From the Snapple “Real Fact” cap # 152: “In 1985, the fastest bicyclist was clocked at 154 mph.”
Was he in a car? A rocket bike? What gives?
I don’t know about this particular case but I know several bicycle speed records have been set with the bicycle behind some motorized vehicle that was punching a hole in the air for it so to speak.
Oh, here’s a picture:
IIRC, it was under no-wind-resistance conditions. In other words, he was tucked behind a truck or similar object which was going that speed.
Damn. Same link, even.
Google, yes?
Human Powered Vehicle Association speed records
http://www.ihpva.org/hpva/hpvarech.html
Man, and I started to freak out when I got up to 40 mph!
Doesn’t mean that you should trust Snapple, the last cap that I had informed me of the interesting fact that “A duck’s quack doesn’t echo” :rolleyes:
Geez, what’s next for the Snapple cap?
“0.9999…(repeating) doesn’t equal 1”?
Drafting? :dubious:
It looks like he’s being towed.
How could anyone pedal 154mph, even without wind resistance?
Well, take away wind resistance and what resistance is left? Not much friction on a well made bicycle. Getting the gearing right is probably crucial.
Freefall?
I saw a bicycle speed record set on TV once, quite a few years ago now - I’m pretty sure it must have been on the BBC show Record Breakers.
The attempt was made on a rolling road type contraption that kept the cyclist stationary in the studio.
If anything this actually seems fairer than doing it riding the wake of a moving vehicle. The slipstream wouldn’t just push the air out of the way but I’m sure it would add several mph to the top speed due to the aerodynamic “tow” effect.
The bike itself wasn’t anything special except that it had only one gear with an absolutely huge primary cog. Because of this it took the rider a couple of minutes to get up to full speed, fighting the mechanical disadvantage.
I forget the exact speed he was said to have attained, but it was well in excess of 100mph.
IIRC, this speed was set by an amateur cyclist and an attempt was made on it by Francesco Moser - former world road race champion, on the perfectly logical grounds that surely a pro would do better.
At this speed other issues come into play, such as accurate wheel balancing and aerodynamic stability, result was that Moser underestimated these other effects and nearly fell off.
The gearing on that attempt was so high that he had to be towed to around 70-80mph before he could even turn the pedals, I imagine this had to happen on the prvious succesful attempt.
From Guinness Word Records:
The highest speed ever achieved on a bicycle is 268.831 km/h (167.043 mph), by Fred Rompelberg (The Netherlands) at Bonneville Salt Flats, Utah, USA, on October 3, 1995. His record attempt was greatly assisted by the slipstream from his lead vehicle. Fred has been cycling professionally for nearly 30 years and during that time has held 11 world records.