Within the cycling industry there is not a moment or time for respite when it comes to improvement. Whether it be someone training to become fitter or a brand tirelessly working to try and improve the products they offer.
At Velotec we pride ourselves in our craft to bring aerodynamic speedwear to the masses and help people be as competitive as they can be, to achieve the results they truly deserve. With the reputation of being an aero focused brand we have the expectation to provide some of the fastest products to market.
With this expectation we work hard, and we also test just as hard to bring these products to market, however, when it comes to testing, things are not always so clear cut. Frustrations can easily arise and so can the levels of head scratching, particularly when we don’t see a result we expect. I’m sure if we scratch our heads too much more we’ll all go bald.
Our most recent trip to the wind tunnel we took Velotec athlete Joe Laverick and triathlete Finn Arentz, to test the latest iterations of a new speedsuit and triathlon suit. Wind tunnel testing is something we frequently do. However this time we filmed some of the processes and perspectives of both Joe and Finn to provide a little more insight into what actually happens when we test at the wind tunnel.
You can find these videos at the links below.
Finn - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jE-_E1FkJOo
Joe - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EFezRn8uESE
The day itself showed the two sides of what can happen when testing. On one hand we had a really great result with Finn using our latest Tri-Suit which is to be released in the coming weeks. This suit tested noticeably faster than some of our major competitors, and was about what we expected across different speeds and conditions.
The same story could not be said for testing with Joe. His results in the tunnel were somewhat a shock, as we were not really able to see the gains we had anticipated. We tried various different suit and apparel combinations and they all resulted in very minute differences. Is this because he is already aero optimised? Is he an anomaly? We just don’t know.
The experience with Joe highlighted that product development and improvements are not always a linear progression. Aero development seems to resemble more a game of snakes and ladders, where what you think in theory is aero has you sliding down a snake back to square one, only later to develop something else that has you climbing back up the ladder.
This roundabout way of progression forces us to keep pushing in development and testing, but it also shows that the speedsuit or the aero socks you rely on to race in were not created overnight. The end consumer product is not the result of a designer, marketing team or influencer saying the pastel colour looks great and I love the font. No. The end product is a result of hard work, constant development and most importantly validated testing results.