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Comment by jeffbee | Hacker News Reader

Yeah, it's so common that literally nobody in high-level road cycling has ever been found doing it. "Motor doping" is the chupacabra: universally feared, never seen.

The math doesn't even begin to pass the smell test, with regards to how much energy you'd get out of some tiny battery vs. the amount you'd spend dragging the dead battery around France all day.

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> The math doesn't even begin to pass the smell test, with regards to how much energy you'd get out of some tiny battery vs. the amount you'd spend dragging the dead battery around France all day.

But there's already evidence that some cyclists were at least dragging around exactly that much extra weight:

> In the 2015 Tour de France, bikes in the peloton were weighed before one of the time trial stages. French authorities told us the British Team Sky was the only team with bikes heavier than the rest—each bike weighed about 800 grams more. A spokesman for Team Sky said that during a time trial stage bikes might be heavier to allow for better aerodynamic performance. He said the team has never used mechanical assistance and that the bikes were checked and cleared by the sports governing body.[1]

That's 800 extra grams-- the same weight as Varjas' little hidden motor that he sold for $12,000.

I'd find it quite strange if you think a hidden battery-powered motor doesn't pass the smell test, but dragging around the same weight for "aerodynamics" does pass the smell test.

1: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/60-minutes-investigates-hidden-...

Aero is basically the only thing that matters, second only to recruiting freak-show riders with horse lungs. These guys are averaging 40km/h. Have you seen Vingegaard's ridiculous mushroom helmet that's pushing the boundary between headwear and faring?

This is just what the bike companies are selling right now since an Aero bike with disc brakes and electronic components that comes in at the UCI weight limit is like $15,000.

If you can have it all you want it all.

Aero doesn't matter at all on hill climbs, they are going too slow there for that.

That wasn't the question. The question would be whether a team would trade mass for drag and the answer is clearly yes. Every elite team has lighter and heavier bikes that are suited to different events.

from GP:

> Team Sky said that during a time trial stage bikes might be heavier to allow for better aerodynamic performance

(emphasis mine)

TDF time trials are almost never uphill. And yes, they have different bikes, showing that that while they might trade mass for drag during a time trial stage, they would do the opposite for hill climb stages. So "aero is the only thing that matters" is clearly false.

I was under the impression that bikes have a minimum weight in the rules and actual bikes are pretty much always under that weight these days? They then add little lead weights in strategic places the get them to the minimum weight (and help improve balance by placing the weights in the right spots). I'm not sure of the average added weight is, but you'd think it would at least negate some of the weight of the motor/battery (ie: the motor+battery weights 800g but there's 500g of extra average weight added to a bike, so they would only have a +300g bike..)

Note: I know pretty much nothing about racing but I have had that idea in my head for a while about the added weight. Maybe from a friend who told me his bike wasn't UCI compliant because it weighed too little?

Supporting what you're saying, it's not hard to find bikes that are under the UCI rules. For example, the Specialized Aethos often comes in at less than the required minimum weight.

But for a TT bike and such as upthread... Or anything where it's not mostly about climbing... Weight is a less important factor than aerodynamics, by far.

I personally think that the whole "motor doping" thing in the pro peloton (ie races like the TdF) is a contrived boogeyman. Unlike drug doping, which could happen with just one or two people besides the athlete, a modified bike would take a bunch of folks to know about it and keep quiet, which is notoriously a problem and would likely leak out.

You'd need the person or folks who modified the frame, the mechanics, the riders, the folks swapping the bikes out pre-inspection, the folks destroying the bikes, and then the litany of people who look over bike and rider photos and video for any little thing (odd buttons, pressing unexpected things at just the right times, etc).

If you think it doesn't pass the smell test then you obviously haven't done much road cycling. In a flat race without much climbing, aerodynamics matter far more than a bit of extra weight. Look at pro level triathlon: those bikes aren't even subject to UCI minimum weight rules and yet the winners usually choose to ride relatively heavy bikes in order to gain an aero advantage.

Perhaps the math would make more sense if you swap the bike once the battery is depleted?

I'm still not sure that the tiny battery would give enough of an advantage to be worth the risk - I don't know take enough interest in road racing to know.

Oh - unless the peloton forget about the breakaway, then I take great interest! Love watching that race: https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2021/jul/25/anna-kiesenhof...

I agree it is rare - the UCI measures seem very effective.

I'm not so sure about the math though, it is trivial for a motor+battery to exceed the 6-7 W/Kg sustained that a human can achieve, thus raising the total system W/Kg.

Also consider that the lightest bikes are 5.5kg or so, and UCI has a minimum weight of 6.8 kg which gives "free weight" for these theoretical cheaters to use...

Bikers swap bikes quite freely so that's not really an issue.

how about 0.5% performance increase on climbs? downhill, the more weight you have the better i guess.

Shall we do the math on this? Pogi's Zone 2 power is apparently around 320W. That puts his FTP around 500. Assume he's doing a climb at tempo, say 6W/kg based on system weight. The power density to beat for your mechanical doping device is 166g/W. But keep in mind, that's the power it has to do in order to just break even and not slow him down.

Also the gains from your device are probably erased if Pogi forgets to poop before starting the stage.

And have you seen the man's bicycle? It is not as if you can just drop a couple of D cells down the seat tube.

It could be a capacitor charged when going down hill

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