By Chuck
Assault on the Peak - Results from a Morning of Climbing
The gun went off at 7am for the 300 plus riders hoping to tame the relentless grade of Pikes Peak outside Colorado Springs, CO in what was the first organized ride up Pikes Peak in over 10 years. 24 miles and 7800 vertical feet of climbing later the Kalkhoff Pro Connect Sport delivered me to the top where cold temperature and howling winds made hanging around quite unpleasant. Starting with a fully charged battery, I lost the first of three charge indicator lights after 7.5 miles of moderate climbing. The second red light went out at 14.5 miles. The final light began to blink at 18.5 miles and the motor essentially cut out. I was heading into a fierce headwind climbing a very steep grade, out of the saddle, pumping hard in first gear, yet barely moving. Fortunately, I had the forethought to pack an extra battery! I pulled off to the side of the road to switch batteries only to have the vicious winds topple me over, spent battery in hand, which of course went flying down the road. I retrieved the spent battery, loaded the fresh one and continued up the road. At mile 23.4 I saw the first riders descending from the summit, two riders in full winter ski gear on Optibikes, followed closely by some very professional looking racer-dude on a feather light carbon bike. I reached the summit a few moments later to find that only a handful of other riders were ahead of me there. Not bad for old guy! I took it easy on the decent, not wanting to heat up the rims/blow a tire.
I started the race with three other riders on electric bikes, one on an iZip Express, one on a homebuilt extra long cruiser type bike with two fairly large batteries (one with 20 amp hours of capacity and the other with about 17 amp hours) and a third rider on a homemade motorcylce-esque contraption with two massive lithium batteries (about 2kW of capacity). They all left me in the dust after the first mile or so, but I persevered. I caught the iZip at mile 9 and by mile 10 his battery was spent so he headed back down. At mile 15.5 I came upon the two other riders I started with. They were off to the side of the road having spent most of their battery capacity. I never saw them again so I have to assume they also turned back. I was really impressed with how far the Kalkhoff’s little Panasonic 10 amp hour lithium battery was able to carry me. Admittedly, I stayed in low power all the way up, but the first battery carried me 18.5 miles and a bit over 5000 vertical feet! The second battery had just lost it’s first red light when I reached the summit.
Comments
Fantastic Chuck… I really loved that Kalkhoff when I rode it at your place.
I wanted to enter the race to see how my trailer would do but the price was about as steep for me as the road!
Congrats to you and the Kalkhoff!
Your comment
Hey Chuck,
That is an awesome accomplishment! Superb storytelling as well, thanks for sharing it- love the photos!
Ride On!
Elana
How many Whrs to climb the peak ?
Jim, The ride up took me 2 hrs and 58 minutes. The ride down was a lot quicker!
but how much elec. energy (Whrs) was used ?
Jim,
It is not simple math but I’ll try to do an approximation for you. On low power, the Kalkhoff bike I was riding contributes 1/3 of the total energy expended, or stated another way, the motor contributes 70% of the power I put in. The combined weight of the bike with extra battery and me was 212 lbs. The road was 24.5 miles and the average grade was 6.7% and I estimated the headwind at 15mph. My calculation using the online bike calculator (http://www.bikecalculator.com) the power output was 336 watts, multiplied by three for the 3 hours it took me I get 1008 Whrs. Does that make sense?
Trying to figure how much of the energy (Whrs) was from the elec. assist… 1/3 of 1000 Whrs = 330
Panasonic 10 amp hour lithium battery x 26 volts = 260 Whrs + 1/3 of second battery +-(86) = 346 Whrs
So, which bike did you use for the climb? And your assist only puts out ~100W on the eco setting? That’s about the same as a healthy human can do for ~8 hours. so you basically had a second set of legs bolted to the pedals
Good show for making the summit on so little assist, especially when others didn’t with much more assist and batteries.
I used the Kalkhoff Pro Connect Sport, completely stock except for the Look clip-in pedals.
Great job!
You rode the Pro Connect Sport with a Shimano Deore XT M771 derailer, 9-speed cassette & 250 Watt motor?
Yes and kept it in low power all the way up
Wow! Is there a link to where your “old guy” status is detailed? Is there a link to the race/climb in general?
Mark,
Here is a link to the Pikes Peak ride: http://www.ridepikespeak.com
Sorry, no link to Old Guy status - that is self-imposed
I’ve been riding my Kalkhoff Pro 3 or 4 days a week to work and back. I’m in Gunbarrel and work is on Main St. in Louisville. There are many ‘serious’ riders out there, and I have yet to be passed by anyone. I consistently make it there in 25 minutes, and since it’s 10 miles, that’s 2.5 min/mile. I think that’s pretty good for a 50 year old! But, I tried to reel-in a young muscled stud on a good road bike yesterday and couldn’t do it.. I thought about the fenders, my non-cleated shoes, the kick-stand, and wondered,, “What if I got serious and tricked the bike out to the max?”
May just have to do it.. };-D
Hi everybody, I want to tell you that I test rode the Pro Connect Spot Dual drive e-bike and it was SO MUCH FUN!!!
My cycling friends and I went to Jamestown from Boulder and the e-bike was so much fun not only for me but to my friend also.
I was able to keep up with the fast group and was very easy for me to use the bike.
Enjoyed the extra power on the hills!
Alma