Cycling in and around Birmingham England

Max speed on the road?

Hi all, I have set myself a target of 50mph on my road bike, with a near-term target of 45mph. I often reach speeds in excess of 40mph, at the moment 42.6mph is the most I've achieved on my new bike before a car got in my way. Today I had my first ever go on a set of rollers, using a front axel stand, and reached 65.3mph with a max cadence of around 190rpm (for a few seconds only).

The bike on the rollers has the same gear ratio as mine, although I wasn't using cleats at the time. So what I'm wondering is; given that I was on rollers with no wind resistance and no gradients, what do you think will be possible to achieve on the road? Will I struggle to reach 50mph or will it be pretty close to this given that theoretically I should be able to maintain the same cadence?

Any thoughts or anyone had similar experience?

Lucas

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Permalink Reply by Kim on September 25, 2011 at 0:56

Bear in mind that at those sort of speeds, at least on a typical road bike, you're liable to go faster if you tuck in and try to make your body as aerodynamic as possible than you will by pedalling.

Lucas said:

Hang on, hang on..... let us just be clear here! lol.

I'm not attempting to reach 50mph on a flat, that would be more than impressive and I'd probably be riding bikes for a living. For me to reach such speeds there will definitely be some sort of gradient involved but I don't want anything so steep that it requires no effort from me, if that makes sense

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Permalink Reply by Ian Wacogne on September 25, 2011 at 9:39

A decade or so ago, living in Australia, I came down a hill and went about 45 miles an hour. Scared myself, ahem, witless. Wheel rims were white hot afterwards. I did check, and I don't think I left any marks on the road on the way down, but it wasn't as a consequence of any active control of the fear...

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Permalink Reply by david.cherry on September 25, 2011 at 11:50

To leave marks on the road you need to hit 88 mph

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Permalink Reply by John Cant on September 25, 2011 at 14:09

We should have different categories and turn this into a challenge!

Here are a few suggestions

Max speed ever down any hill

Max speed within 20 miles of Birmingham

Max speed on the ring road

Max speed at certain specific locations

Here are my results

Ever: 52mph

Ring road - 32mph

Here: http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=Birmingham&hl=en&ll=52.4836... - 39mph

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Permalink Reply by Kim on September 25, 2011 at 15:09

My current all-time max of 48.7mph was here

I regularly exceed 40 (traffic permitting) without really trying just round the corner on Barnt Green Road.

I cycle so irregularly in the city centre that I'm usually more concerned with navigation than speed on the ring road, though my GPS log from August's Critical Mass shows I did over 35mph while sprinting down Great Charles Street Queensway to catch up with the main group. That's got to count for something?

What are people's favourite hills for bonkers descending in the area?

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Permalink Reply by Basil W Bloke on September 25, 2011 at 16:52

Yes. That's a good one.

Primrose hill, which is on my regular loop is quite good but a little short, but after having had cars miscalculate my approach speed at the cross road at the bottom, I now tend to be a little circumspect there.

Mucklow Hill is good with good sightlines and road width. You need to pick a time with low traffic volume or you can actually be held up behind slower cars. It can also have a head wind.

Personally, I've done upper 40s on many occasion on hills but I've never quite hit 50. And now I'm aged and boring, I probably never will.

May I suggest another category?

Fasted speed in fully panniered up cycle camping touring mode on a road you've never ridden on before.

44 mph for me.

Twice.

Once on the A38 somewhere south west of Bristol on my way to the 1999 eclipse.

And then exactly the same score again coming down off Watership Down last summer.

,
Kim said:

My current all-time max of 48.7mph was here

I regularly exceed 40 (traffic permitting) without really trying just round the corner on Barnt Green Road.

I cycle so irregularly in the city centre that I'm usually more concerned with navigation than speed on the ring road, though my GPS log from August's Critical Mass shows I did over 35mph while sprinting down Great Charles Street Queensway to catch up with the main group. That's got to count for something?

What are people's favourite hills for bonkers descending in the area?

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Permalink Reply by Lucas on September 30, 2011 at 6:50

Thanks. No you don't need to book it, you can just turn up. It's free to use but is unavailable when it's been booked out by the cycling clubs. Details are available online. Can't remember the website off the top of my head. Do a Google search and you'll find it. It's worth taking a trip down there, if it's too far then you can just take the train. The park is right by Solihull station.

Andy said:

Nice bike ;-)

With that track do you have to book? I went to Aldersley once after ringing beforehand and when I got there they said that I needed to have someone there to watch in case I fell off - A health and safety rule.

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Permalink Reply by Andy on September 30, 2011 at 7:07

Thanks - Also...

I heard somewhere that it's a figure 8 track. This may be a silly question but don't people crash in the middle - or is it the case that you constantly have to slow down when you get to the middle?

Andy.

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Permalink Reply by Lucas on October 17, 2011 at 8:35

So... just to let you all know. My target of 50mph has been achieved! I went to Wales over the weekend with the cycling club, had some really tough climbs but then some really good runs coming down too. My top speed was 50.8mph so I was pretty happy with that. I'm not going to attempt going any faster as with my current gearing (50D on the front, 11T on the back) I was spinning up. With that in mind, without going to a 52 on the front (at a cost of around £70-80) I'm not going to be able to travel any faster.

I must say, it was really good fun riding in Wales and would highly recommend it to any of you (regardless of level of fitness or bike type). The scenery is awesome and the roads are pretty well maintained with relatively few cars about. I may post up a couple of videos and photo's at some point.

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Permalink Reply by John Cant on October 17, 2011 at 11:42

Hi Luke, it's a small world! I got to 49.3 down that hill a few minutes before you and Xav blasted past me!

John

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Permalink Reply by Simon on October 18, 2011 at 7:57

Dunno my max on road, but max off road was 49.5mph. Achieved on a long down hill fire road in Wales in the days before MTBs had those piddly small chain sets. I would have gone for the magic 50 but everything was shaking so much (also before I had suspension) that I couldn't read the speedo and so didn't know that I was so close (until I'd stopped and checked out the Max Spd function).

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Permalink Reply by Andy White on October 18, 2011 at 8:23

I had an early Cat-eye computer back in the 80's mounted on my beautiful Colnago Super - sadly no longer in my possession. On the hill down from Dudley on the Himley Rd it recorded 54.2mph. It was scarily fast but in reality I suspect it was malfunctioning.

I think I went faster still on the straight drop down to Penmachno from Llan Festiniog. Unfortunately I didnt have a computer, it just felt faster, but I reckon it must have been around the 50mph bracket. Two of us overtook a car and then bottled it as a few sheep appeared at the edge of the road a couple of hundred yards ahead. Could have been nasty.... no helmets either!