best bike for 100m sprint
Discussion
A (hopefully) enjoyably pointless question,
Alittle bit of google fails to come up with any answer as to how quickly a top cyclist could manage 100m (for the obvious reason that it's a bit pointless over that short a distance). What I was thinking of was, what would the best bike for the job look like?
rules:
100m standing start (like a sprint) - no push start
complete freedom to design a bike, as long as it's human powered and has 2 wheels it's good.
my thoughts:
probably something like a trials bike/bmx. No need for a saddle, you'll be standing throughout. Light weight is good, but so is stability - it needs to the allow the rider to spend as little time as possible balancing at low speeds, and as much time stamping on the pedals. Aerodynamics probably not that important either. Very light wheels important, probably very slim front tyre and wider rear.
Anyone else feel like having a go?
Alittle bit of google fails to come up with any answer as to how quickly a top cyclist could manage 100m (for the obvious reason that it's a bit pointless over that short a distance). What I was thinking of was, what would the best bike for the job look like?
rules:
100m standing start (like a sprint) - no push start
complete freedom to design a bike, as long as it's human powered and has 2 wheels it's good.
my thoughts:
probably something like a trials bike/bmx. No need for a saddle, you'll be standing throughout. Light weight is good, but so is stability - it needs to the allow the rider to spend as little time as possible balancing at low speeds, and as much time stamping on the pedals. Aerodynamics probably not that important either. Very light wheels important, probably very slim front tyre and wider rear.
Anyone else feel like having a go?
pablo said:
bmx would be useless after 50m as you will reach max speed by then
this is kinda the interesting point... i'll try and find the relevant link but apparently a sprinter reaches vmax at 40m, then decelerates gradually. My initial reaction against traditional track bikes is they'd still be accelerating at 100m, probably still 200m, as even a light 700c wheel will have a fair amount more inertia than a good 20" or 24" wheel. Track bikes generally seem to start very slowly (mainly gearing I guess, but disc wheels can't help). Guess I'll never get to see unless someone is stupid enough to create a 100m standing start sprint event though (damn)
awesome link, cheersI'm thinking no gears too - for city riding I'm quicker off the lights stamping on the pedals on a high gear than shifting, but spending most of the time going easy on the gears. Might be different with a £2k gearset that can take some abuse though. 'Fraid I'm nowhere near bournemouth, might take my bikes (cheap mtb, half decent roadie) down to the nearest speed camera markings though 
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