You can't buy speed
Well, clearly that’s not entirely true as any good member of staff at your local bike shop will tell you, but there are ways of gaining speed that aren’t just the obvious ‘cash for kit’ choices.
Free
Use your social media for something more than looking at pictures of kittens. My IT teacher used to say ‘Rubbish in – rubbish out’: he was talking about computers not knowing the difference between good and bad data, they just process it, but it struck me that the same is true for us humans too. If you’re going to doomscroll, make sure its all positive and motivational; my feed is full of cycling, be that racing, skills or people riding in the sun. If it’s not cycling, it’s sailing, surfing or climbing – you get the picture. ‘Positive in – positive out’, feed yourself something inspirational. It might not physically make you faster, but it’ll help you get out and train, or remember why you’re doing it.
Likewise, use your Strava account to motivate yourself. Follow your friends, and if you’re racing, follow your enemies. Follow some of the Pros. Seeing people out riding near you, in exotic places or doing events you’ve always wanted to do might give you the kick you need. Seeing your nearest rival went out training when you decided not to because it was cold, wet or you were too tired or busy might remind you to go out next time (okay, sometimes you really are too busy, or it is too wet, but sometimes you could go if you had the right motivation).
£30-60
Join a group, club or team. At group level, at the very least this will get you out riding with likeminded people who will motivate you to ride (and eat cake – what’s not to like). More saddle time will develop your legs and skills, even if it’s not optimised training. Riding with a club will usually come with some sort of training or coaching as well as increased volume. Again, having a group of riders around you is motivating and will make you faster. There is every chance this will lead into some racing at amateur level too. Once you have some idea of the type racing or riding you are into then the club can help you focus your training.
I’ve raced as a privateer, later as a club rider and now as a team rider. Having people around you helps, and it certainly makes you faster. Call it motivation, call it peer pressure or maybe it’s something else, but having people around you ups your game. I’ve had some of my best results just after I’ve swapped clubs or joined new teams, and having technique, setup or game plan advice can seriously speed you up, without physically changing you.
£360 ish
Now we are starting to get into the territory where you might be able to buy something that could shave a few seconds off your PB, but only a few seconds. A dropper saddle on an MTB will make you faster downhill, if you have the skills. The same money could buy you a pretty good aero helmet, again only 10-20 seconds over a 40k TT. I chose £360 because that’s about what a basic monthly gym subscription costs. Twelve months of even rudimentary gym work (possibly guided by your club, the internet or a gym coach) will make you much faster than the few seconds your next purchase might make. As well as increasing leg and core strength, it’ll also make you more robust and less likely to suffer injuries during ride training.
£600 and up
Lighter components will save you time on the climbs, and aero bars, wheels, helmets and skinsuits will undeniably either help you ride faster or reduce the watts you need to push out. They are more than just marginal gains, but the gains are still not massive, and the aero kit does work best or give you biggest improvements in performance if you are already moving fast. A quick look online tells you £1200 is probably a reasonable starting point these days as far aero wheels goes, or at least for wheels that are going to make a noticeable difference to your performance. Another option, and one that will certainly bring much larger gains across all disciplines, courses and whichever bike your riding is to spend the money on a professional coach instead. “I’m not good enough to need a coach, they’re for the pros, I can’t afford it, my lifestyle isn’t suitable for coaching, I’m just an amateur…etc”. If you’re thinking of spending big on aero or some other speed enhancing bling, then you’ve already negated half of these arguments. In fact, the less Pro you are, the bigger the difference a coach can make – lots of ‘low hanging fruit’. Most weekend warriors are running training programmes they’ve pulled from the internet, that they’ve heard a 20 something Grand Tour rider uses, or just have no programme at all, and take it from me, what works for Pog in the build to the TDF doesn’t work for a Vet 50 CX racer. A coach can devise a specific routine for you, fit it around your availability, fitness and goals, and equally importantly, schedule in rest days so you don’t over train (a common amateur problem). Coaching isn’t instant though. New wheels are fast straight out of the box; it’ll take at least a few months for coaching to start to make physical improvements (you will get an immediate psychological boost instantly though). The wheels will last you a couple of years, if you look after them, but the coaching will last you a lifetime. But like the gym, this only works if you go, if you do what your coach sets you.
So by all means treat yourself to some new, shiny, go-faster bike bling (you probably deserve it), but before you do, have a look at some of the other ways you can make yourself faster.
And sometimes it’s not about what kit you have, or don’t have, but about choosing what to use. In my last ever Triathlon event I put in the 9th fastest bike split and pulled myself from 33rd out of the water to 4th bike back. Not because I had the fastest bike, quiet the opposite in fact, but because I used a cheap standard road bike on a hilly course and overtook thousands of pounds of full aero bikes and helmets. A 20 second marginal gain is very quickly lost (and more besides) on a 20% Coastal climb.
Think smart, spend with care.