Tao Geoghegan Hart in the Specialized wind tunnel(Image credit: Courtesy of Specialized)
Geoghegan Hart is one of the most promising British riders in the U23 ranks(Image credit: Courtesy of Specialized)
Geoghegan Hart makes his debut in a wind tunnel(Image credit: Courtesy of Specialized)
Tao Geoghegan Hart's Specialized time trial bike for 2016(Image credit: Courtesy of Specialized)
Tao Geoghegan Hart in the Specialized wind tunnel(Image credit: Courtesy of Specialized)
Tao Geoghegan Hart in the Specialized wind tunnel(Image credit: Courtesy of Specialized)
Tao Geoghegan Hart made the trip to Morgan Hill in January(Image credit: Courtesy of Specialized)
Tao Geoghegan Hart recently made use of Axeon Hagens Berman’s new relationship with Specialized when he visited the bike manufactures wind tunnel facility in Morgan Hill.
The British rider, who has risen through the ranks with the help of Dave Rayner funding and who rode as a stagaire for Team Sky last season, is currently competing in the Challenge Mallorca. However at the turn of the year he travelled to the US in order to seek analysis of his time trial position.
“Axeon Hagens Berman have brought onboard Specialized as a sponsor this year and I was lucky enough to be able to spend a day in their incredible cycling specific wind tunnel facility in Morgan Hill,” Geoghegan Hart told Cyclingnews.
“The aim was simply to get faster. It was incredibly insightful to look at the differences minute changes make. And also to see the fairly substantial gains the team are lucky enough to have solely from an equipment perspective too.”
Geoghegan Hart, 20, already had a fairly decent position on his previous time trial machine, so the work with Specialized revolved around making minor tweaks.
“We baselined my position from last year and made some interesting tweaks. Nothing drastic but it's interesting that the old-school conventional wisdom of 'fast looking positions' certainly doesn't apply when equating for the minute changes in drag in the tunnel.
“It was a very memorable and interesting experience. Being able to feel like you're going at, say, 50kph without having to concentrate on pedalling as such, traffic or the road, was quite fascinating. I am really very grateful to Specialized for taking the time to work with me.
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“Aerodynamics is definitely an area of huge interest. It’s obviously a way to get an unbelievable amount faster with some potentially very small changes. It was pretty eye-opening finding out quite how much real-time difference there is available with different changes, equipment and so on, it makes the 'just the rider against the clock' notion of time trialling seem just a little untrue!”
