Fairing bans just silly: a bike is a bike

[Jeff Potter]

The National 24 Hour Challenge ride was a couple weeks
ago. It's a big deal, with quite a few people riding more
than 400 miles (including a woman!) and dozens more than
300. It's been going on for years and is a very highly
regarded event.

They have a bunch of categories including one for
recumbents. Several 'benters rode over 300 miles this year.

But I have a beef against their ban on fairings. Fairings
don't necessarily relate to recumbents, so I guess they're
their own issue.

OK, I'm sure one is allowed to ride with saddlebags,
fenders, and aerobars. Right? And we're all in favor of
sun protection, crash protection, and visibility to
drivers, right?

Well, why make someone use floppy, separate, ad hoc versions
of these things when a fairing can integrate all of them
conveniently.

A fairing can easily be: a rigid rainsuit, a sun-shield, a
crumple-zone and road-rash-eliminator, a large storage area,
a brightly colored beacon to warn cars. It can even provide
privacy for toilet/clothes-changing needs of many kinds.

Why should it be held against someone that a fairing also
allows easier pedaling? (As does an aerobar, trispoke wheels
and certain physiques.)

One can readily do amazing things with carbon fiber---
fairings could easily be built into frames so that there
would be no need or sense in calling these different parts
of a bike by different names: the frame, fairing, fenders,
storage, weather-protection, crash-protection, visibility
factors could all be ONE solid 30-pound unit, perhaps.

Bans on these kinds of bikes are holding back cycling
advances.

As long as it doesn't have a motor, a bike is a bike.

OK, I suppose that these kinds of bikes could readily be
used in typical century rides and organized tours or
personal tours of any kind. So maybe they're not being held
back in that regard. Recumbents in general are becoming more
popular in centuries. I'm sure that small fairings are
coming on strong in such rides. I hope we someday see more
trickledown from HPV racing in terms of more integrated
fairing design. I suppose another thing such bikes do is
hamper the social factor in such rides, unless the rider's
head is exposed and the rider wants to go slower. However,
in really big rides such wide-ranging functionality in a
solid package might be of great interest. I'm sure it's of
interest for the velomobile car-replacement movement. It's
just that I think we'll see that velomobiles with feature-
intensive integrated design and light carbon construction
will have more and more to offer for touring, marathoning
and racing.

--JP

[David Bogie]

Did you ask for an explanation? The organizers might be
wrongheaded from our perspective but they might have
elgitimate reasons from their point of view.

david boise ID

[Tom Blum]

See "WISIL NASA DUCTS-Why and How"
http://www.wisil.recumbents.com/wisil/nacaduct/naca-duct.htm

I believe that's the info you are looking for.

--
Miles of Smiles,

Tom

[Jeff Potter]

"Tom Blum" <teblum@verizon.net> wrote in message news:<ohwFc.3522$6e7.1631@nwrddc03.gnilink.net>...
> See "WISIL NASA DUCTS-Why and How" http://www.wisil.recumbents.com/wisil/nacaduct/naca-
> duct.htm
>
> I believe that's the info you are looking for.

??

--JP

[Jeff Potter]

bogiesan@mac.com (David Bogie) wrote in message news:<5e63edec.0407021902.cb51b2f@posting.google.com>...
> Did you ask for an explanation? The organizers might be
> wrongheaded from our perspective but they might have
> elgitimate reasons from their point of view.
>
> david boise ID

Well, yeah, I've talked with them about it. They said it
would be unfair and take away the pride of achievement from
the unfaired bikes. I said it would be unlikely that any or
many fullfairs would go farther than the best uprights. But
I suppose his complaint would be relative along the line:
whatever distance someone rode unfaired would be worth more
but look like less if compared with a faired.

It's silly. By the exact same standard, if someone rode an
old British 3-speed they should be given more credit yet
somehow: why should carbon bikes with aerobars be treated
the same as someone riding an old heavy bike with very
upright position and loaded down with panniers, say.

Or what about the idea of a Clydesdale division? Some mtb
races have a division for riders over 220 lbs. Top cyclists
seem to have very similar and not very common body types:
skinny and aero, leg-dominant. What about people with
different bodies? What about their achievement? Obviously if
you look a lot different from a standard racing cyclist
you'll be unlikely to ride as far. But what if you did
anyway? What if some heavy, stocky person rode, say, 300
miles on a heavy very-upright posture bike? I personally
would be very impressed and would wish to single them out.
But they're not highlighted as it is.

In the end, I say let the stories fall where they may. We
don't need to protect achievements. A bike is a bike.

A fullyfaired bike today will often be quite heavy,
especially if one wants to include all the features that can
be included so easily. And who's to say that if they went
far it wouldn't be due to comfort and smart design more than
due to aero per se. As I mentioned, a faired bike includes
protection from crashing and sun and rain, includes cargo
space, makes lighting easy, allows privacy: all these things
can result in time- and energy-savings on the road. None of
them should be held against the cyclist.

--JP

[Paul Bruneau]

The organizers allowed this year an Angletech Aerotrunk as
long as it was being used for storage, so that is a step.

With that logic, I probably could have gotten permission to
use my VK2 tailbox since I would have had water, tools and
tubes in it. But I had removed it and made other
accomodations for storage since I knew they were rabidly
anti-fairing.

I did ask one organizer about it this year, and he said "We
don't want it to become an HPV event". Which is of course
ridiculous. I explained to him that the Calvin's Challenge
allows any type of fairing and it is far from an "HPV
event". He said "hmmm".

So if I ride it next year I will try to get my VK2 tailbox
allowed. It is much smaller than a full aero tailfairing and
is clearly a luggage-centric design.

Having said all that, they put on a very nice event and have
a lot of **** to deal with so I don't begrudge them wanting
to keep things simple.