How Much Do People Lie About Averages Speed?

[Uawadall]

Pfft! No way in heck would I even get close to a KOM on our local climb. The first 50 riders or so are Tour De France riders that did the Tour of California.

Lol.....My ego won't let me be satisfied with 7th/38th place on one of my weekly segments..Being #6053/7273? .I'm a medium sized fish in a small pond though,lol...I think the segment with the most amount of attempts in my immediate area is around 270

 

[Mr. Beanz]

Lol.....My ego won't let me be satisfied with 7th/38th place on one of my weekly segments..Being #6053/7273? .I'm a medium sized fish in a small pond though,lol...I think the segment with the most amount of attempts in my immediate area is around 270

This is the landmark climb for all the hardcore climbers out here. If you come out here and do this climb. you'd be a small fish in a huge pond! :lol:

Not sure what your 7th place is but this is an 8 mile climb at 6% (2300 ft gain). The first half of a 4400 ft climb straight up.

You've got strava, let's see your segment, length gain etc?


Ah wait, I just saw on the 7th place image you posted, an 8 minute climb! There is a pretty good chance you wouldn't even make it up this segment. :lol:

 

[maydog]

Half the people claiming an average speed do not even know how to calculate one.

Instead they just look at the speedometer at a few convenient times during a ride, typically while cruising above average.

 

[Uawadall]

This is the landmark climb for all the hardcore climbers out here. If you come out here and do this climb. you'd be a small fish in a huge pond! :lol:

Not sure what your 7th place is but this is an 8 mile climb at 6% (2300 ft gain). The first half of a 4400 ft climb straight up.

You've got strava, let's see your segment, length gain etc?


Ah wait, I just saw on the 7th place image you posted, an 8 minute climb! There is a pretty good chance you wouldn't even make it up this segment. :lol:

Most of our long climbs are in park trails and more suited for MT. Biking. I think i'll have to find a town a little further out for longer climbs. Also, I'm still a rookie, let me get 1 full year in before the trash talk,lol..BTW do you ever mountain bike?I may look into getting one next season.

 

[Mr. Beanz]

Most of our long climbs are in park trails and more suited for MT. Biking. I think i'll have to find a town a little further out for longer climbs. Also, I'm still a rookie, let me get 1 full year in before the trash talk,lol..BTW do you ever mountain bike?I may look into getting one next season.

Yes mainly fire roads. Most are just midweek short rides to practice climbing.

 

[CAMPYBOB]

Right now my best KOM is a second place...to one of the guys I train with. Any KOM I take will fall to someone else pretty quickly, as a rule.

I posted the average STRAVA speed for all U.K. males and all females, all rides in 2014, here before. The figures were totally believable

http://roadcyclinguk.com/sportive/strava-2014-year-numbers.html#5jh4Wo6TcovjBZ4X.97

23 KPH for males and 20 KPH for females for all rides in the year 2014.

That's 14.29 MPH for males and 12.43 MPH for females.

If focusing in on the more performance oriented 'roadie' (road warrior, road ace, etc.) or road racer, triathlete, the average would be markedly higher.

There's some global figures at that link and I'm sure there is plenty more fairly accurate data available online.

I did hit 37 MPH on this afternoon's ride. Relaxing in a crouch coming down a hill onto a valley floor! One of the few times gravity doesn't suck! Ride average speed was 16.12 MPH and I really don't give a damn who believes me or who doesn't at this stage in my life.

 

[CAMPYBOB]

Nice fire road pics, Mr. B.!

It was 100° in San Diego last week and I have a business trip scheduled out there soon. I think I'll make time to ride. A friend is lending me one of his Harley's and I think I'll buy a bike while I'm out there. Solvang...Palo Alto...wish I had time to head up North too.

 

[Uawadall]

Yes mainly fire roads. Most are just midweek short rides to practice climbing.

Love those picks!If I could find work in architecture some where like that, i'd do it in a heartbeat! I can't justify getting anymore bike gear for some time though, maybe in a year or two i'll look to get my first mountain bike.

I did hit 37 MPH on this afternoon's ride. Relaxing in a crouch coming down a hill onto a valley floor! One of the few times gravity doesn't suck! Ride average speed was 16.12 MPH and I really don't give a damn who believes me or who doesn't at this stage in my life.

I hit 35.6 mph this morning, but still need work on my descending cornering technique and a little bravery ^_^ . I'll probably never attempt more than mid 30's because it scares the **** out of me,lol...

 

[Mr. Beanz]

Nice fire road pics, Mr. B.!

It was 100° in San Diego last week and I have a business trip scheduled out there soon. I think I'll make time to ride. A friend is lending me one of his Harley's and I think I'll buy a bike while I'm out there. Solvang...Palo Alto...wish I had time to head up North too.

We have some nice trails out here/. What sucks is now they charge for parking what has been a free lot since 2005 when I started going. Now it is $4 per day and I only use it for an hour or so. I'd have to sell a bike to afford a yearly pass. :lol:

Supposed to be 93 here tomorrow. I plan on doing 5,000 ft of climbing so it will feel like 200 degrees!

