Why is there little innovation in road bikes?

Coopz

Coopz

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A mate bought a nice Cervelo roadie this week. Had a look last night and it's a pretty bike. It's an upgrade over his 20 year old dropbar 105 bike.
Yet with the 2 bikes next to each other in his man cave they look identical from afar. Same frame, gears (albeit 12 vs 10 speed) and disc brakes over dual pivots. The newer bike is a fraction lighter as well

On the other side he has his 2 mountain bikes parked next to each other. A vintage dualie from the turn of the century and his newish evil insurgent. The difference is night and day.

Makes me think did road bike design peak 50+ years ago? Other than disc brakes and electric gear changing I haven't really seen any advancement in frame design or other functions.
 
Aero has made big advancements in the last 20 years. And in the last 5 years, tyres have gotten wider. Frame suspension and compliance have improved, especially for endurance bikes.
 
Jabubu said:
Aero has made big advancements in the last 20 years. And in the last 5 years, tyres have gotten wider. Frame suspension and compliance have improved, especially for endurance bikes.
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I always thought aerodynamics on a road bike are ridiculous. Everything goes out the window when you put a very poorly shaped human parachute on the bike even with tight as fuck lycra and a wind tunnel designed helmet. Head down on the drops helps but 90% of riders hardly used them for more than 5 minutes at a time.
 
I was thinking about something similar last night. I had a convo with a roady where I mentioned that my Hyrax cost $8-9k+. His response was that spending $8-9k is nothing compared to buying a good roady. And I got to thinking that my bike leans towards the upper end (Quality frame, Ohlins rear shock, 2024/5 Lyrik ultimate, Hope 4 hubs, PNW dropper, DTSwiss rims, etc.). It's definitely not in the upper-leagues without an XTR equivalent group set, carbon bars, i9 hubs, carbon rims, etc., but it can sit next to a top end bike without feeling ashamed of itself.

I'd think - and I could be totally wrong here - the equivalent standard roady would be another 20-40% of the $8-9 that I paid for it. Yet road bikes have far less design and innovation on them, especially when you factor in suspension, linkages, braking, tyre tread design, dropper posts, chain stabilisation, etc. etc.

And when you add this question to the OP question; MTBs seem to have experienced so much more innovation and development than roadies, why is there such a price disparity?
 
johnny said:
I was thinking about something similar last night. I had a convo with a roady where I mentioned that my Hyrax cost $8-9k+. His response was that spending $8-9k is nothing compared to buying a good roady. And I got to thinking that my bike leans towards the upper end (Quality frame, Ohlins rear shock, 2024/5 Lyrik ultimate, Hope 4 hubs, PNW dropper, DTSwiss rims, etc.). It's definitely not in the upper-leagues without an XTR equivalent group set, carbon bars, i9 hubs, carbon rims, etc., but it can sit next to a top end bike without feeling ashamed of itself.

I'd think - and I could be totally wrong here - the equivalent standard roady would be another 20-40% of the $8-9 that I paid for it. Yet road bikes have far less design and innovation on them, especially when you factor in suspension, linkages, braking, tyre tread design, dropper posts, chain stabilisation, etc. etc.

And when you add this question to the OP question; MTBs seem to have experienced so much more innovation and development than roadies, why is there such a price disparity?
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Marketing and designed obsolescence. There are Scott Foils from 10 yrs ago that are just as aero as today's wunder bikes, that were also compliant enough to win Paris Roubaix.

The only differences? Standards, number of speeds, electronic shifting and infernal cable routing.

I've got a 15yr old Lynskey Sportive with cable disc brakes, 50mm carbon clinchers, 10s Ultegra and a Pioneer power meter. It's hilariously stiff yet comfortable and efficient on all road surfaces. And will remain that way for decades more.

Sent from my 24069PC21G using Tapatalk
 
In defence of roadies my new top spec Cannondale roadie (2021) is faster in every way than my retired top spec LOOK roadie from 2005. And the meat sack powering it is definitely less aero and less powerful. Sure they look the same in the shed. UCI even get in on sock length for pro roadies to protect the image...
Would love a fang on one of these from 1995.
 
johnny said:
And when you add this question to the OP question; MTBs seem to have experienced so much more innovation and development than roadies, why is there such a price disparity?
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High level wankery. Think the founding dentist of a multi-room dental business.

My best mate spent $20-something thousand on his latest Pinarello. Love him to death, but fuck paying that for a single purpose bike. I'm struggling to justify $10k for when Evie needs replacing, and that thing goes everywhere.
 
Cardy George said:
High level wankery. Think the founding dentist of a multi-room dental business.

My best mate spent $20-something thousand on his latest Pinarello. Love him to death, but fuck paying that for a single purpose bike. I'm struggling to justify $10k for when Evie needs replacing, and that thing goes everywhere.
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100%, it's MAMILS, by and large, who are usually highly paid professionals in Law, Medicine/Dentistry or Biz.

Dudes who can finally buy the kind of bikes they lusted after when they were younger men but didn't have the $$$$$$$$.
 
If you think about the relative age of both genres I think it’s reasonable that mountain bikes are going through more change than roadies. Looking at 90s MTBs, they were nothing compared to what you get today but also the actual trails being ridden were really different too.

Roadies have been around significantly longer and the terrain is mostly unchanged. There’s been tonnes of improvement in the way they can be analysed both for aero and I’d imagine getting the carbon layup right. These would probably go unnoticed for anyone just glancing at them. I had a mate that was working on aero for track frames and so they were doing a whole bunch of comparisons for what was around at the time. One of the track frames they were studying had aero profiles not optimised for zero yaw. The bike still looked aero but they’ve since realised that track riders only ever really get a headwind and so those profiles would be all fixed up now. Similar thing goes for wheels, a lot of the early carbon deep section wheels were just v shaped, now they’re made considering the conditions they’ll be exposed to. They still look similar from the side and so doesn’t seem like there’s been any real innovation there.
 
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