@Dave Tallo I'll bite! In a couple of weeks, I planned to start a "New" thread soliciting ideas for my "next" bike (I have some interesting reasons as to why and an idea that I want something that doesn't technically exist yet, so stay tuned). I've been on my Cervelo P5 since 2012 with now-obsolete 10-speed Di2 shifting. I don't even know how many miles I have on it, but it's somewhere north of 20,000+...
Clearly both of these bikes (Ventum and P5) are "fast" in a wind tunnel and they can be easily setup to be super clean. You're a data guy, so I'll let you search the interwebs to see all the wind tunnel testing etc... Maybe I'll get all "Science-y" or "Data-y" in a future post, but I'll start with my "seat of the pants" experience first.
In 2012 I switched form a "Then supposedly best in the world" Cervelo P3 to what was touted as the "New Supposedly Best in the World" Cervelo P5. The Engine is clearly the most important factor in making a bicycle go fast (but that's why we're all training in the OS and season builds). But just looking at my old P3 vs my new P5, the P5 simply "looked" faster. My P3 was sleek, but there were brake cables and shifting wires sticking out of the cockpit and into the wind, not to mention exposed front and rear brake calipers. How many seconds is that worth over 112 miles, I have no idea... But it seems obvious to me that "less stuff" sticking out into the wind equals "more faster" at similar power outputs. Other things like the shapes of the tubes and ability to channel the dirty air around the even dirtier wheel areas also has to make it "more faster".
The thing that stood out to me the most when I hopped off of my P3 and onto my P5 was the immediate Power Transfer I felt like I got into forward motion. The bike was simply stiffer, which should be of no surprise just glancing at the frame layouts and tube shapes. So... When I put big power out from my legs into the pedals, it simply felt like ALL (or more) of that power was converted directly into forward motion and not leaked out into the ether from flexing or creaking. So it "felt" like at the same, say ~300W, more of those Watts were converted into forward motion than when on my P3... and the P3 certainly felt like it was more than on my older road bikes. (how much was the drive-train vs the frame, not sure...)
This was somewhat verified by the immediate bump I got in speeds on some of my regular local routes (this was pre-Strava).
And being on my sexy new P5 simply made me want to train harder to justify all the $$ I spent and to be fit enough to not be passed by the dude on the Nishiki road bike with down tube shifters... So I'm sure there's some Placebo effect as well.
Mark Allen and Dave Scott were putting out crazy fast bike splits on round tube road bikes, so clearly the engine is the absolute most important thing of a bike split. And on average, Pro bike splits did't make a huge jump with the advent of Superbikes... But they're still faster than non-superbikes which are faster than road bikes which are all faster than Fat Bikes!
If you do a Best Bike Split analysis and change from a "Superbike" (i.e. Ventum or P5) to a standard Road bike, it will change your theoretical drag coefficients and calculate a different "ideal" bike split for you at a given power output. Many things will effect this in reality and you probably get a much higher ROI (form a $$ perspective) for an Aero helmet, Aero wheels, rear disk, latex tubes and race tires, removing bottle cages, wearing a tight fitting kit, and always staying down in the aero position... But if you're at the pointy pointy end (which you are), you're already doing all of those things and having a more aero and stiffer bike just gets added to that long list of additive things to shave off seconds or minutes.
Only you can decide if those extra Thousands of dollars are worth it for a few seconds or minutes. I don't regret for one second the $$$ I spent on my P5, but pro-rated over it's life so far, my P5 has literally cost me Pennies per mile... That's WAY less than the amount of $ per mile that I spend on training nutrition or for swimming goggles, supplements, etc... Heck, my new Vaporfly 4%'s that I bought are gonna cost me ~$3.00/mile!
If you believe the Slowtwitch crowd, we are in the age of peak aero, meaning there's not a lot to distinguish one superbike from another purely in terms of aerodynamics. My 9 year old Cervelo P4, cleanly set up, is still almost as fast as what most manufacturers are selling today (and faster than some). Nonetheless, I think I may be in the market for a new bike this OS. Why? Two factors. First, I'd like (no, like really like) better braking. As in, I'd like a bike that has functional brakes. The P4, for as fast as it is, may possess the dubious title of 'world's worst rear brake'. Second, The comfort difference in going from 23c to 25c tires is pretty huge, and I'd love to have a bike that's as aero as my P4, but is optimized for 25c tires.
