another discussion though.

More to your question, I think, is the issue of aerodynamics and pedaling efficiency. Generally, hybrids are heavier, have more frontal area (e.g. wider tires, suspension forks) and put the rider in a more upright position, all things which slow down the bike and sap rider strength while pedaling hard.

Flat bar roadbikes, on the other hand, are no slower than drop bar road bikes, presuming proper thoughtful setup. Practically, though, flat bar road bikes are rare, and performance flat bar road bikes rarer yet. Road bikes set up to be slow, are plentiful, on the other hand.

jsigone

Looks better so must be faster

aero drag
body position efficiency
skinny tires
taller gearing
lighter weight

dru_

Actually I think your first point is far more relevant than aero factor TBH.

First, most budget hybrids ARE quite heavy compared to drop bar road bikes at 2x the price point. Not many people are spending 1.5k on a hybrid with 105 on it. They are spending $400 and getting a mix of mountain bike and road bike components, with mountain bike rear cassette and derailleurs instead of road sets. That right there accounts for a significant loss in speeds, factor in weaker hip to pedal positions, and yes, you have many non-aero factors that impact speed. When you start getting up to the higher end hybrids, that equation evens out. If you are willing to part with 2k, a Quick Carbon 2 with Shimano 105 or Carbon 1 with Ultegra then you can start talking about aero advantages of moving from there to a drop bar frame and setup, but up to that point, you pretty much comparing apples to oranges.

Second, I hope you just typo'd that last. Road bikes are set up to be fast, and plentiful. Said that way, I concur, and you can find VERY attractive entry level road bikes for far less than moving into exotic territory with road hybrids, with some Sora based bikes under the 1000 mark.

I will toss something else out there though.

Pedalling efficiency is as much about the rider as it is the bike. Precious few hybrids are being ridden in cleats of any sort. This right here reduces pedaling efficiency by a huge margin. Just putting a pair of SPD's on the bike and riding clipped in will gain any rider power and efficiency because you can now pull as well as push, and you lose less in the transition (and can gain even more if you work to learn pedaling in circles not down down down mashing the pedals). Fear of being clipped in is all too frequent. It is truly amazing how much easier and faster you can ride and climb once you embrace the clip (I suggest mountain bike style SPD's and cleats for Road Hybrids and commuter since the shoes are usually something you can still walk in).

chasm54

A lot of it is aerodynamics. You are in a more aero position, and the "skinny tyres" are much more aero than the 32 mm tyres on your current bike. Surprisingly, this makes quite a difference. Plus the bike will be lighter, and the wheels, especially, will be a lot lighter. This doesn't matter so much on flat ground, but does make acceleration faster and makes a significant difference on the hills.

When I used to commute 16 miles each way to work, if I took my road bike (weighing about 18lbs) it took me just under an hour. If I took the touring bike (also a drop-bar set-up, but about 30 lbs) it took about 65 minutes. The difference would have been slightly greater had the roads been less crowded. So a difference of two mph on a typical ride is probably realistic.

headloss 

When does drag really matter? On a windy day, certainly... otherwise, when we reach what, 20, 25mph? That's about when I notice a difference. I wouldn't want to ride a flat-bar set up in the Chicago area, it's too windy. Take away the wind, and I don't think it matters so much.

All else being equal between two bikes, drop bars aren't faster than a flat bar until you reach a given speed that most people starting out won't be riding at anyways.

