Coggan and Verheul set a national record
I just got word about a kind of result most of us can only dream about. Over the Labor Day weekend Andy Coggan and John Verheul threw their legs over a wicked aero tandem timetrial bike and set a 40 km national record. Their time: a blazing fast 46:47.72.
Anyone who has done a 40 km TT on his/her own knows what an accomplishment it is to break an hour. These guys beat that standard by over 13 minutes!
I've been doing so many aero drag computations lately I couldn't help myself. I had to take a run at what these guys' combined CdA might have been. Based on what little I know, a couple of guesses, and the weather conditions Monday morning in Moriarty, New Mexico, I figure their CdA to be in the 0.31-0.32 range.
Congratulations to Andy and John on your outstanding accomplishment.
Thanks / credits to Andy for the shot of you and John and that seriously fast looking tandem, and to the New Mexico Cycling club and John Price, for the action photo.
Tandem Components
Congrats on the great finish. Can you share some of the components and how you guys determined your fit/setup?
I wonder if stoker elbows are out of the boundary layer in the lower pic.
Best Regards,
Kevin Saunders, KGS Bikes http://blog.kgsbikes.com
elbow position
John described most of the parts in his race report here:
http://tenspeeddrive.com/national-90-tandem-40k-record/
As for fit, except for the handlebars I was basically in a road position, whereas John was in a position similar to what he uses on his (UCI-legal) TT bike. We could probably go faster on a TT-specific tandem, but those are rare beasts indeed.
As for me elbow width, that pic was taken in the last ~100 m, as we were driving for the finish line/timing tape on the shoulder of the road. Except for then, the start, and the turn-around, I rode with my hands wrapped around John's seatpost and my forearms resting on a ~6" length of tubing cut from an old set of handlebars and padded with a bit of pipe insulation. That allowed me to put my elbows in front of my torso, but in terms of reach the position was more akin to riding with your hands on the tops of your bars, vs. being on aerobars.