Rumor has it that Cervelo will be releasing a disc brake version of the P5 sometime around Kona time. That would be pretty interesting.
Don't know why you're asking, but on suspicion that you are considering getting a new bike, I'll relate my now one year experience with a new super bike (not one of these two, a QR PR Six) after 18 years on a round-tube 650 c, on which I had some measure of success.
First thing I'll note is to agree with what John K says, that aero super-bike characteristics seem pretty mature now - visually, it's hard to tell one brand from another without the decals. Not like the days of Kestral vs Cevelo vs Soft-Ride vs Natascha (and Lori Bowden's) Cheetah etc. Although, there is the Ventum...
On the "feel" side, I noticed the same thing as John W. For me, I would describe it as, when I get up to cruising speed, it feels "easier" to hold that speed. John says there is less effort bleeding off the bike, that seems right.
On the data side, I had one 40K triathlon bike leg on the same course comparing 2010, when I was 7 yrs younger and in superb shape 2 months before Kona, which I did again last summer. My times were the same, as was the power output. But my HR was significantly lower (in the range of 5-10 bpm, Im too lazy to look up the exact # now). So I concluded that I may not have bought "free speed", but I did buy "free fitness". Whether that's from aero improvements, stiffer frame, better wheels (my old ones were Zipp 404s), or whatever, it was real to me. Now, was it worth the $9K I spent? Amortized over the preceding 18 yrs, or the next ??? is one way to look at it. Luckily, my old medical group from which I retired had just been bought out and I received a big pay-out as a result, so it felt like found $$ to me.
So while a "better, newer" bike may not take you faster, it may make it easier to go the same speed, setting up a faster run, which you of course will magnify with Vaporflys...
@John Withrow wrote: "the dude on the Nishiki road bike with down tube shifters" ==> Way back in the early 90's I had that bike; used to race duathlon. Kenny Souza was my idol
@Al Truscott wrote: "when I get up to cruising speed, it feels "easier" to hold that speed" ==> In 2002 I rode a Softride TT7, and it had that same feeling. That bike still sits in my basement, waiting to be ridden again
@Dave Tallo I agree with you; the P5 and the Ventum are both slower than my old Softride
Comments
@Dave Tallo I'll bite! In a couple of weeks, I planned to start a "New" thread soliciting ideas for my "next" bike (I have some interesting reasons as to why and an idea that I want something that doesn't technically exist yet, so stay tuned). I've been on my Cervelo P5 since 2012 with now-obsolete 10-speed Di2 shifting. I don't even know how many miles I have on it, but it's somewhere north of 20,000+...
Clearly both of these bikes (Ventum and P5) are "fast" in a wind tunnel and they can be easily setup to be super clean. You're a data guy, so I'll let you search the interwebs to see all the wind tunnel testing etc... Maybe I'll get all "Science-y" or "Data-y" in a future post, but I'll start with my "seat of the pants" experience first.
In 2012 I switched form a "Then supposedly best in the world" Cervelo P3 to what was touted as the "New Supposedly Best in the World" Cervelo P5. The Engine is clearly the most important factor in making a bicycle go fast (but that's why we're all training in the OS and season builds). But just looking at my old P3 vs my new P5, the P5 simply "looked" faster. My P3 was sleek, but there were brake cables and shifting wires sticking out of the cockpit and into the wind, not to mention exposed front and rear brake calipers. How many seconds is that worth over 112 miles, I have no idea... But it seems obvious to me that "less stuff" sticking out into the wind equals "more faster" at similar power outputs. Other things like the shapes of the tubes and ability to channel the dirty air around the even dirtier wheel areas also has to make it "more faster".
The thing that stood out to me the most when I hopped off of my P3 and onto my P5 was the immediate Power Transfer I felt like I got into forward motion. The bike was simply stiffer, which should be of no surprise just glancing at the frame layouts and tube shapes. So... When I put big power out from my legs into the pedals, it simply felt like ALL (or more) of that power was converted directly into forward motion and not leaked out into the ether from flexing or creaking. So it "felt" like at the same, say ~300W, more of those Watts were converted into forward motion than when on my P3... and the P3 certainly felt like it was more than on my older road bikes. (how much was the drive-train vs the frame, not sure...)
This was somewhat verified by the immediate bump I got in speeds on some of my regular local routes (this was pre-Strava).
