Pedaling ovals makes you a more efficient rider, says absoluteBLACK’s chief scientist

Several years ago, Borut Fonda, a doctor and biomechanics researcher, decided to leave academia, having had enough of the inherent bureaucracy that then plagued his professorial life. He got what some of his scientific peers would describe as an offer of lifetime: the chance to focus on cycling, biomechanics and drive train efficiency full-time in industry, free of the persistent pressures to publish and scour for grants.

A former pro mountain biker, the offer came courtesy of absoluteBLACK the London and Poland-based designer and manufacturer of aftermarket oval chainrings to be their chief research scientist. The company had existing research to support the supposed supremacy of oval rings; his work would further substantiate their claims and focus on building a smoother pedal stroke with better bike parts.

What is a smoother pedal stroke? Does that mean more power? More efficiency? How do you quantify smoothness? Is that enough reason to swap rings?

The benefits of going oval, says Fonda, are beyond marginal - a five to nine percent decrease in energy consumption (greater metabolic efficiency) over a 200km ride. While you can’t expect a 30 watt increase in FTP by using them, Fonda boils it down like this: “metabolic efficiency is something you can’t fake. Even a one percent savings - at the professional level - can mean the difference between winning a stage race and not finishing it.” With such a massive savings at stake, we got a set of AB’s ovals to see what the fuss was about. Turns out the claims about efficiency are hard to dispute.

Several pro teams have formed informal relationship with Absolute Black and their Science Lab to improve their pedaling efficiency. Photo by Martin Paldan | GripGrab.

The great ring debate: are ovals better?

While no UCI pro teams currently race in AB’s rings, a number of pros work with the company’s fit lab, looking for efficiencies in their pedaling styles. Anecdotal feedback and Strava times, says Fonda, suggest AB rings are different from their asymmetric predecessors and a step beyond pedalling on round rings. “When someone who could potentially win a three-week stage race says they see a noticeable jump in their times on ovals, that’s another level of feedback,” he says.

Pedalling ovals won’t give you a higher FTP. What ovals do give is enhanced use of human physiology, says Fonda. While previous asymmetric rings (Shimano introduced their Biospace rings in 1983; Rotor’s QRings came roughly a decade later) took force away from the knee during a pedal stroke, AB’s innovation is to distribute pedalling force across the entire leg - hip to heel - and to maximize peak power with shapes and shifting. (Several smaller brands have since emulated this approach.)

So interesting are these rings, they appear to have reignited a debate (in our minds, anyway) as to whether or not pedaling ovals is actually advantageous. Theoretically better suited to most people’s power profiles, pedalling ovals amounts to spending less calories to turn out the same watts. If you’ve seen them up close, you’ll have seen how the ring spends more time where power is generated (as the crank rotates from 10 to 3) and less time in drivetrain “dead zones.”

The major benefit of ovals, says Fonda, is that you engage your entire leg to pedal - hip, knee, ankle and calf - the snout to tail of pedalling. (My hips were sore AF for two weeks after I started using the rings - so greater engagement confirmed.) Saying they are “better” may be entirely subjective and possibly influenced by your existing bike fit. But there are noticeable differences.

Ovals are better: ride conclusions

Absolute Black is a small company that’s smart enough to fund big ideas and their rings are growing more popular. During lockdown, sales have actually grown online (they are currently selling over one million pieces a year). Pros are anxious to race them (it’s rumoured they will supply rings to several teams in 2021).

WIth AB’s ovals, the cranks just seem to turn over easier - a purely anecdotal conclusion but an undeniable one all the same. If an aftermarket part can actually leave you with a little more gas in the legs, which these do, I’m all in. Since the rings were installed (see bike above) there is undeniably a broader muscular engagement and greater ease with cadence. As for faster times, that’s hard to qualify without doing some A/B testing against comparable round rings. I’m less fussed with that, and more focused on an ability to ride further and fresher, which ovals offer hands down.

At 170 euros for a set of premium rings, AB has cracked the cost conundrum that some critics have slapped on oval rings. They are inexpensive, awesome and an upgrade that shouldn’t be ignored.

Design icons: how a Swedish cycling co. made safety cool

It’s January when I connect with POC - a brand that has seemingly sat at the front of cycling safety for decades, though they’ve only been in the road market since 2014. We’ve met once or twice in past - at the Rouleur Classic in London, at Eurobike in Friedrichshafen - but with kernels of COVID coming and the make-up of the 2020 season soon-to-be altered, this conversation feels a bit different.

Seven years ago, when POC announced a three-year partnership to become the official helmet and eyewear supplier of Cannondale-Garmin, few would have predicted that the Swedish company with a strong mission and divisive designs would enjoy such a meteoric ascent, evolving into purveyors of a modern design aesthetic that is so immediately recognizable. More than 40 international awards later and a strong showing on club rides and in races however tells a different story.