Where road bikes have an edge is getting up to speed. In general, they have narrower tires and lighter wheels with less drag, shorter chain stays (which also means less room for wider tires) but it gives a firmer response from a stop, probably higher gearing as well... once you are up to speed, the only thing that matters in my opinion is having the drops to get out of the wind if necessary. I can easily ride my flat bar bike (winter bike) and keep up with the guys on road bikes to a point... but they will loose me if there is a lot of stop&go or if wind resistance becomes an issue.

rumrunn6

above posters covered it well

my 2 cents

1st penny: you have to learn how to field "what comes out of peoples' mouths" meaning smile condescendingly and say some thing witty like "uh huh"

2nd penny: perception is reality

I started commuting on an old MTB with knobbies and a bent crank, fixed the crank and swapped the tires, got lower with bolt on drop bars, but then bought a hybrid, rigged that for road riding, but then got a road bike, then got a modern road bike with lighter frame and brifters. am I much faster that that 1st MTB with knobbies? oh yes. am I much faster than that roadified hybrid? NOPE. but still, the road bike is the way to go. not to mention brifters changed my life ...

chasm54

You're mistaken. Wind resistance, even in still air, is the major factor that limits your speed. Drag varies with the square of your speed, so at 15 mph it is more than double what it is at 10 mph. At 20 mph it is almost twice what it is at 15 mph. It's exponential.

The reason you don't notice it so much at lower speeds is simply that you're still below your threshold power, so you can continue. But it's there all the time, and it's progressive.

squirtdad

Two things

1) better bio-mechanical position, ie users your muscles more efficiently
2) aerodynamics


I can see the difference even at moderate speads/effort. My road bike is an easy 2-3 mph faster for the same effort as compared to my upright commuter utility bike. so with same effort that gets me 12-13 mph on the utility bike I am more 15-16 mph for same or less effort

and here they are to compare (and because we don't have enough bike pics in C&A)

road bike Miyata 1400 '89



utility bike Nishiki olympic 12....'82 with lots of modes (frame, fork and seat post are only remaining original parts)

chaadster

A flat bar road bike can put you in just as aero a position as a drop bar road bike, the difference is that on a flat bar, you're max aero all the time, whereas a drop bar has multiple hand holds that allow you to break from max aero (drops) to higher hoods and flats holds.

headloss 

Huh?

The difference is the ability to tuck out of the wind, have you ever taken a hybrid for a ride into a 30mph head wind?

Regardless of the shape of the bars, a drop bar is always going to allow you to tuck down lower than a flat-bar, all else being equal (i.e. for a given frame size and headtube length).

I'm not mistaken, we just disagree on what amount of resistance is negligible. It's not a question of whether or not the resistance exists, but at what point it will hold back a rider. Riding a drop bar is irrelevant if someone stays in the hoods all the time, so riding style is another factor to consider.

Whatever the case, I gave my own personal criteria for when flat vs drop matters, I'm sure we disagree on lots of things.

CommuteCommando

$0.02 on weight. On flats where there is not a lot of stopping, weight doesn't make a lot of difference. Going up a particular long incline, my speed has gone up about 1 mph for every 15 lb I have lost. Some of than can be attributed to better conditioning, but I understand enough physics to know weight plays a big factor. A world class 6', 170 lb racer attacking hills in a road race can see the difference between winning and losing with two lb difference on the bike. Me? I'm looking at taking another 30-40 lb off my carcass just to get off the bottom of most Strava leader boards.

As far as aerodynamics; I have a fixie, and like most of those with traditional track bike geometry, I get a lot lower in the drops than on my road bike, and am usually about 2 mph faster.

chasm54

You are mistaken. Largely because of drag, maintaining 15 mph instead of 10 mph requires three times as much power. Drag varies with the square of your speed, power with the cube of your speed. Hardly negligible.

headloss 

You're being literal. I'm talking about my own personal real world experience; riding a hybrid has never held me back under the conditions that someone would normally ride a hybrid.

You fail to show the change in drag due to position on the bicycle going from flat bars to drop bars. The information you post would be true for either (hypothetical) bike and doesn't even address my criticism. The wind resistance between an upright rider vs the wind resistance of someone in an aero position is most definitely negligible for an hour long ride at 10mph without any additional wind resistance due to weather conditions and all else between the two bikes being equal. I didn't draw the line at 15mph or any definite speed, I asked at what speed does it really matter? Sure, the hybrid rider will have wind-resistance increase at a higher rate, but at what point does the resistance translate to a real world hindrance? How many hours of riding until the loss of efficiency is relevant?

