(upbeat music)
- Welcome to part two
of my quest to take on the hour record
and see if I can beat Eddy Merckx,
the greatest cyclist of all time.
(upbeat music)
A quick recap, the hour record is beautifully simple.
It's how far you can ride around a velodrome in one hour.
It was first done in 1873 on a penny farthing
and since then it's been regarded as
the ultimate test for a cyclist.
The 1972, Eddy Merckx, the greatest of all time, set
a record distance of 49.431 kilometers,
this has long been regarded as a benchmark.
Merckx' record was performed on standard equipment
and it stood until the 1980s when it was beaten
through the use of better technology,
and that then started a period
where it was continually beaten by the best riders
of the day, employing imbalances in aerodynamic technology.
Now, Merckx, is an exceptionally gifted athlete.
Physiologically, I am no where near him.
I could never hope to produce anywhere near
as much power as the Belgian cannibal
who ate steaks and bike races for breakfast.
I'm training as hard as I can.
I'm going to be the fittest out of a beer
and I've never trained this hard, with as much structure
and discipline as I am doing with the help
of expert coaches, Neil Henderson and Mark Hassen
from the Sufferfest.
(upbeat music)
They've subjected me to some really intense fitness tests
and the brutal assessment to groom reality
is that even with the best training in the world,
the fitness games that I'm going to see
aren't going to get me anywhere near Eddy on their own.
However, if you think that getting fitter
through the Sufferfest is the only weapon
in my armory, then you clearly haven't been paying attention
because I didn't spend 10 years at university for nothing,
oh, no, I'm going to use science.
See, the thing is when traveling at 50 kilometers
an hour, 90% of the resistance that I'm going to encounter
is through aerodynamic drag.
Now, in theory, using science and technology,
if I can get sufficiently more aerodynamic,
I should be able to ride faster than Eddy
for much less power.
(upbeat music)
Since the Merckx era, bikes
and clothing have become far more aerodynamic,
and we've also seen technology from other sports
such as Formula 1 come into cycling
and have a huge impact, which is why I've come here
to the Boardman Performance Wind Tunnel near Evesham.
I'm going to be meeting with Dr. Zavia Disley
of Aerocoach, he's an aerodynamicist,
an engineer who helps top level
and elite cyclists become as aerodynamic
and as fast as possible.
He's also going to be helping me become as aerodynamic
and as fast as possible,
probably his toughest challenge yet.
(upbeat music)
This is the bike Merckx used.
His clothing was basic by modern standards too.
Modern bikes allow riders
to get into far more aerodynamic positions,
and the latest frame tube shapes and cutting-edge fabrics
that can be worn also reduce drag significantly.
If used the kind of setup Merckx had, I would not have
a prayer of getting anywhere near 49.431 kilometers.
The amount of power a cyclist can produce
can be expressed in watts.
Having tested this kind of setup
in the wind tunnel, we can calculate
that it I were to use Merckx' equipment, I would have
to produce 440 watts for an hour.
Considering I can currently do around 280 watts,
this would be impossible for me.
Nerd aler now (ringing noises),
but pay attention because I promise it will be worth it.
When we measure how aerodynamic an object is,
for example, in the wind tunnel, we calculate
its drag co-efficient, this is called the CDA.
It doesn't have any units, it's just a number,
and the lower the number, the more aerodynamic
a given object is.
For example, a sphere is set to have a CDA of 0.47,
whereas an aerofoil is set to have a CDA of 0.04,
a much smaller number, it's a much more aerodynamic object.
The reason why I would have
to produce so much more power with a Merckx style setup
is because my CDA would be 0.29 which coincidentally
is the same as a Nissan 350-Z.
The world's best male time trialists
like Tom Dumoulin typically have a CDA
of around 0.18 to 0.20 which coincidentally
is the same as a General Motors EV-1 electric car.
Interestingly, the worlds best women athletes
like Chloe Dygert often have a lower CDA
than the world's best men
because women are typically smaller.
Anyway, if I can get my drag coefficient
and my CDA into the realms of these pro athletes
then the amount of power I need to produce
to equal or better Eddy Merckx becomes much more feasible,
potentially into the realms of around 300 watts
which is potentially something I could do.
We're now going to look at the difference
that modern clothing can make,
and Nopens have kindly agreed to support us
with aerodynamic clothing so we can demonstrate this,
starting with an aerodynamic jersey and shorts,
the kind of equipment
that you'd wear in a race or a road ride.