“We were never design-led, but most look at our helmets and make that assumption,” explains Damian Phillips, global head communications. “Interestingly the style that has defined us has come from an exploration of boundaries. We take a lot of time to ensure there’s a clear Scandinavian aesthetic in our product, but we never start at this point.”

The best example of POC’s rather simple mission is perhaps the helmet that made them famous - the Octal. It was their first for road, and it was envisaged to be lightweight, vented and safe. The mushroom shape - a characteristic many still can’t wrap their heads around - came from an engineering objective to be both light (200 grams in M) and to save lives. It won awards and would soon enable POC to grow.

This of course was never POC’s objective - to be a leader in cycling apparel and certainly not a harbinger for style. POC’s founder, Stefan Ytterborn, had sons, both ski racers, whose skills and speed were quickly outgrowing available protection. He decided he would build a company that could keep up, starting with helmets, spinal impact protection and wrist guards designed for snow sports. Several alpine athletes would latch on to the concept. After a fall, they would send used helmets to POC which they then researched in partnership with academia. Over time this would form the basis of what would become the POC Lab - a scientific forum that brought together experts from a range of disciplines and medicine - going on to inform both the company’s engineering and design processes. In 2009 and out of the POC Lab, POC would help bring MIPS to market for the first time, starting what is still an ongoing debate in road riding: what makes a helmet safe?

“The Octal was the first we released to meet the challenges of the uncompromising world of the pro peloton, followed quickly by the Cerebel and more recently, the Ventral SPIN,” explains Jonas Sjögren, POC’s CEO. Adds Phillips: “we never went into these projects saying we want to change the way people think, but we are always looking for a different way to innovate. Almost accidentally, this has shaped many people’s opinions about safety.”

Partnerships over the years accelerated POC’s place in the peloton. The Octal was well-regarded with pros. Out of their relationship with EF Education Pro Cycling, the company soon rode towards several design KOMs like the Ventral. Ideas continued trickling into POC’s engineers, nurturing a culture that balanced the needs of enhanced safety alongside growing risk. During it all, innovation continued.

Working with Exeger in Sweden, today POC is working with different foils to power helmet lights; a dome with endless energy. In partnership with Volvo, the car maker, they developed the world’s first crash test between cars and bike helmets; they have also just released medical info chips built into their Ventral Air Spin NFC; a helmet that speaks for cyclists when they’ve had an accident and can’t to it themselves.

POC has transitioned into an essential partner for several brands, chosen for their safety, performance and yes, their styling.

The company is tight-lipped about other announcements to come in 2020 and beyond, and like many in cycling, are still waiting to see when some normalcy to the season will return - if it does at all. Regardless, their story has bread a culture of innovation will which continue, driven by an internal desire to not just meet safety standards but to set them.

PART 1: Focus on the slice

The Giro Empire started as a one-off aero-shoe designed for Taylor Phinney to help him win the prologue at the 2012 Giro d’Italia, emulating the look of Nike’s mercurial soccer cleats, which Phinney loved as a kid. After winning that year’s prologue, he crashed in a road stage and destroyed his Giro Factor road shoes. Phinney wore the Empires after that, including on the podium after a stage, where his bloody ankle was photographed with the silver and neon green lace-ups. An icon was born. Why am I thinking about shoes lying in hospital bed in Zurich? More on that in a minute. First, let’s start with Andy Stumpf.

I don’t know Stumpf; I don’t think he even rides a bike. While in ICU last week though I listened to him on Rogan talk about SEAL training. Zwifting for hours seems soft by comparison. Being a SEAL takes you to the brink. The queen-stage is a five-day exam on two hours sleep. At this very moment I can only liken that to pulling a catheter out — twice — in a couple hours. I am sure there are better cycling analogies to apply here, but such is life currently.

The updated Empires caught my eye in September at Eurobike. At my request, Giro generously sent a pair and granted me interviews to supplement a larger product feature (which will follow in Part II). While other parts of life have recently taken over - COVID, worsening health, a spinal tumour - I haven’t been able to ride much. That will soon change; many now find themselves in this boat and I wonder how many are focusing on the pie - Twitter, news, survivalism Reddit’s, kids, freelancing (an undigestible and acidic slurry) - versus the slice - family, cycling and health (a critical holy trinity)?

Without cycling I wouldn’t have noticed something was wrong with my spine. I wouldn’t have pushed for a MRI. I wouldn’t have been reminded to slow down, focus on what matters, exert energy on things I can control and disregard the things I cannot. The slice.

The Empires are undoubtedly a design icon of modern cycling, rubbing shoulders with the Gabba, the Octal and a couple others. The above pic caught my eye several times while lying in hospital because of how much I can’t wait to ride in them and get back to things I can control. Cycling takes on a new, different dimension when you can’t do it. That’s recently been underscored, as has the generosity of people who support and read HNH - the slice I can soon focus on again; a piece of a much larger pie.

