tomatl411

A great descending video at Luz Ardiden (sp?) these guys are going wicked fast, the lean on some of those corners is incredible. I personally, don't feel comfortable going as fast as those guys downhill--one pothole and its all over. When the lead rider gets into his tuck you can visually see the gap increase on the camera man--pretty impressive. Some good car passes too--again nothing I would feel comfortable doing (downright dangerous) but, damn, it does look like fun. The music kind of grows on you after you listen to it a few times.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYmDwapJ934

Good Stuff.

Jason Johnson

DrPete 

Cool video--thanks for posting. Reminds me a lot of descending Mont Ventoux--those hairpins are no joke, and near the summit of Ventoux they're totally exposed and sans guardrail as in the video you posted. And just when you think you're in the clear and you're flying down the mountain, WHAM! there's another hairpin. I'll have to go back sometime and see if it's as scary the second time around...

pcates

sure makes all the effort getting up the hill in the first place worth it doesn't it!!

Dead Roman

Those guys were really sailing. Reminds me of a motorcycle video I saw he other day where the guys were cutting between cars and stuff.

https://www.gassattack.com/videos/SpringTour05.zip


Similar just not the same.

Any more descent vids?

DrPete 

They were moving along, but I don't know about "sailing." Watch video from the TdF and see how much steeper the lean angles are on similar descents. THOSE guys are sailing.

VosBike

Maybe it's the camera's persepective or something, but I was entirely unimpressed by that video. They weren't going that fast, the lean angles were no where near maximal, the guy in front was taking terrible lines (camera man was much more skilled in that respect).

It takes balls to descend sans guardrails, but that just didn't impress me. Go watch some videos of salvodeli, that's decending.

pcates

+1 the pros reach speeds of 90km/hr on some of the descents

TheKillerPenguin

Pros also don't have to worry about oncoming traffic when finding a good line

socalrider

In the 1986 TDF - alpe de huez stage - Lemond and Hinault hit over 110km/h.. The lead cars were having trouble staying ahead of them.

pcates

didn't lemond used to have special bars that'd help him get into that tuck of his......this is why he was the man

SSP

+1. The lead rider was mostly sitting up wearing a big ole floppy jacket that was catching wind like crazy and slowing him down (if you want to go fast downhill, ditch the jacket and zip everything up).

And you're absolutely right about the lines he was taking through the corners...they were mostly pretty awful. Not exactly a Skills Clinic on how to go downhill fast.

mkadam68

Not in 1986. Traditional road bike (Hinault branded). The special bars (Scotts) came later, 1990/91 with Team Z.

waterrockets 

Cool video to watch, but they were neither descending fast nor cornering hard. I'm no descending specialist, and this still looks moderate to me. I won't call it slow, because they'd drop a lot of cyclists, and they were riding well.

pcates

you're right......i remember when he had those going down the luz ardiden. it was a novel idea (was he the first?) to use those lower bars and then launch his frame over the bars. despite what people may think of LeMond now, the reason the tour is the way it is now is because of him......he really brought new ideas to a sport that handn't changed much in 80years before him.

clutchy

awesome video!!

in motorcycling we call that blowing a turn, passing on a blind corner, and crossing the double yellow...

Dead Roman

Also would be known as squids. Fun to watch, but you dont wanna be one.

terrymorse 

Then there's this photo of Myles Rockwell in the Tuna Canyon downhill race:



Pretty tight lean angle, but crummy body position. The caption says "Rockwell corners like a pro". A pro that can't keep his nose over his stem and doesn't understand that sticking knees out only screws up the bike's handling.

Here's what cornering looks like when done well:



Jobst Brandt descending Haskins Hill, near La Honda, CA. Still the fastest descender I've seen.

Edit: I just finished watching the video. The guy in the yellow jacket looks like he descends all the way on the hoods! What a nut. When I see someone desending on the hoods, I give him lots of room. Nothing says I don't know how to descend quite like hands on the hoods.

Dead Roman

Shifting your body to the inside of a turn wil merit you a larger contact patch, which in turn means more friction, which in turn means more traction.

But this is based on my knoledge of motorcycle and bicycle physics.

zzzz

These guys are much better descenders than the riders in the OP's video link:

https://www.neufstream.com/tag/downhill/video/172154

It looks like they are getting lean angles of around 45 degrees (1g) in many corners.

DrPete 

I, for one, don't think I will ever be able to call Myles Rockwell a cornering hack. Maybe from a different school, but I'd certainly be hard pressed to critique his body position. Dude descends stuff that would make most of us pee our pants, and made a pretty good living for a while doing it.

waterrockets 

That's not really true on a bicycle. The tire profile is pretty much round except for a few styles that are built up on the edges -- in which case you'd be better off leaning to that point.

Dead Roman

https://www.redbullroadrage.com/action.php


THESE guys are descending fast. You will see some unorthodox style as most of these guys are downhill MTB guys. Theres some roadies in there though.

Dead Roman

https://youtube.com/watch?v=93gGn2OZDrc

More, same event

FrankBattle 

Glad it wasn't just me. I go faster than this video appears and I'm CHICKEN on unknown downhills.

botto 

i had those. looked cool, but were worthless.