I don’t know where I saw the argument first, but I would rather it goes in the opposite direction: The bikes and the kit used for a stage race is “approved” ahead of the entire race, and you race that on all stages, so the TT becomes only about the position and the rider, not fancy cough helmets, magic sauce in the frame, unicorn dust on the legs, socks made of carbon fibre and whatnot. You can choose to have a bottle or not, but that is up to you. Having bikes just used for a super specialized thing is wasteful in my opinion.
Merkxx-style TT, only slightly updated to modern race kits.
I have absolutely no doubt that it does deliver those benefits.
It’s impossible this hasn’t been in a wind tunnel at the very least and likely some IRL testing. With something so different and borderline comical, I can’t imagine how a team or rider would use it without some clear justification.
Per discussion on the Placeholders Podcast, they seem to have it on good authority that this is a winner in aero terms. This will be a “when” situation where other companies will offer something similar, not an “if” would be my guess.
OR UCI will step in and squash it as they so often do, but that might be the only way this doesn’t see expanded use… unless people value aesthetics over results?
I’m in agreement with this if grand tours really lengthened ITTs and brought back long TTTs as well. Force GC riders to trade off the aero advantage of frame A vs the perceived climbing advantage of frame B for an entire grand tour. Same idea with long TTT: do you bring a team with lots of time trial folks to help your GC rider gain time in the TTT. But have fewer mountain domestiques? Or vice versa
I’d add to this on TTs similar in profile to where Pog won his first Tour you make you bed, you lie in it.
No swapping from TT bike to super light climbing version. If you have a mechanical you get the same style bike. I’m sure there’s downsides but it just doesn’t feel right getting a totally different bike mid way through.
I don’t want to be the person who defends the POC gravel helmet, BUT I do think that 50% (one side) of it is a good idea, even if it’s total over kill, as a T1 diabetic, with asthma, some other medical issues, I carry identification at all time, and details of my medical conditions, do you know what happens in a accident, they treat your injuries and presume the reason you are out of it is because you are drunk (not because your sugar levels are on another planet because of the crash) , anything that makes your ID more obvious is a winner in my opinion (which is what one side of the helmet is all about)
I agree that making ID / health info more visible is a good thing (I’m on blood thinners, so any crash for me is potentially life threatening and very time sensitive)…but both sides of that helmet carry more risk than benefit, IMO. They may just act as “sticking points” if you hit the deck, thereby increasing the chances of a concussion or neck injury.
Very good point, I get angry when I see people attaching camera / lights to their helmets for the very same reason (although they wouldn’t also increase the the pressure point)
The only time I use anything attached to my helmet is a light for trail riding…the added safety of seeing through the turns outweighs the potential injury risk, IMO.
Interesting to note that Trek Segafredo are able to choose whichever helmet they like since Bontrager doesn’t make an aero TT helmet (they have just come out with the almost TT-esque aero road helmet). None of them have chosen this new sweet one…
That may just be a matter of logistics. The Sweet helmet is just released and developed in cooperation with the Uno-X team (which Sweet have sponsored for a number of years), so it makes sense they get it first and at launch. If Trek Segafredo was to have it at launch, they would need inside connections at Sweet Protection.
