{"id":13871,"date":"2025-08-06T11:58:02","date_gmt":"2025-08-06T09:58:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.main-vision.com\/richard\/blog\/?p=13871"},"modified":"2025-08-06T11:58:02","modified_gmt":"2025-08-06T09:58:02","slug":"quick-thoughts-on-drafting-while-cycling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.main-vision.com\/richard\/blog\/quick-thoughts-on-drafting-while-cycling\/","title":{"rendered":"Quick Thoughts on Drafting while Cycling"},"content":{"rendered":"Reading Time: <\/span> 2<\/span> minutes<\/span><\/span>

When you ride alone you face the headwinds, and have to fight them. When you want to speed up you get to a certain speed, and if you want to ride faster you need to fight the wind. On a windy day you might feel sluggish and slow. You might then see a group ride overtake you with ease and think "I wish I was as fast as they are", or even "I wish I was in that group".<\/p>\n

Drafting as Lanterne Rouge<\/h2>\n

When I was on one ride three or four days ago someone wanted me to rejoin the group by drafting, and I wanted to but my legs were tired so when I tried to push they didn’t give the thrust I wanted them to. The result is that I had to make more effort than my body was ready for and I got fatigued.<\/p>\n

Drafting is not simply a matter of getting behind someone and being pulled along. It’s about having enough power to keep up with the person in front. That’s why it’s easier with a larger group going at a comfortable pace.<\/p>\n

In contrast when I was riding behind that individual during a LeCercle Ride I had to push hard to try to keep the wheel. I had to burn through my reserves to keep up.<\/p>\n

The Drafting Three<\/h2>\n

Fast forward to this weekend, when I was drafting behind the people with aerobars and the situation was different. Through Versoix I struggled but once we were back on the "flat" between Mies and Nyon I could cope much more easily.<\/p>\n

I still had to push hard, and I needed to throw out a lot of power to hold the wheels. By the time I could finally slow down, in Nyon I was ready to limp home, rather than ride hard.<\/p>\n

By ‘limp home’ I mean ‘ride slower’.<\/p>\n

Today I was on a solo ride into Geneva this morning and I saw people riding and blocking the cycle lane so I chose to sprint along the road as it was quiet. I managed to overtake everyone, and I managed to reach faster speeds than usual. I felt that my position was different, as if the ride behind those with aero bars changed my habits.<\/p>\n

And Finally<\/h2>\n

Today I was fresh, so I could ride hard. I wasn’t riding to a group ride. I was just riding to drop off the bike, for a few hours, and will pick it up this afternoon. That’s why I pushed myself.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reading Time: <\/span> 2<\/span> minutes<\/span><\/span>When you ride alone you face the headwinds, and have to fight them. When you want to speed up you get to a certain speed, and if you want to ride faster you need to fight the wind. On a windy day you might feel sluggish and slow. You might then see a group ride […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12287,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":3,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"federated","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[255],"tags":[1069,733,6965,6645,6855],"class_list":["post-13871","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-swiss-walks","tag-collaboration","tag-cycling","tag-drafting","tag-group","tag-rides"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.main-vision.com\/richard\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13871","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.main-vision.com\/richard\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.main-vision.com\/richard\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.main-vision.com\/richard\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.main-vision.com\/richard\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13871"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.main-vision.com\/richard\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13871\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13872,"href":"https:\/\/www.main-vision.com\/richard\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13871\/revisions\/13872"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.main-vision.com\/richard\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12287"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.main-vision.com\/richard\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13871"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.main-vision.com\/richard\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13871"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.main-vision.com\/richard\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13871"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}