carpediemracing 

I was thinking that having the bars lower helps me, but that may not be the case. I'll need to experiment. On my road bike I had tremendous control issues sprinting when my drops were 3 cm higher. I sort of assumed that would be the case on the track, but there's a difference between sprinting on the road and doing a standing start. I'm super inexperienced with the start, and I don't know if maybe having a more upright position for the start would make it easier to apply torque to the pedals.

As far as the aero bar part goes, I need to experiment there as well. I haven't used aero bars on the track ever, and the last time I used aero bars on the road... I'm guessing it was 30 years ago.

Thanks for helping me think through this stuff.

RobertPaulson

Maybe just try and hit a solid season at the track and leave the kit for a bit then, you'll get lots of opinions on what works for you or doesn't as the track time builds up. If you are sprint focus, there is a great xls sheet kicking around somewhere that lets you see f200 times vs gearing and RPM, once you have a few timed quali runs down to calibrate it you can pretty much always work out your speed just using an RPM magnet and recording your gearing - really helpful for trying stuff out and seeing what makes you faster or slower and being analytical on your f200 build-up, which I'm guessing you (like me!) would enjoy going through to try and find extra speed.

topflightpro

CDR, I'll mention this here as well. If you are just doing the 500, you will be fine with a drop bar. If you are doing pursuits, then you should look to an aerobar.

Also, if you can arrange to get down to RH and try out the 250 before nationals, that would be very helpful. Feel free to DM me if you want to come down this way, and I will meet up with you there.

carpediemracing 

I appreciate the responses. I'm definitely someone that likes to tinker and see what does what. It's hard for me to get to a track though, so that's a tricky bit. For example, I never got to do a 500 until 2021 Nationals, so that was the first 500 I ever did (and the first time I used that gear, etc). The second one was late last year, 2022. I'm still very green in attacking the 500.

Honestly, I think the last thing I'd do is the pursuit. When I did one in 2009 my time was poor enough that I'd have gotten lapped at least once by the winner, if not twice (333m track, 2km pursuit). If things seem reasonable for me I'd love to do the sprint and maybe the scratch race, although I'd have to be flying to be good for either of those.

I suspect that because my power drops off so rapidly, having an aero position may help me sustain speed in the last third of the event. That's been my thought so I've wanted to experiment to see if that is anywhere close to reality. Of course a narrow bar like the narrow sprint bars would be close to that kind of position, without the hand position change move thrown in there.

I do plan on going down to RH at some point this year. First, I need to get some kind of certification so I can race the track, and I figure I can get it there. And the second is I'd like to do at least one recon trip to get a feel for the lay of the land. I did manage to do that for TTown, as the last time I'd been there before 2021 was 1992. My recon trip included checking out the hotel, finding a place to eat, getting used to the drive (in addition to the overnight I also went there and back for one night of racing - that was long, returning home at 2 am or something). It was good and my wife and son joined me for the second recon trip. Unfortunately Nationals conflicted with stuff at home so I went to Nationals on my own.

A good friend (he was my leadout man and my race day bro for about 5 years), his folks live in the area ("20 minutes away"), and his wife thinks it's a great idea for us to go down there and be bike racers for a bit (lol). So that's another reason to head down.

Morelock

BikeForums Rock Hill meetup!

Poppit

UCI position press release https://www.uci.org/pressrelease/uci...rsgeQtgahAAfXr

RobertPaulson

This is the agro sprint next to the wx-r carbons