Sharing the Roads - Safety Quiz

The following quiz is for cyclists and drivers alike. The "A" responses are split for cyclists and drivers simply pick the appropriate answer, if like most cyclists you are also a driver you could.

As you go through make a note of your selected multiple choice answers and check them at the end and see what sort of road user you are.

Questions

1) The traffic light ahead is about to turn red, what do you do?

A (drivers)  - Press the throttle to accelerate so as not to get caught out by the light
A (cyclists) - Keep pedaling bikes don't really need to stop
B - Ease up and stop if the light is red - there will be a green along in a minute
C - How do I know if it might turn red?

2) What do you do at advanced stop lines when the lights are red?

A (drivers) - Drive into the box as long as there's no bikes in it
A (cyclists) - Move ahead of the traffic and put my bike ahead of the box
B - Stop behind the box in my car or in the box on my bike
C - What are advanced stop lines?

3) How much room should you allow when passing a cyclist?

A) (drivers) - Enough so my car won't get messed up
A) (cyclists) - A foot or so, I'll be past quickly so they'll hardly know I'm there
B) - The same as passing another vehicle and at least a metre
C) - Cyclist! what cyclist?

4) If a cyclist is riding well out into the road approaching a junction what do you do?

A) (drivers) - rev the engine, beep and pass as fast an close as possible to teach them a lesson
A) (cyclists) - pass on the inside, make a comment or offensive gesture to teach them a lesson
B) - Wait patiently behind as he's probably making sure he is safe until past the junction
C) - Junction! what junction!

5) A long queue of cars has formed and you want to turn right about 5 cars along. What do you do?

A) - Pass those 5 cars on the wrong side of the road indicating to make it alright
B) - Wait until you can make the turn correctly from your own side of the road
C) - How many cars did you say?



How did you do?

Mostly "A"s - You are a facist driver/cyclist! You shouldn't be allowed to share our roads and your vehicle should be melted down to make speed cameras.

Mostly "B"s - You are patient and respect other road users. I'm happy to share the roads with you, even if you are a little too good for your own good!

Mostly "C"s - You really aren't trying are you. I'm not sure you should be on the roads at all, even when you've sobered-up.

What if your Brompton punctures?

Changing inner-tubes on the small wheels of the Brompton is always a bit of a pain. Using Marathons and Marathon Plus tyres seems to have greatly reduced the number of punctures but what if it happens. Out come the extra strong tyre levers and all that swearing and faffing trying to get the tyre back on.

Well today I have the solution.

The Clown bike is a little bit heavy for the front of the pack, perhaps it would fit better on a rear rack, but it is very strong, has a very low gear for climbing (it has a very low everything really) and it has solid tyres so you'll not get another puncture while you cycle on with the Brompton on your back.

Climbing - Part 1 - back to basics

Riding bikes up hills is the thing most cyclists find difficult and it is especially difficult for novices. Most people end up learning to climb without much help or advice and often end up finding it much harder than they ought to.

To understand why riding up hills is hard here's a little bit of science (skip the green bit if you don't like science):

The Science Bit

When Albert Einstein worked out one of the best known pieces of science he probably did it because he realised how important it is for cyclists wanting to ride faster or climb hills.

e = mc(2)

In words the formula reads "energy equals mass x constant squared"

The formula is used to show how much energy is required to move an object. But what does it really mean?

"Energy" most of us understand, although it comes in a variety of forms, and when riding a bike the energy is provided by the engine (the rider) except when heading downhill when something called potential energy comes into play.

"Mass" is a bit like weight in that it is a measure of the amount of material in something (the weight of an object varies depending on its location but mass is always the same - think of how light things are on the moon)

The "Constant" is a way of measuring the things that affect the movement of the object like gravity, friction etc.

When riding a bike on a level surface the constant is mainly made up mainly of air resistance (the coefficient of drag, the CD value car makers used to publish in the 80s, multiplied by the speed of the bike) and the mechanical efficiency of the bike and the drag from the road surface (these last two are relatively minor). The squared bit at the end of the formula means that to double the speed of the bike requires four times the energy.

Riding up a hill the constant includes a measure of the gravitational pull of the earth (itself a constant  called g) as well as the factors applying on the flat. As speed is much lower going up hills the air resistance becomes less significant and the energy requirement to ride against the gravitational pull of the earth becomes the most significant factor.

__________________________

What does it mean in simple non scientific terms?

So does that mean that the lighter you are the better you can climb? Not necessarily classic climbers like Lucien Van Impe, Robert Millar or Marco Pantani were all very slightly built but what about Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault and Big Mig Indurain who all climbed brilliantly and were much heavier riders (with much more mass). The bigger climbers simply needed more energy to climb at the same speed as the lighter ones and in the examples given they had sufficiently powerful engines to be able to produce that amount of energy.

The important factor to be able to climb really fast is to have lots of power compared to how much you weigh (a high power to weight ratio).

