What is the top speed

tintin40

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If i was the fittest man in the world ;) What would be the highest speed i could travel on the gears on my XT-R 44/11 teeth? No not down hill but on the road in a nice day. So a bit dreaming i know :LOL: But also the theory
 
Not sure what you'd be able to do with your 44, but on my TT bike, full aero setup with disc, downhill in a tailwind spinning out a 53/11, I've never gone faster than 60mph
 
According to my Cateye i hit 48mph using a 42/11 set up. It was downhill on tarmac, but i still had to pedal, i think it worked out at 180rpm :shock: Not something you can maintain for long :LOL:
 
Back at my peak - looonnnngggg time ago - 50 / 12 set up got me 48 off road and 52 on road downhill

- at 52 I couldn't keep the pressure on the cranks for more than a few revolutuions at a time.

- At 48 offroad I stopped peddaling because I was scared.
 
I've just done some maths and reckon that you would need to maintain a cadence of 151rpm to get 48mph out of your bike with a 44/11 combo and 26" wheels. Reduce that speed according to your cadence.
 
48 :shock: I could never do that in London. The traffic is a nightmare :LOL: The boys in blue did stop me once for going to fast in a built up area :shock: Lucky i had better brakes back then.
 
ameybrook":11br15jo said:
Not sure what you'd be able to do with your 44, but on my TT bike, full aero setup with disc, downhill in a tailwind spinning out a 53/11, I've never gone faster than 60mph

That's insane. What bars were you using? Aero ones? I've managed over 50mph on the drops on my road iron and to be honest it scared my sh*tless.
 
John":2ecedomo said:
That's insane. What bars were you using? Aero ones? I've managed over 50mph on the drops on my road iron and to be honest it scared my sh*tless.

Yeah, my TT bike with Cinelli integrated bar/stem combo. Trust when I went that fast, it was coming down a solid 6% grade in a tailwind. Yeah, it was too fast to be going without having my fingers on some sort of brake lever. I wouldn't be able to pedal myself up that fast for sure.

;)
 
In the Polaris Challenge in the Keilder Forest in 1992, I recorded 50mph on my speedo off road. It was a very steep and quite twisty fire road off of Hindhope Law (425 metres) that was really icy. I was scared to use the brakes and pedalling seemed to give me more grip than trying to just coast.

When I managed to stop at the bottom, I checked the max speed and thought it must be wrong until the next guy down came screeching to a halt and checking his speedo yelled "Wow! 48 mph", so I guess it was true. It was on my Cannondale (in those days fully rigid) with a 48/12 top gear.

Ironically the fastest I have knowingly been on tarmac was only 48 mph, again on the Polaris, this time in 2004 in the Northern Pennines. It was on the descent off Killhope Summit (627 metres) on the A689 heading east towards the village of Nenthead. This time I was deliberately going for a record and only failed beating my previous best because my chosen route meant I had to turn off on a side road half way down. The road runs straight down the hill so If I had let it run all the way into Nenthead (at the bottom) I'm sure I could have got nearer to sixty. This was on my Scott and was on a 48/11 (retro chain rings (48/38/28 ) but a modern 8 speed cassette).
 

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