ienjoyracing wrote:
rstranger wrote:
I have a PhD in physics. Explain this to me. Wind resistance is not related to mass. It's a function of cross sectional area and velocity. As long as two riders are putting out the same watts, the physically smaller rider with a smaller cross sectional area - likely to have less mass - will be less affected. The more massive rider is likely to have a larger cross sectional area and fare worse in the wind.
You say you have a physics PhD and your contradicting me. Interesting situation. Either I’m about to learn something or I will heroically triumph over a physics PhD. Or your lying I guess, only time will tell. To explain, no I wasn’t asserting that as mass increases wind resistance increases. I understand that it’s related to cross sectional surface area or whatever you said. Also I did not account for a heavier rider having slightly more air resistance due to probably being larger, I assumed it was negligible.
I could defend my point, but I’d rather go about it a different way and gauge if you really are a PhD. Since you have the alleged physics PhD I’ll let you explain to me why a bowling ball falls faster than a beach ball of the same size, and we’ll go from there. :)
You have to take into account the higher inertia of the heavier rider. So, a lighter person has a proportionally larger surface area to mass and has less inertia and probably generates less power. I think a smaller rider has a lot harder time cutting through the wind, even if they have a smaller frontal area. A feather gets blown around a lot more than a rock.