And being on my sexy new P5 simply made me want to train harder to justify all the $$ I spent and to be fit enough to not be passed by the dude on the Nishiki road bike with down tube shifters... So I'm sure there's some Placebo effect as well.
Mark Allen and Dave Scott were putting out crazy fast bike splits on round tube road bikes, so clearly the engine is the absolute most important thing of a bike split. And on average, Pro bike splits did't make a huge jump with the advent of Superbikes... But they're still faster than non-superbikes which are faster than road bikes which are all faster than Fat Bikes!
If you do a Best Bike Split analysis and change from a "Superbike" (i.e. Ventum or P5) to a standard Road bike, it will change your theoretical drag coefficients and calculate a different "ideal" bike split for you at a given power output. Many things will effect this in reality and you probably get a much higher ROI (form a $$ perspective) for an Aero helmet, Aero wheels, rear disk, latex tubes and race tires, removing bottle cages, wearing a tight fitting kit, and always staying down in the aero position... But if you're at the pointy pointy end (which you are), you're already doing all of those things and having a more aero and stiffer bike just gets added to that long list of additive things to shave off seconds or minutes.
Only you can decide if those extra Thousands of dollars are worth it for a few seconds or minutes. I don't regret for one second the $$$ I spent on my P5, but pro-rated over it's life so far, my P5 has literally cost me Pennies per mile... That's WAY less than the amount of $ per mile that I spend on training nutrition or for swimming goggles, supplements, etc... Heck, my new Vaporfly 4%'s that I bought are gonna cost me ~$3.00/mile!
If you believe the Slowtwitch crowd, we are in the age of peak aero, meaning there's not a lot to distinguish one superbike from another purely in terms of aerodynamics. My 9 year old Cervelo P4, cleanly set up, is still almost as fast as what most manufacturers are selling today (and faster than some). Nonetheless, I think I may be in the market for a new bike this OS. Why? Two factors. First, I'd like (no, like really like) better braking. As in, I'd like a bike that has functional brakes. The P4, for as fast as it is, may possess the dubious title of 'world's worst rear brake'. Second, The comfort difference in going from 23c to 25c tires is pretty huge, and I'd love to have a bike that's as aero as my P4, but is optimized for 25c tires.
Rumor has it that Cervelo will be releasing a disc brake version of the P5 sometime around Kona time. That would be pretty interesting.
Don't know why you're asking, but on suspicion that you are considering getting a new bike, I'll relate my now one year experience with a new super bike (not one of these two, a QR PR Six) after 18 years on a round-tube 650 c, on which I had some measure of success.
First thing I'll note is to agree with what John K says, that aero super-bike characteristics seem pretty mature now - visually, it's hard to tell one brand from another without the decals. Not like the days of Kestral vs Cevelo vs Soft-Ride vs Natascha (and Lori Bowden's) Cheetah etc. Although, there is the Ventum...
On the "feel" side, I noticed the same thing as John W. For me, I would describe it as, when I get up to cruising speed, it feels "easier" to hold that speed. John says there is less effort bleeding off the bike, that seems right.
On the data side, I had one 40K triathlon bike leg on the same course comparing 2010, when I was 7 yrs younger and in superb shape 2 months before Kona, which I did again last summer. My times were the same, as was the power output. But my HR was significantly lower (in the range of 5-10 bpm, Im too lazy to look up the exact # now). So I concluded that I may not have bought "free speed", but I did buy "free fitness". Whether that's from aero improvements, stiffer frame, better wheels (my old ones were Zipp 404s), or whatever, it was real to me. Now, was it worth the $9K I spent? Amortized over the preceding 18 yrs, or the next ??? is one way to look at it. Luckily, my old medical group from which I retired had just been bought out and I received a big pay-out as a result, so it felt like found $$ to me.
So while a "better, newer" bike may not take you faster, it may make it easier to go the same speed, setting up a faster run, which you of course will magnify with Vaporflys...
@John Withrow wrote: "the dude on the Nishiki road bike with down tube shifters" ==> Way back in the early 90's I had that bike; used to race duathlon. Kenny Souza was my idol
@Al Truscott wrote: "when I get up to cruising speed, it feels "easier" to hold that speed" ==> In 2002 I rode a Softride TT7, and it had that same feeling. That bike still sits in my basement, waiting to be ridden again
@Dave Tallo I agree with you; the P5 and the Ventum are both slower than my old Softride