why do the fastest bicycles have really thin tyres but the fastest cars have very wide tyres
In: Engineering
Fast cars have massive engines. There’s not a hard upper limit on how much power you can put in a car. That means power, weight, aerodynamics ,and traction are in a constant balancing act.
You can squeeze out more power with a bigger engine, but if it makes the tires spin you don’t get that power, and it also weighs more.
For more traction, increase the weight and tire size, but increasing weight robs from power.
Aerodynamics limit the top speed, so you want to reduce drag and reduce weight to get the most speed possible out of the power your engine puts out. In order to make this work, tires get wider so they can output the force to the road on the minimal weight of the car.
Bikes literally dont have this same struggle.
Humans power the bikes, and humans weigh way more than we’d like, and only a portion of our weight is actually our leg muscles.
We’re not powerful enough to spin our tires on pavement, so we’re not limited by traction anymore.
The goals of a cyclist are to reduce weight, reduce drag, and train to add power and endurance.
Adding power adds leg muscle which is weight.
Since traction isn’t a limit, thinner tires reduce drag and reduce weight.
Reducing tire weight is a pretty big factor, because it takes a lot of energy to get something heavy spinning and change it’s speed. By lightening the tires, a biker has more power to accelerate in a burst. That’ll help them get ahead of the pack or around an opponent.
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