When you start riding a sport bike, such as a hybrid bike or road bike, you will inevitably want to go faster.
Even if the level of a professional athlete riding at an average speed of 50 km/h or so is just a dream, everyone who rides a hybrid bike or road bike would like to ride their bike as fast as possible.
I too have more than a little yearning to ride my bicycle at a high speed.
If I am going to ride my bicycle the same distance, the faster I am, the faster I can reach my destination.
The faster I can get to my destination, the more reason and value I have for riding my bicycle.
I began to think that the time required for a slow ride is not so different from the time required for a frantic ride in an urban area.
So, here is a summary of the results of the verification by riding a bicycle in an urban area.
I tried commuting to work to see how fast I could get to work
Commuting distance of 29 km and the time required
The reason I decided to conduct this study was because the commuting time by bicycle is much longer than by train, and I felt that it would be difficult to commute by bicycle if the current situation continued.
My commuting distance is about 29 km by road.
If I can simply calculate that I can ride at an average speed of 30 km/h, I can reach my office in less than one hour.
In reality, it does not work as calculated, and the average speed is about 22 km/h to 24 km/h due to repeated stop-and-go at traffic lights, and riding with a margin of safety in mind and not overreacting.
Then, the average speed required is calculated to be about 1 hour and 30 minutes, but in reality, the time required is about 1 hour and 50 minutes, including the time spent waiting at traffic signals.
The reality is that my commute to work is much shorter by train, and it is not feasible for me to continue by bicycle.
If I can somehow shorten the time it takes to get there, I will have room to consider whether or not I can commute by bicycle in earnest.
The most important factor in switching from train commuting to bicycle commuting is the time required.
If the bike is faster, you will be motivated enough to start biking to work right away, but if the train is faster, you will not be able to make the switch to biking to work.
Now, if I commute by train, my commute time is about 1 hour and 10 minutes.
In other words, if I can ride my bicycle 29 km to work at an average speed of 30 km/h, depending on the timing of my train connections, it will be faster, making it much more worthwhile to consider a bicycle commute.
Bicycle commuting time attack challenge.
I challenged myself to a time attack to my workplace by bicycle.
If I ride as fast as I can all the way, I would run out of energy halfway through the race, so I decided to ride as fast as I could, focusing on roads that are well maintained, easy to speed up, and have plenty of road width.
For example, a road that is normally ridden at around 27 km/h is now ridden at 33 km/h. The goal is to reduce the time required by about 20 minutes.
1 hour 45 minutes
I pedaled my bicycle frantically, out of breath, to get there, and the result was a time savings of only five minutes compared to usual.
It was a completely unexpected result.
Incidentally, the average speed was about 23 km/h, almost the same as usual.
Unsatisfied with this result, I tried several more time attack attempts, but the results were all similar.
Why the time required is almost the same whether you are in a hurry or not
The main reason why the time required remains the same is waiting for a traffic light.
The biggest cause of time loss in commuting is undoubtedly waiting at traffic lights.
I have to wait for several minutes, especially if I get stuck at a traffic light on a major street.
And the road I use to commute to work has over 50 traffic lights.
In fact, an old man in a ragged bicycle riding leisurely, repeatedly ignoring traffic lights, is faster than I am!
More stop and go’s will lower the average speed.
More traffic lights mean more stop-and-go traffic.
In other words, the number of times you have to stop once and start riding again increases.
No matter how lightly you ride at speeds exceeding 30 km/h, the average speed drops dramatically after just a few stop and go cycles.
In other words, depending on the number of times you get stuck at a traffic light, it may be possible to reach your destination faster if you ride slower.
Everyone’s opinion was the same.
I have concluded that there is not much difference in the time required whether you are in a hurry or not, but it is often the case that it is just me.
So I asked the opinions of those who ride similar courses and distances and the answer I got was “there is little difference in the time required whether I hurry or not”.
It seems that everyone is the same.
There are many disadvantages to riding frantically and many advantages to feeling comfortable.
There’s no advantage to riding fast in the city
The biggest advantage of riding a bicycle fast is getting to your destination faster, but this advantage is rarely felt when riding in an urban area with many traffic lights.
In other words, when riding in an urban area with many traffic lights, forcing yourself to hurry will not save time, but will only cause more danger, more stress, with little advantage.
If so, I have come to believe that it is definitely more enjoyable and pleasant to ride slowly with a relaxed mind and enjoy the scenery while cycling safely.
Riding fast or slow will not change the time, so please ride with safety first!
As long as bicycles are vehicles, it is certainly tempting to pursue speed, but that is something that should be pursued in race. When riding on public roads, I think the most important thing is to ride safely.
In order to cut off the temptation to speed and to remember to ride safely with a relaxed mind, it is good to know that when riding in an urban area, the time required is almost the same whether you are in a hurry or not.
So, let’s all ride safely.
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