[HN Gopher] Asymmetric Effects of Tire Pressure Optimization
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Asymmetric Effects of Tire Pressure Optimization
Author : giuliomagnifico
Score : 51 points
Date : 2021-07-02 07:26 UTC (1 days ago)
(HTM) web link (blog.silca.cc)
(TXT) w3m dump (blog.silca.cc)
| greatgib wrote:
| Very interesting but also so disgusting for the spirit of sport.
|
| Here you have the confirmation that it is not the best human
| performance that wins in the end, but the one that has more money
| to spend in R&D and product development for the bicycles or
| tools.
| dawnerd wrote:
| That's been the case for a very long time with all sports
| unfortunately.
| gameswithgo wrote:
| why unfortunate?
| dawnerd wrote:
| Because it's no longer about human ability and more who has
| the biggest R&D budget. Wired has a good couple episodes
| about it.
|
| Ex: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tn0lqMuGguw
| tjoff wrote:
| It certainly helps but gaming your psyche has greater reward.
|
| 10% of X might sound a lot until you realize that X only
| accounts for 2.2% of the total.
| cobri wrote:
| This likely happens in every sport that relies on gear,
| apparel, or some level of mechanical variable.
|
| Swimming -> buoyant suits; Basketball -> Lighter, stiffer
| shoes; Soccer -> Cleats, Uniforms; Running -> Carbon fiber
| plates;
|
| Sports that depend on some mechanical variable seem to trend
| toward improving/tuning that variable in whatever ways allowed
| by that sport (car/bike/boat racing).
| GuB-42 wrote:
| Cycling is a mechanical sport, mechanical sports are a
| competition that test both the machine and the people who
| design and build it as well as the human operating it.
|
| There are competitions where everyone is given the same machine
| to put emphasis on the human performance. In cycling for
| instance, Japanese "Keirin" racers all use the same low tech
| steel bike that they maintain themselves.
|
| Anyways, money is always going to matter. More money gives you
| better training, better nutrition and medical support, better
| equipment and can allow athletes to focus exclusively on their
| sport by offloading them from the usual chores. In teams
| sports, also better teammates. There is no way around it, but
| it doesn't mean the athletes lose merit, even with performance
| enhancing drugs, it takes a lot of effort and dedication to
| come out on top.
| skybrian wrote:
| That's needlessly reductive, treating the engineers as if they
| were machines that convert money into performance. But
| engineers are human too and this is a challenge for them. They
| do need money, but it's not a given that the most money gets
| the best engineers.
|
| It does change the nature of the challenge when it's not
| entirely about the individual on the bike.
| visarga wrote:
| We get the same complaint in ML - big companies have more money
| for compute so they can try more idea variations, discard the
| bad ones and stake a claim on the good ones. Or even on the
| same architecture they can train more models and by pure chance
| get one that is %0.1 better than previous SOTA ("random seed
| optimization").
| C19is20 wrote:
| I'm afraid you won't enjoy this much, then - Durianrider:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_f7QxGr688
|
| discussing Natural or Not Natural (Tour de France, but he'll
| call out anybody).
| C19is20 wrote:
| / talking about the use of chemicals in Cycling - natural or
| not natural.
| gameswithgo wrote:
| There are sports that are almost only about the human, sports
| that are almost only about the machine, and everything in
| between. Cycling is in between and always has been, people have
| looked for an edge since the beginning. It is part of the fun
| for some, a chore for others.
| viraptor wrote:
| Does anyone know what this means:
|
| > last year we ran 32mm tires labelled as 30mm
|
| That sounds dodgy, but maybe I'm missing some context.
| cy384 wrote:
| bike tires have a manufacturer's specified width, but it's very
| common for the actual width of any given model to be 1-3mm
| wider
|
| for competition purposes, there may be maximum widths
| (depending on the exact rules, more like 33-38mm), not based on
| the label but measured directly
| discreteevent wrote:
| Also the measured width of the tire will depend on the width
| of the rim it is installed on.
| gameswithgo wrote:
| actual width varies with pressure and wheel it is mounted on
| tyingq wrote:
| I had assumed by the title this would be about automatic tire
| pressure monitoring/adjustment in cars and trucks. I don't know
| much about it, but in the truck space, products claim ~1.5%
| better MPG and longer tire life. It's also used to deflate tires
| when in muddy conditions like construction sites to keep from
| getting stuck.
| ajuc wrote:
| I like how Sherp does this. Tires have 2 automatic valves - you
| can set the pressure and it will fill the tires with exhaust
| fumes if it's too low and release them to atmosphere if it's
| too high.
| helge9210 wrote:
| ~1.5% assuming generally correct pressure/distribution is
| adjusted according to actual road conditions.
|
| If the starting state is "unknown pressure, but looks round",
| you can get up to 10% improvement.
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