Hello everyone, this is my first post here and I'm relatively new to cycling. I've been thinking what is everyones top speed? mine been 45.5 kph and seems like I cant hold it at that speed even when I'm pushing with one leg and pulling with the other. I'm riding an aluminum bike (trek 1.2) with sora group, is there anything I can change to achieve faster speed? changing wheels? group set? wheel set? whole bike? or my legs

Also, those days I'm seeing a lot of dogs around, I'm sure that speed and time I keep the speed for won't be sufficient, right?

Thanks in advance everyone !

Ride more.

From experience, you probably won't outrun them in a short distance.

Get good at unclipping and going for their head.

Or get good at detaching your frame pump quickly

:

This is the response, to speed questions, by the new umd?

I've sprinted to 48km/h on a slight up-hill on my steel Bianchi.

As has been stated already, ride more. You need to setup a good foundation before worrying about pedalling technique.

I rip open a wormhole every time I sprint.

New to cycling,

If you have to gauge something, focus on the hours you ride.

Miles, speed, HR, avg......they all make it to the table reguardless, but the hours you ride govern how much surface area you have to lay out all the dishes you will be serving.

Enjoy riding.

My max speed was 56.4 mph. Of course, that was going down Mt. Mitchell

You don't need to be faster than a dog. Just make sure you're riding with at least one other person, and that you're faster than him/her. Problem solved.

That said, you should work on out-sprinting dogs. I've only met one dog I wasn't able to out-sprint, and that was just because he surprised me going up a hill. I've found two techniques to be helpful when dealing with dogs: 1) Talk to them nicely in a calm voice (i.e. hey there puppy!) -- for most dogs, this calms them down and takes them off guard; 2) for when 1 doesn't work, in a firm voice and as loud as you can say NO!. Any dog that's lived in America generally knows what NO means. And if you meet the dog that doesn't, that's when you need to be able to out-sprint them

pedal faster.

That's about 30 mph. I don't think many people on this forum would be able to hold this speed very long on the flats without a tail wind.

I don't think very many dogs can run that quickly, either, at least for more than a very quick sprint. A greyhound might, but they aren't very threatening.

You know what works really well for dogs? Hold something in your hand ( it can be a pebble ), and then shake or wag it enticingly, like you're a dog person who's about to give Fido a treat. Get the dog's attention this way, then pretend to throw your cookie in the direction you're coming from. If you don't have anything to throw, just hold your hand as if you do - dogs have great smell, but don't have the best eyes. This works on about 99 % of dogs ... the first time.

Speed will come, keep training

If you're new to cycling just spend a lot of time in the saddle building a good base then you can consider training for speed. New equipment isn't going to help much so ride and enjoy it, you'll notice the progress if you push yourself a little more every week. Another great option is to find a group to ride with as they are typically great for learning what to do right as there are experienced riders in the fold.

i'm so confused by this dog thing. i'm curious why everyone has dog techniques...clearly people are getting chased too much.

are there a lot of strays in the US? are peoples dogs just hanging out unleashed on their front yards? why are dogs chasing all of you?

You blinked? You missed me....

Yep

They're dogs...that's what they do.

I don't know that everybody is actually being chased all the time ... a lot of cyclists have heard stories about other cyclists being chased, though. There are a few dogs in my neighborhood that are unleashed, and hang out near their owners' houses, but don't chase people - the dogs are either lazy, or well trained. I know that the pretending to have food trick works because I grew up around dogs, and know that they value food more than people value money and sex combined.

I've never been chased. Maybe it's a regional thing.

When I was riding in the pacific northwest I never had an issue with dogs.

I now ride in northern Georgia and last week I had two different occasions where I got bit (not just chased, tooth to foot contact). One got a good enough grip to put a scratch in my shoe.

Carry some Raid ant and roach spray in your water bottle cage. It sprays over 15 feet and works great on nasty dogs.

WOW, amazing people and responses on this forum! coming from a table tennis forum, I really enjoyed reading your replies that everyone took the time to write! thanks a lot everyone!!!!

I guess dogs here wont understand "NO", nah kidding they are usually trained in english words. I am a person who have fear of dogs, I would stop for one and say "NO".. I'll try to sprint till I faint, watching dog chasing on youtube doesn't help either :/

Unclipping and kicking the dog is an option? this dog got kicked in the face and still came back to attack! nothing stopped it but a taser, after it got tazed it went into a "crazy ape" mode and couldn't control itself, and damn it was so fast when it did those weird moves.. one word SCARY!


I heard some cyclists use pepper spray, sounds evil..

FWIW - I remember reading the specs of my new Avocet computer many years ago and being surprised to see that the max speed it would indicate was 399mph!

to handle dogs, if I can't accelerate and outrun them easily, the next best thing is to spray some water from your bottle in their face. I have had one dog stop me in my tracks, he must have been good at math, he took the best angle on me and intersected me perfectly.

when it comes to speed going downhill i think i can beat just about anyone. On rolling hills where the downhills are quite short and last no more than a few seconds i often hit 50 mph. My max has been 58mph. i have gotten so used to it i don't even realise until afterwards when i see the computer.