There are two main reasons why climbing is harder than it should be for many riders and these are:

a) power to weight ratio is too low
b) technique needs improving

In the following two posts Climbing - Part 2 and Part 3 - I'll take a look at how to use training to tackle the power to weight issue and how to improve technique to climb more effectively.

Pedalling - back to basics

One constant in cycling is the need to pedal effectively. The more we pedal the more the body will adapt to pedalling and the better it becomes.

Technical

Pedalling looks pretty simple and it comes naturally when you ride a bike a lot. There is just one really important technical issue with pedalling which relates to the correct position of the foot on the pedal. When pushing on the pedal the ball of the foot should be directly above the axle.

Think about running and jumping, the power is always delivered through the ball of the feet, the same applies to riding a bike, maximum power is applied through the ball of the foot. This gives rise to lots of discussion about the types of pedal and cleats. In reality most pedals with cleats (sometimes called clipless pedals) work perfectly well for those that want to use them although each rider will tend to have a preferred system.

For maximum power delivery the soles of the shoes used should be pretty rigid. There is also a theory that flat pedals work perfectly well and for most purposes except racing that is probably true, I've used flat and clipless systems for commuting and MTB and most of the time they are fine but in a sprint or hopping over an obstacle on a road bike the clipless have an advantage.

There are lots of studies and articles about pedalling technique but none that conclusively prove that techniques such as “ankling”, trying to pull on the upstroke or dragging the pedal through top-dead-centre make any measurable difference to the overall effectiveness of the rider. Training to pedal is therefore achieved by simply pedalling, lots and lots of pedalling.

The muscles that do most of the pedalling actions will develop as more of the fibres come into use and the circulation in the legs will improve in order to supply oxygen to the muscles. The muscles that are used  the most get bigger as more fibres are brought into use. That’s why after years of riding cyclists legs get to look different from other people’s legs (that and the shaving!).

How quickly should you pedal?

Does matter is how quickly you pedal. Ideally you should probably pedal faster in training than you think you should. If you want to know what quick pedalling looks like watch any video of Lance Armstrong - whatever he did or didn’t do in terms of doping he certainly developed the ability to pedal  quickly and comfortably.

Most people don’t pedal quickly enough and then in a competitive situation when they need to pedal really fast they can’t. If you train by pedalling slowly then your body adapts to be able to do that and pedalling fast is going to be difficult. If on the other hand you pedal more quickly when training the body adapts to be able to pedal quickly but it can pedal more slowly without difficulty.

Summary

Pedal quickly when training (watch Lance!)
Pedal with the ball of the foot over he axle
Pedal lots and lots

My next "Back to Basics" topic will be climbing with a bit of science for good measure.

Back to Basics - What is Training?

In cycling there are three main types of training which can be defined as:

physiological - adaptation of the physical attributes of the body
technical - development of physical skills and techniques

psychological - development of mental skill and techniques

The Training Effect

The human body is a very clever design and in essence if it needs to do a particular action frequently then it can adapt itself to become better at that action.

In very simple terms if you want to run fast then you keep running as fast as you are able and  over a period of time the body will make changes enabling it to run faster (see the science below). If you keep pushing to what seems to be your limit in this way the body will adapt in a wide range of ways to make that possible. All of those adaptations put together create the “Training effect”.

This is hardly new science and it is how human beings have trained for sport, for war, for work and for survival over many thousands of years.

At the same time human beings have used the basic training methods to develop technical skills, lots of repetition and carefully building up the parts that make a technique to become more effective. That's the way farmers learned to plough the land and also how soldiers learned archery. Those same principles apply now to those of us wanting to become more effective cyclists.

In psychological terms repeating a process enough helps to alter the pathways in the brain and is part of the effect of technical skills training. In addition the brain is able to learn things through effective thinking techniques such as visualisation and can benefit from strategies to boost morale. It isn't really surprising that increased morale actually boosts physical performance.

What do we need to do, and what do we need to understand, in order to become better cyclists?

The answer to that question depends on a wide range of variables including the specific areas of cycling where we want to improve. Do you want to ride further, faster, climb better, sprint better etc. These specifics will be addressed in the following blog postings starting with the one constant in cycling; pedalling

The Science Bit

There is an excellent explanation of the theory of adaptation in physical training from Colorado Sports Training at;

http://coloradosportstraining.com/site/physical-load/adaptation-as-a-main-law-of-training

In simple terms all organisms have the ability to respond to stress by adapting.

If your circumstances mean you have to run away (e.g. from large carnivores) frequently then your body increases the capacity of the heart to pump enough blood, increases the capacity of the lungs to supply oxygen to be carried in the blood and increases the number of fibres brought into use in the leg muscles. Of course if you have to run away too many times without giving your body time to rest and to make those adaptations while resting then you are likely to get caught (and eaten). This is where evolution kicks in because the better adapted are more likely to survive and breed etc.

By carefully planning your training you persuade your body, by creating the right amount of stress, that it needs to adapt and then you give it the necessary time and nutrients to make the adaptations and you become more effective.