Originally Posted by brunop
the truth is--and this really is the truth, what matters is heart and lungs and legs. again, lance (say) could win on most anything with properly inflated tires. it ain't a cliche--it's not about the bike, it's about the rider.
right, but what if some scientist were to make an exact duplicate of lance and give them different bikes? there would be a small difference, but it would make the guy with the better bike have better odds.
I read somewhere that given scientific training and nutrition, humans have reached close to their peaks in most sports, and there will likely be fewer and fewer world records broken as time goes by. That may be one of the reasons why gear is so important to elite-level sports, especially a sport like track cycling.