Nothing can take away from the TT abilities of world champion Filippo Ganna. But his Ineos Grenadiers team is leaving nothing to chance with their roof rack strategy when the Italian races against the watch.
At Tirreno Adriatico earlier this year, many social media users pointed out just how stacked the roof rack was on the car following him that day. And it was the same again on Wednesday on stage 4 at Critérium du Dauphiné, which he also won; the rack packed full with spare bikes, only one of which was a spare TT bike for Ganna.
A study has shown when a roof rack is stacked with bikes, it combines with the vehicle to create a wall behind the rider. The theory is that the closer the following team car is to the rider, the more it pushes the rider along, or certainly gives them an advantage. The practice is not illegal.
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On Wednesday Ganna only beat Wout van Aert (Jumbo Visma) by two seconds, but the roof rack on the car following Van Aert was also rammed with bikes, as was his team mate Primož Roglič's. They didn't look quite as stacked as Ganna's, though it was very close.
Interestingly, Ethan Hayter went into Wednesday's TT with a chance of victory. He lost the visor of his helmet during his ride and complained that impacted his contact lenses and his vision. Still, he was only 17 seconds down on his winning team mate over the 31.9km distance. His roof rack was nowhere near as packed as Ganna's.
And based on the results of the only study on the impact of stacked roof racks in TTs, if Hayter's rack had been piled more densely with spare bikes, he may have gone much faster. And if Van Aert had packed a few more bikes onto his rack, it may have found him the three seconds he needed to win - the same could also be said had he been able to wear his own skinsuit rather than the yellow jersey-issued suit.
Dutch engineer Bert Blocken, who has studied aerodynamics in cycling, has conducted the only study on the impact of stacked roof racks in TTs. His study stated: “The drag reduction for the cyclist ranges from 3.7 per cent over 1.4 per cent to 0.2 per cent for realistic separation distances of 3, 5 and 10m, respectively.
“For a typical 50km individual time trial, the potential time reduction by exploiting this effect (e.g. by a car following the rider at this short distance versus no car behind) is 62.4 s, 24.1 s and 3.9 s, respectively. As elite cyclist time trials are often won based on seconds or sometimes even less, these differences can be decisive for who wins the stage.
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“Therefore, it is recommended that the UCI not only raises its current minimum separation distance of 10m to at least 30m, but also strictly enforces it, to avoid this unwanted aerodynamic effect that can influence the outcome of the race.”
If you want to read more on that study, from 2015, you can find it by following this link. In the meantime, take a look below at the different roof rack formations of the best riders in Wednesday's TT.