Next week I’ll start riding the updated Empires. Until then, iconic images continue to keep me motivated to focus on what’s important. Things that make me feel and think. Weather this storm similarly and you’ll probably be OK, too.

Now what?

This is my local bike shop. Right now, it probably looks a lot like yours. It is littered with bikes and kit. In the back there’s an espresso machine. After rides (when there are rides) coffee and conversation is kindly doled out for free.

Like everything else in Europe, it is now closed. One thousand square feet of dormant, dark space. Before the spread of COVID 19 changed cycling and everything else, it and shops like it were already in peril, besieged by direct-to-consumer models that were pushing at the margins. What will happen when they eventually re-open? How many will pivot to a “shop-for-services” model, focusing on builds, tune-ups, fittings and aero measurements for athletes to augment sales and survive?

LBSs have been on the back foot for a while. We all know this. Part-sales like brakes, cassettes, chains, lubes, pedals, bar-tape, lights and batteries have already been lost to the Internet (partially because of how little shop floor space they occupy in physical stores). Bike sales aren’t far behind. Will COVID force their hand?

---

While the world watches COVID, the way cycling does business is forever changing. The impact stretches beyond LBSs. The 2020 race calendar looks to have started with Omloop and finished with Paris-Nice. This week, Le Col started selling kit for indoor rides; races (for the time being) have moved to Zwift. Companies are doubling-down on digital for some semblance of continuity.

Castelli - from one of the world’s worst COVID regions - connected with their mailing list Friday in very plain speak with a discount code and an acknowledgement of the current pandemic. “Right now feels like the worst headwind or the biggest climb we’ve ever faced. And the end isn’t just around the next bend,” the company said. Small shops, builders and behemoth brands the world over followed suit, discussing how closures will change how they operate.  

Cycling faces some real risks in the current context. Small races will be cancelled and their long-term viability possibly jeopardized. Riders won’t be motivated to train (what for?); ride volume in general will decrease affecting kit designers. And on it goes.

In 2018, we interviewed Eric Min, the CEO of Zwift, on his platform as a vehicle for safer cycling. While few would have predicted it, even him, virtual rides are now a key lifeline; a reminder of how important cycling is for so many. It is a hobby, a passion and a vital part of our (social)lives.

Every climb has a descent, every sprint, a finish. I have a mountain of kit to write about for this blog, but in the current environment, staying healthy and staying inside are more important. COVID means changes for bike shops, businesses and cycling in general. This too shall pass. But for LBSs already facing headwinds, it just might be the domino that was needed to rethink their model entirely.

An antidote to chaos, Vitti Cycling shuns scale for style

Stand for something or stand for nothing. Of several well-articulated answers lobbed at me during a recent Hangout with photographer, designer and entrepreneur, Guido Vitti, this is the most memorable.

Memorable because it could be a Rule for Life, added to twelve others in a book of the same name. A guide to navigating a chaotic time in life and in modern design. It hangs in the air with the same effect. In reality, however, it’s just good advice given to him a long time ago; a principle that drives much of his work.

Vitti Cycling has taken its time crafting an image that is carefully curated on their Instagram. It is getting noticed. After shooting for big brands for two decades, he and partners now have their sights set on building their own, stitching together a kit co. that reflects interests rooted in research, careful sourcing, and manufacturing that ignores repetitive design, focusing instead on the classicism commonly associated with cycling’s post-war golden age.

“I’ve always wanted to bring my art and my aesthetic to what we see is a very repetitive marketplace,” he explains. “Ours is design birthed from a moment in time so often romanticized with all the benefits modern manufacturing can yield.”

Italian backroads are the backdrop for the company’s mood boards and the narrative from which they hope to create a cycling brand. Why would you make bibs anywhere else that looks like everything else, they say?

After their soft-launch last September, Vitti is getting ready to ramp up again this Spring. Their first full year in biz will see it add cold weather kit to the shop by Autumn. Over the winter, they’ve been busy building a narrative that will slowly drip throughout the year - a story intended to remind people why they ride. “Cycling lends focus which then lets me focus on my life,” Vitti explains. “That’s what’s so intoxicating about riding. What we see in the market doesn’t necessarily reflect that and other elements we’re passionate about.”

The cycling kit market is a crowded one, he admits, but their intent is never to be the brand of the moment. The next juggernaut. They just want to offer their stuff to people who ride at the exclusion of everything else. The noise and gradation that is dominant today can be done differently, they believe. A vision that sits at the crossroads of cycling’s past and present.

“Not to be flippant, but I really don’t care much what other companies are doing. Our kit is made for riding, for people who love cycling and who are modern-minded. That’s where we’re hoping we can make our bones in this industry.”

Taking on giants can be an impossible thing. Vitti, instead, will double-down in 2020 on casting its unique aesthetic out into the world. Probably a little riding, too. Kit review to follow.