Swiss Side Aero Tip - Weight Savings

posted by Fabienne Dirksen
June 25, 2021

TRUE OR FALSE? The lighter the set-up, the faster the bike.

Absolutely FALSE, this is a cycling industry myth. We’ve tried, we’ve tested, and aero wins 99% of the time. Even on courses with steep climbs, the aero setup will be faster overall. For normal cyclists, the average gradient of the ride needs to exceed 4.5% for weight to become more important than aero. That means 4500m climbing per 100km! For professional riders, this threshold increases to 7.5% (because they are faster). In short, this means that the ride needs to be a pure uphill time trial for weight to matter more.