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Re:Ceramic-bearing bicycle drive shaft (2018) by LeifCarrotson on Friday August 16, 2019 @12:41PM (#20716941)
In round numbers, the drivetrain causes about 4 watts of loss.

Tire rolling resistance costs about 40 watts (on regular roads with road bike tires; less in a velodrome and more with knobby, thick mountain bike tires).

The bike itself costs 8 ~60 watts or so in air resistance, less for aero, deep-dish tri bikes and more for round-tube wide-tire gravel bikes. But more importantly, air resistance increases with the square of velocity, no matter your starting drag coefficient.

The remaining 150 watts or so are caused by rider air resistance.

And of course, all 250 watts are produced by the rider and dependent on their fitness level.

Clearly, the best way to go faster is to put more energy in. Next, improve your posture to produce less drag. However, it's easier to spend money than to sweat and suffer, so people instead turn to aero bikes, tires, and the drivetrain.

Re:Ceramic-bearing bicycle drive shaft (2018) by track_me_now on Friday August 16, 2019 @01:27PM (#20717387)
>> However, it's easier to spend money than to sweat and suffer

not disagreeing with anything you're saying, however at the super-elite level everyone puts in the maximum amount of perfectly allocated effort into training and preparation. if we could eliminate 4 watts of drive train friction loss that would be material. For your average weekend warrior the points you make are definitely true, but hey, not the worst thing to blow your money on...