Using the same amount of energy and going from an upright position to a tucked position, would result in a speed increase... I don't question that. However, I believe that at a slow speed the increase in speed is marginal; it's dependent on the initial drag which hasn't been defined. How many miles per hour faster do you suspect someone would go with the same amount of expended energy, with initial conditions being 10mph with the resistance from an upright riding position?

What is negligible? At what point is the investment in a different bike relevant to the purchaser? How many seconds are we trying to shave off of a lap? We haven't defined any of this, so you can't say that it isn't negligible? The fact that I called it negligible is completely subjective and based on my own experience... yet you tell me that I am mistaken, about what? My experience?

Wind resistance is negligible given the conditions I propose... negligible in light of other differences between a road bike and a hybrid that would make more of a difference at the given speed (10 mph).The real difference felt by someone who is new to a drop bar isn't the difference in wind resistance, it's the change in tire width, geometry, wheels, etc. that gives a bike a more lively feel from a stop, that's what people are feeling when they first change from a hybrid to a road bike.

*edit to add* and that brings us back to what chaadster was saying as well... just because you are riding a flat bar bike doesn't mean you can't tuck to some degree. I can get pretty low, even with that set up, but not low enough where I wouldn't regret leaving my road bike at home when I get hit by that 30mph headwind. So for that matter, the amount of resistance from either position is a variable which is hard to quantify without a wind-tunnel test. I'd love to see some real-world numbers comparing a rider tucked on a flat bar vs someone tucked on a drop bar (heck, we haven't even defined how much drop matters, or headtube and spacer height, for that matter which also would matter). In either case, how low can you go? At what point does the tuck itself have diminishing returns. Maybe the OP should just wear a time-trial helmet on his hybrid around the local path? (as I'm confident that, in your opinion, the improved aerodynamics of wearing said helmet would not be negligible!)

One other thing, you are also assuming that someone stays in the drop position for an entire ride and thus "goes faster." The aerodynamic position between my hybrid or my road bike doesn't really change that much, except for when I do ride in the drops instead of the hoods... so back to the OP, unless the people he talked to were spending maybe 80% of their time in the drops (which I doubt) I don't see where the road bike gave them any advantage based on aerodynamics... it's as much about HOW you ride as it is WHAT you ride. Just more things that aren't defined in our discussion...

Beachgrad05

Pretty much the question you had Calliebear has been answered in the above. As I started out on a hybrid (Trek FX 7.2) and now have two road bikes in my stable of bikes, I figured I would comment my experience.

I rode with a women's group that I had found for my first group ride on my FX. EVERYONE else was on a road bike. I was in regular sneakers and using the pedals that came on bike. I struggled mightily to keep up. Fitness was part of issue tho. I rode with a woman from the group 1 day a week on the local trail. She kept telling me that when I got a road bike I would find myself to be much faster, that the hybrid was helping to ensure that. It was heavier, less aero and had wider tires plus I was not clipped in. My hybrid does not have a suspension fork BTW.

I did find that once I got my road bike and was clipped in, I could ride faster. Comparing rides:

Edited out the links as for some reason they did not go to the rides I was referencing.

I rode a similar route about two weeks apart...first with hybrid and then with my new road bike. I was riding with same friend both rides but on different bike and about a 2.5 mph difference in average speed.

I still have my hybrid and rode it yesterday for a short ride while my car was being worked on. My hybrid is the one bike I have that I will lock up outside and not be absolutely paranoid it will be stolen. It is my putt around the hood, short errands bike and if I ever get a job again closer to home...it will once again be a commuter bike.

Penny4

Bikes should go on sale soon! I think 2015 models start coming out around August, so shops will put bikes on sale. With a 2k budget, you can get a very nice bike! You could can get a great entry level/endurance fit bike closer to $1200. Try any of the road bikes/brands that your LBS carries.

