genec

I've done loaded tours that involved 100 miles a day... it really isn't so bad if you work up to it. Makes for a huge appetite though. I remember once going into a Pizza Hut and ordering a large pizza and salad and being asked if I wanted to wait for the rest of my party. "No thanks, I'll just eat it here." You should have seen her eyes as my mere 150LB self downed that pie.

apesrunner58

My fastest going down a hill is 48.7mph

dahut

Thats what Im talking about!

I saw a pic of one of the TdF riders out for an injury. He was in McDonalds wolfing down 'Le Big Mac' and 'pomme frites.'

gregf83 

Ryder is impressive but there is something broken with that file. I uploaded it to Golden Cheetah and it is missing about 40 min of power data. It looks like his avg power for that stage was more like 236W.

Training Peaks provides ride data for Chris Anker Sorensen and Flecha which is quite interesting. I was hoping to see yesterday's data with Flecha in the break but it hasn't been posted yet.

JanMM

Can't beat tandems and recumbents for downhill runs..................we've switched to a recumbent tandem this year and am curious to find out if our max speeds increase on downward slopes. On the level, it does seem easier to maintain speed, once we attain that speed.

stapfam

So what is speed like on the uphill?

Downhill speed can be phenominal and we have caught several riders out that have tried to follow us. Ours is a full offroad beastie with Downhill spec wheels to take the hits of the trail and Top grade disc brakes. Suspension is via a set of Boxers so it will take all the hits we give it. That is fast --Downhill. On the flat and we get a solo rider come alongside us at around 20mph and we gradually raise the speed up to around 25. Then a couple of turns on the pedals and we are at 30 and the solo is gone.

But a tandem will soon show you when you have hit any gradient uphill. It is either flat or downhill-----OR uphill on those things.

waynesulak

We climb at about the average of our two single bike climbing speeds. Tandems aren't slower than singles up hill they just loose all the advantage they have on the flats and downhill. This makes tandem riders think they are stronger than they really are and they end up with stronger riders on the flats - until a hill brings them back to earth so to speak.

Now two strong riders on a tandem are fast - Rode with my 24 year old son once as the stoker - WOW He is not really a bike rider but on a slight downhill where my wife and I struggle to maintain 30 mph we accelerated to 38 mph and slowed because he started to get nervous. The bike was flexing a little. He is a 200 lb young guy who just mashes the pedals. One old weak guy + one young untrained unskilled guy = 38 mph ...tandems are a blast.

Funny note - he rides a motorcycle.

JanMM

Uphill, we are not so fast! On the bright side, the Screamer seems quite manageable at very slow speeds. We're still learning how to ride this thing.

stapfam

What kept you? Our Beastie weghs in at 400lbs all up weight and is slow uphill. Saying that- When we do peak on fitness we can keep the fast solos at bay on a 30 mile offride ride but that is not our type of riding--Or wasn't as we have come to our senses now.



This was us in 2004 on a 100 miler and we were a bit unhappy as we were not certain if the gate was open 1/2 way down Butser Hill and kept the speed down till we were certain it was open. If we knew the gate was open we are certain we would have done more than the 53.8mph we recorded. And that was offroad.

mac61

40 mph + --- i guess if i rode over the edge of a cliff i could do it.

Smogsteve

Last spring I was visting friend in Santa Rosa, CA and while out on a ride a double paceline caught us on a slight downhill. It was Lipehiemer, Horner and the rest of the Radio Shack team on a " recovery ride". We tucked in at the back of the pack and were pulled along at about 30+ mph. When we hit the first hill 7 -9% they did not even slow down but joked with each other all the way up and dropped the t2o old guys like a empty muset bag. We are not slow. on good days we will do 4:20 centuries, and the Markleyvile ride every other year. These guys were still 2 months to the tour of California and still were in amazing shape.

stapfam

And back to that 40mph. Stage 11 and a breakaway up the road and the pelaton decided to chase. It was persisting down and the breakaway were a good group with some strong riders and 3 minutes up the road and just on the limit of distance left to be caught. Mptor bike shot and they were doing 80 kph on the flat. That is 50mph and had to keep that speed for many miles before the 6 riders in front were caught.

And I hate think what speed the sprint for the line got to in the rain.