Categories: Breaking The RulesCyclocrossDefining MomentsRantings from the V-Bunker

Motorhead

Motors are acceptable for this.

Motherfucker.

I honestly don’t like swearing in an Article, much less using such a word to open an article, but seriously. Motherfucker. A motor discovered in an U23 rider’s bike at the Cyclocross World Championships has to be the lowest of the low that anyone can go. I’m so pissed off, I’m rhyming. Which itself makes me madder than a hatter.

I have a pretty lenient stance on doping, which I hold to fairly wide criticism. I believe that the path towards doping is full of shadows and gradual steps towards the darkness. It is easy for me to imagine a young, ambitious rider who has sacrificed education and other vocations for the chance to become a Pro Cyclist, who is taken under the wing of an older, more experienced rider and to whom is explained the ways of the sport. If I was 18 and following that path, I cannot say with certainty what choice I would make, given the limited perspective one would have under those circumstances. While I hate doping and wish for clean sport, I hold limited judgement over those who have strayed down that path.

But we ride bicycles for the pleasure of propelling ourselves along the road under our own power. We push the pedals and we go faster, it is as simple as that; the motor resides in our heads and in our hearts. Performance enhancing drugs will, to various degrees, fine-tune and modify that motor, but there remains alive a notion that even a doped rider is holding true to this basic notion.

Competition is about finding out who is the superior athlete, it is as simple as that. We train, we fine-tune our equipment, we learn the strategy and tactics required to rise to the top. Doping certainly obscures that concept, but that a rider would abandon this fundamental principle of our sport by utilizing a motor in their bike seems to me an order of magnitude removed. It is gratuitous to the extent that there is no possible justification apart from an unabashed desire to win over all else.

This is bike racing, not motorcycle racing. For fucks sake.

frank

The founder of Velominati and curator of The Rules, Frank was born in the Dutch colonies of Minnesota. His boundless physical talents are carefully canceled out by his equally boundless enthusiasm for drinking. Coffee, beer, wine, if it’s in a container, he will enjoy it, a lot of it. He currently lives in Seattle. He loves riding in the rain and scheduling visits with the Man with the Hammer just to be reminded of the privilege it is to feel completely depleted. He holds down a technology job the description of which no-one really understands and his interests outside of Cycling and drinking are Cycling and drinking. As devoted aesthete, the only thing more important to him than riding a bike well is looking good doing it. Frank is co-author along with the other Keepers of the Cog of the popular book, The Rules, The Way of the Cycling Disciple and also writes a monthly column for the magazine, Cyclist. He is also currently working on the first follow-up to The Rules, tentatively entitled The Hardmen. Email him directly at rouleur@velominati.com.

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View Comments

Ron says:

Feb 1 2016 at 6:21 pm

Here goes to hoping I never have to see the world "tautological" outside of my academic reading. Damnit.
frank says:

Feb 1 2016 at 6:25 pm

@Barracuda

@brett

@Gianni

Inconclusive. I ride up the Koppenberg at that same pace!

(Ok, I’m comment doping there…)

The fact that she wasn’t pedaling up the Koppenberg may have been an issue.

!! +1 Badge!

@Teocalli

Interesting idea. Leaking wattage? I like it.

@Teocalli

@litvi

I’d suggest that the flywheel effect of the rim would far outweigh any type of flywheel that could be concealed within a frame and it would have to be in the hub anyway otherwise the chain would have to be driving the wheel and back to the pedals needing to be turning.

The only other method of driving it would be with the magnetic drive being in the wheel rim.

Totally agree. On further thought, that has to be electromagnetic if it's not just a locked up freewheel or something flukeish.
litvi says:

Feb 1 2016 at 6:30 pm

@frank

Or an electromagnetic wheel?

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/electromagnetic-wheels-are-the-new-frontier-of-mechanical-doping-claims-gazzetta-dello-sport/

But more to your point, I wonder if a dynamo powered only by the rider themselves is different from a motor. At least it is all energy that the rider put into the machine themselves. There was a guy I ski raced with that used poles with springs in them. They were heavy and ineffective, but even if they worked, it would just be an exaggerated version of using steel’s flex to propel the bike during acceleration.

This is an interesting philosophical turn.

A flywheel would be the rider's power, held in reserve. Much like Sagan did in Richmond: wait for the right moment, then apply the power (hold on! I love the guy and how rad he is, so stick with me). A dynamo would be the rider's own power as well, leveraged through electromagnetics. Not much different from mechanical leverage.

How is it much different from the variable leverage through oval chainrings? It is, after all, still the rider's own energy... just applied at more optimal time(s).

If a rider stores kinetic energy in a flywheel, and it's applied through a smart clutch, it's still his energy.

If a rider creates electrical charge through a dynamo, which propels permanent magnets, it's still his energy.

If a rider keeps his ATP reserves fresh by gliding with the peloton before applying it all at once, it's still his energy.

If I'm more efficient at 90 RPM and ride a compact, and I beat a guy with a 42x23 uphill, is that cheating?

If a cyclist is on a bike with variable carbon lay-ups engineered to be compliant this way, and springy that way, and whatever other tech jargon the magazines are using these days, it's still his energy.