I can't answer the question about why you go faster on the road bike vs hybrid, but it made a huge difference for me when i switched.

stephtu

Well, like you said, you have to define negligible. I plugged some numbers into an online bike power calculator, it suggests that drop vs. tops is still worth ~1 mph at that low speed, 11 mph vs. 10 at same power. Is that big enough to matter? Probably depends on the person.

For me, road bike bars vs. hybrid is mainly about multiple hand position options, and my preference for neutral hand position vs. pronated. Extra speed from being able to get down lower is secondary.

StanSeven

That's pretty much everyone's experience after prolonged rides over the same course. If you switch a mountain bike with your commuter utility, you could subtract add another mile per hour or more to the speed compared to a road bike.

headloss 

I think it matters... I just don't think it would be noticeable unless the rider was actually keeping track of all the diagnostic stuff. The fact that I don't use a computer, don't keep track of cadence or speed, etc. probably has a lot to do with what I call negligible. Obviously, there's a clear line between people who use computers (for training) vs. those that don't, in which constantly improving on a time matters to the individual. I don't tend to think that a beginner on a hybrid pays attention to that stuff so much, nor did I think that the context in the OP was suggesting that we were talking about any type of serious training, just perceived change in speed due to a different platform. Of course, I could be wrong.

Either way, it was a good tangent for this thread. Certainly not off topic or irrelevant... just trending way more in depth than I was looking to go.

I think the key is whether or not someone is riding for max speed to begin with, and assuming that while riding a road bike said person would be in the drops and trying to make the best possible time... both things that I wasn't assuming in my earlier posts. (in which case, they'd be riding much faster than 10 or 15mph).

chaadster

Hehehe! Yes, you're right of course; I don't know why I wrote that! Distracted, I guess.

What I meant to say is that a flat bar can be positioned very low for a very aerodynamic position, one that could be lower than the typical road bike. Again, yes, if a stem is slammed and angled down as far as possible, a drop bar will always be lower (in the drops), but of course, there are very, very few bikes with an absolutely low as possible bar setting, so in practice, setting a flat bar as low as someone is likely to want to be is totally possible.

Sixty Fiver

Unless you are climbing hills weight does not play much of a role while aerodynamics and pedalling position make the most difference... I have done 40 km time trials on vintage racing bikes that weigh closer to 30 pounds as well as modern racing bikes and the the difference is only slight because they share similar aggressive riding positions.

My XC mountain bike has drop bars and slick 2.0 tyres and I can hang with faster road cyclists as it also has enough top end gearing to keep me spinning in that 35-40 kmh range quite happily... it is also very light and because of the extra low gearing it is great for routes where there are a lot of steep climbs and less than perfect rod surfaces.

Lighter wheels will spin up faster and accelerate better so speed changes require less output.

I also ride some small wheeled performance and touring bicycles and with drop bars and the ability to get just as aerodynamic makes them deceptively fast.

On a conventional hybrid the position is more upright and from a physics perspective, air resistance is the square of one's velocity and after 30 kmh this becomes the greatest challenge to overcome.

Miele Man

Hi Calliebear9.

Road bicycles can be either fater than hybrid bikes or easier to maintain a quicker pace with for a number of reasons.

Roas bike tires usually have a higher maxinum pressure which makes them faster or easier to roll. Another thing is that besides being lower than hybrid bike bars, road bike bars are often narrower too. The wider bars means you catch more wind even if that wind is only generated by your forward speed. This is even more noticeable if you wear loose fitting clothing. This again means the road bike is more efficient at getting you up to your cruising speed and then maintaining it. That means their is less effort on your part which means less fatigue to you. The bent over position on a road bike besides being more aerodynamic also puts more of your body wright onto the pedals thereby making pedalling easier as gravity does more of the work than it does on a very upright position. You don't have to be extreme with tthe bent over position either.

Cheers from Miele Man

MichaelW

Jamis Coda is a nice 25lbs. If you fit 25mm tyres and some aero-bars you will get most of the performance advantage of road bikes.

Aero drag is proportional to velocity squared. If you double your speed you quadruple your aero drag.