Originally Posted by
hueyhoolihan
if your estimation of the consensus is true then the "consensus is wrong" IMO.
what i think people are missing is that a bicycle at motion relative to the road is under acceleration at all times while pedaling. just stop pedaling sometime and see how long it takes to come to a stop. something is slowing us down, so if we are maintaining a constant relative speed to the road we are applying power to overcome it, and the power necessary to maintain that speed is proportional to the weight.
the force it takes to overcome air resistance is substantially higher at normal cycling speeds then the effect of weight. I can even sit up higher on my bike and slow myself down after coming down a hill.