In pursuit of the wind... http://dimonds.net.au/
I hate to distract from Marko’s defense of his POC helmet and shades photo but @snowgeek is weaving cycling and sailing together here. It may never have been done before so please read carefully. The two activities have almost nothing in common except the wind and being wet and miserable. @snowgeek is not dwelling on the wet and miserable part.
Yours in Cycling, Gianni
There is a concept in the sport of sailing called apparent wind. It is the wind that you and your boat and your sails experience – the sum of the true wind speed and direction and the boat speed and direction (vector sum, for the geeks in the crowd). This is vaguely relevant here, as cycling is commonly employed in explanation of apparent wind to those not familiar with the concept, usually in some form akin to, “When riding your bicycle on a calm day, the apparent wind is from directly ahead and equal to your speed.”
I introduce apparent wind primarily as a subtle diversion, to make a preliminary connection between the sport of sailing and the sport that is the focus (locus?) of Velominati, to soften the blow, as it were. What I really want to discuss is this, there is a term in sailing called VMG. It stands for Velocity Made Good, and refers to the portion of a vessel’s speed (and direction) that gets it and its passengers closer to their destination, (I suppose the remaining speed and direction is velocity made bad?)
(Even the least astute in this crowd will at this point have already done the mental substitution, and inserted into VMG the concept of The V in place of Velocity.)
To continue, sailing vessels use the aerodynamics of sail shape and the hydrodynamics of hull shape to progress forward through the water, the basic details of which often preclude sailing directly toward one’s destination, either because it is directly upwind, or because one could get there more quickly using a faster point of sail (direction relative to the wind).
By example, if one’s destination is directly downwind, but your boat sails faster 120 degrees to the wind instead of directly 180 degrees downwind, it may be faster to get where you are going by not sailing directly there (sailing, like cycling, is an endeavor virtually overflowing with metaphor) – total elapsed time is reduced by sailing a longer, but faster course, whereby VMG is maximized.
By concentrating on maximizing VMG (there are GPS-based computers that calculate this for you in real-time), one is accounting for all the vagaries of wind speed/direction, boat speed/heading, currents, and boat performance on different points of sail.
Enough explanation. Most of you are already well ahead of me here, so let me put it to you bluntly:
When you are laying down The V, how much of it is VMG? Are you at Mach V?
I, for one, being perennially two months from being not too fat to climb, tend to express proficiency in inefficiency even when I am shopping at the Five and Dime. My VMG in most cases is a fraction of what it could be, in stark contrast to the truest displays of mettle which are lore around these parts.
Yet, could we not define all effort expended in pursuit of The V as VMG? I propose that Made Good, in cycling (as opposed to sailing), be defined less in terms of a physical destination as in terms of pursuit of the state of being that is epitomized in LVV – and therefore every effort to make a deposit in the V-Bank is VMG.
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Sailing and cycling are linked for me not only because of wind but because in the summer I turned 13 I bought my first proper road bike, and my own 12' sailboat.
Another thing both have in common is going fast, quietly.
VMG is well and good but it assumes you are trying to get somewhere in particular. Sometimes the best rides, and best boat outings, are measured by the fun had dinking about. Ratty was wrong when he said "there is nothing - absolutely nothing - half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats," but only because messing about on a bicycle is equally worth doing.
@Nate I fear the Ratty analogy breaks down when we introduce Toad and the Road - though Toads obsessiveness may be appropriate.
Though I agree there are similarities in sailing - particularly going downhill on the edge of control with far too much sail up. I remember once after a particularly hairy downwind leg (offshore racing) when a local cruiser was taking photos of the fleet going by. In the bar we were talking to the skipper of the cruiser and he said - "I love getting close to you racing guys in a blow and feel perfectly safe as you all know what you are doing". We just looked at each other, we didn't really know how to broach to him (pun unintended) how much danger he was in. Cue the thread on current cycling "fans" behaviour.
I always liken the guys who insist on climbing in the big ring long after they should have changed to the guy who pinches up to weather, while I'm cracked off a bit and making much better VMG, ultimately beating him to the mark.
(On the other hand, I don't beat many people to the mark climbing regardless of what ring I'm in...)
@Jamie
Or the guy beating with too much sail up and has to pinch to stay upright vs the guy who reefs and net goes faster with less sail?
Or when you find that you've tacked at the right time to catch the next shift and find yourself a few boat lengths ahead of the boat you've been chasing for the past couple legs.
Who would the Merckx of sailing be? Paul Elvstrom would get my vote.
Sailing and cycling, my two favourite hobbies. This site has just surpassed itself.
Similar with the notion of the V showing up in sailing, so to does the Man with the Hammer (or is he the Man with the Anchor?). At least, when hiking hard in a blow and the guns are screaming to give in and ease off, knowing it will cost you a place, it is He who appears on the lee rail, disrupting the balance, and whispering that to give in would bring peace, comfort and recovery. That is when you must hike hard, hold fast and suffer until the next mark rounding when physical prowess changes to mental prowess in that pursuit of victory.
@TheVid
As a one time serious Thistle racer, I can identify with that passage. I'm not sure the scars have fully healed on the backs of my legs 30 + years on.
@Nate
Eloquently put. Great article @snowgeek.
If time and money weren't the limited resource that they are, I'd be lost to sailing.
There is so much in common between the sports, spending a night on the rail being blasted by waves that you don't see is a match for fighting the rain and a headwind on a proper rule 9 day and racing a yacht in a tight pack has to be experienced to be believed.
If we're doing the sailing/cycling are the big cats and trimarans the recumbents of the yacht world and the mentalists who race them solo the audaxers?
Fucking up badly is also just as dramatic...
Isn't this a little complex for us here? This is some advanced shit and I never learned how to add or subtract anything not ending in V or X.
@therealpeel
I did think of that Far Side bit about what you say to a dog and what they hear.
"Blah, blah, blah, go fast, blah, blah, blah, laying down the V, blah, blah, V-bank..."
@Chris possibly even more. I have never seen a road racer pitch pole.