 

[Mr. Beanz]

I just want everyone to know that I have held 30 MPH for nearly 20 minutes in the past! OK all down hill! :lol:

These are my best descending times on GMR, 8 mile descent ,twisty turning roads. My max was 38.8 MPH, fast enough for me on that road.

This is the descent.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6jBSRAO4qY

 

[Darktone]

I just use the average on my iPhone app

 

[Mr. Beanz]

Love those picks!If I could find work in architecture some where like that, i'd do it in a heartbeat! I can't justify getting anymore bike gear for some time though, maybe in a year or two i'll look to get my first mountain bike.

I picked up anew Trek 8000 back in 05 for $1000. It has good stuff on in, LX/Xt. Hardtail so only front suspension. It works for me as I don't worry much about going fast downhill. MY buds have carbon Ibis bikes all the good stuff. I can't justify paying $5000 for something I won't use to it's potential.

They have full suspension 29'ers so they roll right over stuff that I have to think about. Still not worth it to me though. I have looked into anew MTB but to get the grade of stuff I have already, I'd need to spend abbut $3000, no thanks!

This does the job for me! B)

 

[Mr. Beanz]

I just use the average on my iPhone app

You can use that to join Strava. If you don't know that already. Petty cool site. Charts your rides with google type maps, keeps track of all your stats, elevation charts. Follow friends like facebook.

If you like, set rides to private and they can't be seen by anybody. Or show them and compete with everybody that rides your road.

 

[jhuskey]

Garmin lies. Mostly on elevation gain.

 

[CAMPYBOB]

Garmin's built-in Barometer is close, but no cigar, on most of my rides.

Strava clocks in the same or even higher on elevation stats until I hit the 'Correct Elevation' button. 90 times out of 100 it will correct to less than the Garmin barometer...going by actual elevation surveys (usually done by temp-corrected barometric reading or stationar GPS readings).

Most of the time the correction is just a few percent less than the Garmin. Some times the reduction is significant...the shorter the ride, the greater the variance in my experience. Sometimes the comparative readings are very, very close. And there seems to be no common factors as to when the elevation readings are off by a significant margin and when they are not off by much.

For fun, upload your ride to five different GPS sites from the same ride file. The elevation number's spread leaves me with little faith in the accuracy of the algorithms used.

Calories can also vary with a lot of weirdness. Strava is usually higher on calorie count even with less climbing on the same ride. Go figure...

And then there's always fun with the estimated average power figure! Oh, and Garmin's temperature sensor just plain sucks. It's at least 3°-4° cooler than the actual air temp. If they are using that sensor to correct the barometer readings...well, good luck with that.

 

[sunshiney]

I somehow actually know more people in real life who blatantly lie about their average speed. One guy I used to cycle with claimed to regularly hit 35 mph when he wasn't slowed down by the rest of us. He had endless stories about near misses on his bike that were only avoided by his amazingly elite riding skills, and he loved to talk about how he frequently got pulled over by the cops for almost breaking the speed limit.

He tended to attract the same kind of cyclists who all had suspiciously similar stories so needless to say I distanced myself from that group pretty quick. I honestly don't know why people think they can get away with stories that are so obviously embellished or just plain not true. The guy I knew who was like this was definitely a little delusional about his life.

 

[Susimi]

you sound like your lying the opposite way...Maybe your doing the math wrong.

I wish I was...I sometimes use a speedometer installed on the bike to check my speed but now I mostly use it for distance.

 

[Uawadall]

I wish I was...I sometimes use a speedometer installed on the bike to check my speed but now I mostly use it for distance.

I'd check that speedometer for accuracy. A brisk walk to work use to take me 1 hour for 4.5 miles. A jog at a moderate pace for me is 4.5 miles in 35 or so minutes. I'm not trying to be rude, I just think you may have a malfunctioning speedometer. Either that or you're going up some major climbs. A phone app like runkeeper or strava can help you find out if this is the case. Also, If you know the distance from your location to your destination, time yourself and do the math manually. Again, not trying to be rude.

 

[CAMPYBOB]

Remember when guys were getting killed on DOWNHILL KOM"S on STRAVA? The term "STRAVAcide" was coined to describe the ultra-serious guys that risked their lives for a statistic.

There were 'riders' using their Garmins on their motorcycles and cars to win a KOM or up their speed stats.

That's a little...weird.

 

[Uawadall]

Remember when guys were getting killed on DOWNHILL KOM"S on STRAVA? The term "STRAVAcide" was coined to describe the ultra-serious guys that risked their lives for a statistic.

There were 'riders' using their Garmins on their motorcycles and cars to win a KOM or up their speed stats.

That's a little...weird.

What a stupid mindset to have. What some fail to realize is that a very hilly 13-15mph is a much better workout than doing flats and 50 mph descends to average 20mph. Descending can be really fun and gives your legs rest for a little while, but nothing I would take pride in.