If I can capture MY OWN energy and re-apply it later, through carbon layup nanoseconds later, oval chainrings microseconds later, and both are legal, maybe applying my own power from a flywheel or a dynamo later on isn't cheating after all.

Some of these means of leveraging a rider's own energy are legal, some are not. Technical innovations are all frowned upon, or even forbidden... until they aren't.

One guy built a velociped. Another guy built one with suspended saddle. Then some guy built a bicyclette with a chain drive... then two gears... then a gear changer... then derailleurs, now e- and hydraulics.

All that said... electromagnetic drive assistance may not be a motor, but it still smells like cheating.
litvi says:

Feb 1 2016 at 6:30 pm

@Ron

Here goes to hoping I never have to see the world “tautological” outside of my academic reading. Damnit.

Welcome to class.
litvi says:

Feb 1 2016 at 6:39 pm

Good news everybody. I found the guy who loaned Femke the bike.

I did not have electromagnetic relations with that woman.
wilburrox says:

Feb 1 2016 at 6:46 pm

@Gianni

@brett

@Gianni

Inconclusive. I ride up the Koppenberg at that same pace!

(Ok, I’m comment doping there…)

OK, besides Brett, people don’t ride away from such powerful cyclists on that kind of grade. To my eye it looks totally evident she has an assist.

Sure does to me too.
wilburrox says:

Feb 1 2016 at 6:56 pm

@litvi

Good news everybody. I found the guy who loaned Femke the bike.

I did not have electromagnetic relations with that woman.

Then it's all gonna depend on what the meaning of "is" is! Ahhh those were the good ol' days. When the prospect seemed very real of the Supreme Court of the US of A having to debate what exactly oral sex was in terms of sexual relations. Regret that it never got that far. It'd have been one for the constitutional scholars to have debated for years. It's not like anyone is debating if this electromagnetic relations was cheating is it? Just the magnitude of the cheat? And the appropriate consequences? Dang there are some similarities here... Interesting. Cheers
Brian Kelly says:

Feb 1 2016 at 7:01 pm

Motherfucker, it's alright to use the word motherfucker in this instance. However, it is NOT ok to besmirch Motorhead's good name right after Lemmy died, ok, motherfucker.
EBruner says:

Feb 1 2016 at 7:06 pm

@litvi

If I can capture MY OWN energy and re-apply it later, through carbon layup nanoseconds later, oval chainrings microseconds later, and both are legal, maybe applying my own power from a flywheel or a dynamo later on isn’t cheating after all.

Is that like capturing your own blood and Re-applying it later?
frank says:

Feb 1 2016 at 7:24 pm

@litvi

@frank

Or an electromagnetic wheel?

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/electromagnetic-wheels-are-the-new-frontier-of-mechanical-doping-claims-gazzetta-dello-sport/

But more to your point, I wonder if a dynamo powered only by the rider themselves is different from a motor. At least it is all energy that the rider put into the machine themselves. There was a guy I ski raced with that used poles with springs in them. They were heavy and ineffective, but even if they worked, it would just be an exaggerated version of using steel’s flex to propel the bike during acceleration.

This is an interesting philosophical turn.

A flywheel would be the rider’s power, held in reserve. Much like Sagan did in Richmond: wait for the right moment, then apply the power (hold on! I love the guy and how rad he is, so stick with me). A dynamo would be the rider’s own power as well, leveraged through electromagnetics. Not much different from mechanical leverage.

How is it much different from the variable leverage through oval chainrings? It is, after all, still the rider’s own energy… just applied at more optimal time(s).

If a rider stores kinetic energy in a flywheel, and it’s applied through a smart clutch, it’s still his energy.

If a rider creates electrical charge through a dynamo, which propels permanent magnets, it’s still his energy.

If a rider keeps his ATP reserves fresh by gliding with the peloton before applying it all at once, it’s still his energy.

If I’m more efficient at 90 RPM and ride a compact, and I beat a guy with a 42×23 uphill, is that cheating?

If a cyclist is on a bike with variable carbon lay-ups engineered to be compliant this way, and springy that way, and whatever other tech jargon the magazines are using these days, it’s still his energy.

If I can capture MY OWN energy and re-apply it later, through carbon layup nanoseconds later, oval chainrings microseconds later, and both are legal, maybe applying my own power from a flywheel or a dynamo later on isn’t cheating after all.

Some of these means of leveraging a rider’s own energy are legal, some are not. Technical innovations are all frowned upon, or even forbidden… until they aren’t.

One guy built a velociped. Another guy built one with suspended saddle. Then some guy built a bicyclette with a chain drive… then two gears… then a gear changer… then derailleurs, now e- and hydraulics.

All that said… electromagnetic drive assistance may not be a motor, but it still smells like cheating.

Totally agreed. The point is that it isn't in the open; they are hiding it which is one of the key aspects that makes it cheating.

One thing that makes it "feel" like doping is that the resistance caused by storing up the energy on a huge descent in the bunch doesn't feel a lot like the guy suffered more than anyone else to get the energy stored up.