I'm also going to be testing on my time trial bike.
The reason for this is that we're mainly looking
at the different position makes,
and this bike has loads of adjustability in it
which will allow us to test different things.
For the actual attempt, I will be using
a dedicated trap bike as they are faster
and slightly more aerodynamic, but for now this is ideal.
(upbeat music)
- So, what we're doing now with Ollie
is getting some baseline data,
so his starting position, which we're going to do
with bips and jersey, and a normal road helmet
and we're testing him at 50 kilometers now
because that's pretty much the speed he needs
to go to break the record that Merckx did.
- [Oliver] We're now going to put on the time trial helmet
and see how that drops my drag coefficient.
(upbeat music)
- [Zavia] We're also going to do a bike-only run,
and what that allows us to do is to see out
of the total drag, what percentage of the drag is Ollie
and what percentage is the bike.
We know that the rider accounts for the vast majority
of the aero drag, but it would be nice to see
how much of it exactly is for Ollie.
(upbeat music)
- Now that Zav has established
the 29% of my drag is my bike, and roughly 71% is me.
What we cover me in becomes hugely significant,
so this is the brand new new Nopens flow suit.
It's just been approved from the Tokyo Olympics.
It features a brand new hi-tech fabric called speed scale
which is supposed to be excellent at reducing drag
in lots of different scenarios.
I'm also wearing some special flow covers.
These are integrated shoe covers and aero socks,
and they actually make a measurable difference.
The turbular airflow around your moving legs means
that if you can cover it in something that reduces drag,
it's really useful, but let's see how much lower
this makes my drag coefficient.
(upbeat music)
That's been a really productive session in the wind tunnel.
We've managed to get my drag coefficient down to 0.18
which is really competitive, it means I'm pretty aerodynamic
and I'm also really confident
because once I get on a track bike
with a double disk wheel setup,
I'll be even more aerodynamic in theory,
but being able to be aero in the wind tunnel
is one thing, doing it for real
and putting the power out on the track
is a completely different thing,
so that's what we're going to do next.
I'm going to go to the track and I'm going to try riding
at our record pace in the positions and see what happens.
(upbeat music)
I'm just about to ride this BMC for the first time
on the boards and do a little bit of a warmup, main wattage.
(upbeat music)
I've got a lot to do, well, I feel like I've got a lot to do
because this is all new riding 'round track
and holding the black line, and there's an art to it,
and there's a deceptive amount of technique.
I think the best people in the world,
when they do it, and you watch them on the Olympics,
they make it look easy,
but you forget that they're professionals,
but I feel confident I think just riding
that 'round, going around 46 kilometers
an hour felt quite comfortable,
so, yeah, I feel good but nervous.
- In order to measure Ollie's aerodynamic drag
around the velodrome, we have the track aero system
which is a system of software and hardware
which takes all the data off his bike
and then transmits it to the computer
and we can see his CDA or aerodynamic drag live
in real terms every single second as he rides 'round.
What I'm going to do now is put a small sensor on his bike
which will connect to our kits
and then we'll get him out on track
and see what his CDA is on this new bike.
(upbeat music)
Take two laps to wind down, that's fine.
(upbeat music)
- So, I've done an aero testing session in Newport.
That's what you hear is a bit of the noise now
because there's a tourney whizzing around,
but I hope there's some good news out.
- There is good news, Ollie. - Thank you, good.
- What's great about what we've found out today
is that even though you haven't ridden
on a set of aero bars around the track before,
although you do have a lot of experience
with time trials, we've managed to match the CDA,
the aerodynamic drag that we saw in the tunnel
in the time trial bike 'round here in a more live scenario,
on a very alien bike to you
that you hadn't ridden before. - Yeah.
- So, we did do some runs where you're riding
at record pace, where we were focusing more
on seeing how well you can hold a position rather
than just what the CDA says on the screen.
- What's it saying?
- The starting CDA was similar to the starting CDA you saw
on the CT bike in the tunnel,
you'd set the bikes up relatively similarly.
- So, hands were like that?
- But your hands were a bit lower, exactly?
- Are there any other gains that I can make?
Can I get even faster?
- The good news is is that you've only
just set the bike up, and we've made a few tweaks
to it, but there are some more mechanical things
that we can play with.
