It’s with considerable interest that Gizmag has followed cyclist Graeme Obree’s latest quest to break the human-powered speed record on his self-designed and self-built bicycle, Beastie. On Friday at the World Human Speed Championships at Battle Mountain, Nevada, Obree finally made the attempt. Though he fell short of that ultimate record, he did break the world prone record (for cycling head first, face down) with an impressive speed of 56.62 mph (91 km/h). Yet the overall speed record was broken during the event, by a team from the Delft University of Technology and VU University Amsterdam.

Though Graeme Obree’s own achievement fell short of the 100 mph barrier he’d hoped to break, he sounds satisfied to hold the prone speed record. Yet Obree remains convinced that 100 mph is achievable. “I do still believe 160 km/h 100mph is possible in the next 20 years with the developments I’ve seen here this week,” he tells Cycling Weekly. “There is absolute cutting-edge technology here and brilliant, friendly people.”

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But can those bikes carry 20kg of shopping?

Bubblecar said:

But can those bikes carry 20kg of shopping?

Yes but you need a longer braking area

> 133.78 km/h in the high-tech recumbent from students of the Delft University of Technology and the VU University Amsterdam. With this speed, he broke the world record and became the fastest cyclist on the planet. It was 0.6 km/h faster than the previous record

Not a huge improvement in speed. Have visited Delft University of Technology.

> The speeds were measured over a distance of 200 meters, after accelerating on an eight kilometre straight road in the desert of Nevada (USA).

That seems sensible. But wouldn’t it make more sense to cover the same section of track both ways, to counter any assistance from gravity and/or wind?

> “The computer simulations showed that the bike should have gone a lot faster than it did and after a thorough analysis of the data, the problem turned out to be an aerodynamic problem. When pedalling at high power inside the VeloX3, the outer shell turned out to deform slightly because of the force”

A simple wind tunnel test would have picked that up. I wonder why they didn’t.

> “Compared to an ordinary bicycle, our design only has one tenth of the air resistance. We also make use of a special coating from Akzo Nobel which they use in the Fomule 1, which gave the VeloX3 extremely low resistance”

I don’t see any mention of the bicycle being in any way special, other than being recumbent. I’m glad they used a special coating with low skin friction. At speeds like this that matters.

From the photographs it’s not immediately obvious which end is the front and which is the back. I take it that the blunt pointed end is the front and the thin flat end is the back? But it’s not immediately clear why. Would they be cycling face down or face up? The overall length is surprisingly short.