The front disk is a good one, so that will help speed you up
a little bit, we've already done some work
on tire pressure which was another improvement still,
and then also the drive train.
So, if we get you a carbon drive train
and get the chain line exactly perfect, that will help,
and then the last thing is the front end.
We're going to build you some custom carbon aero-extensions
just to squeeze out every last little watt.
- Right, well, thanks for today, man.
- That's all right. - Yeah, it's been great
and I've got a long way to go,
but, yeah-- - Get some hard training
in and you'll be fine. (laughing)
- Right, right.
It's been really cool riding around
the track in the velodrome
and getting the aerodynamic data,
and the exciting and really interesting thing now
is that I can send that data over to Neil or Mark
from the Sufferfest and then they can tell me
what I'm going to need to do physiologically
in order to achieve my goal and how much power I'll need
to produce, hopefully it's not 400 watts
because I can't do 400 watts. (laughing)
Good seeing you.
- [Neil] Definitely, Oliver, very good to see you.
Sorry I'm here alone today.
Mac might still be in a plane.
He's on his way to Australia
for the Track World Cup in Brisbane this weekend.
- Well, he's got a good excuse then.
I'll forgive him.
- [Neil] Yeah, a reasonable excuse.
- So, looking at my CDA data
that we've managed to get from the track and the tunnel,
how does that translate physiologically now
in terms of what I'm going to have
to do with it to achieve this?
- Ultimately, there is basically a cost associated
with any given CDA as well as air density conditions,
so if we think of air density, that's temperature, pressure,
and saturation, so using the values at Newport,
if we get the temperature there
to about 25 degrees celsius, assuming that the humidity
is around 50% or so with a barometric pressure
of about 10 millibars,
that puts the air density at about 1.17.
For your weight, there's a rolling resistance component
as well, so you plus bike is going to probably
be somewhere around 76-77 kilograms total,
and giving you a nice fast tire rolling resistance,
a rolling resistance of probably closer to 0.0025,
it's going to require to go 49.43 kilometers per hour,
speed approximately 304 watts.
That's the current cost with that CDA.
- [Oliver] What sort of training
and stuff can we do going forward
to try and get my power up to hopefully even more
than that over the next week?
- Yeah, there's two components that we're going to look at.
Number one is actually continuing to push on some
of that upper ceiling to work that aerodynamic position
because that ceiling does set a little bit
what is possible, what is sustainable underneath that,
so we're going to keep pushing up that ceiling.
The other thing that that's going to help you do
is be able to tolerate that standing start effort
because clearly there's a pretty significant demand
of getting accelerated up to nearly 50k an hour
in just 15-20 seconds.
Secondary to that, we're going to be working
on that threshold and that FTP,
but instead of doing long efforts at and above,
we're going to predominantly state just below
to push up that threshold rather than go above it
and try to pull it up.
If we think about some of the adaptations,
we're trying to be able to have a high flux
of lactate at that threshold point.
That's part of it, it's about being able
to take up and utilize what is being produced.
There's some component of our general endurance
to produce less lactate, but when we start
to work harder, we are producing a lot of it
and so it's actually enhancing that flux rate, sound fun?
- Yeah, I'm up for it, I'm up for it.
I'm going to give it everything.
All right, well, I'm going to have to go.
It was great talking to you today, Neil,
and I'll catch up with you next week.
- [Neil] All right, good luck, Oliver.
- I've learned a lot the last few days.
It's been really interesting
and I'm under no illusions as to how hard
this is going to be.
I feel like I'm climbing a mountain, Mt. Sufferlandria.
This is a lot of work to do,
but getting more aerodynamic has given me some confidence
that what we're doing, there is a chance
that I can pull this off, so I'm going to keep training
and this is the most structured, most disciplined training
I've ever done in my life, but I'm going to give it my all,
and if you enjoyed this video, then please give it
a thumbs up, and if you'd like to stay updated
on my progress, there's going to be continual weekly updates
in the GCN show, there's also going to
be some longer form videos like this one,
so stay tuned for those.
Click the bell, subscribe, you know the drill.
There's also going to be updates on my social media,
so on Instagram and Scrobber too,
and the attempt is scheduled, at the moment,
for the 17th of February in Newport,
but in the meantime, let me know how you're getting
on with your own Sufferfest hours of power down
in the comments section below,
and I'll see you next time.