Manchester Mountain Bikers take on Chris Hoy

Fresh from their team gold in the Downhill at the BUSA championships, Mountain Bikers from the University of Manchester took on Sir Chris Hoy on Monday. The challenge was to try and beat the Scottish track rider’s max power output of 2,000w. The weapon of choice in this battle is one of British Cycling’s now not-so-secret weapons, the Wattbike.

Wattbike are a Nottingham based firm who produce what on initial inspection is an advanced exercise bike. The reality is that after seven years of development, it’s the first product of its type to be endorsed by British Cycling and is being used to test professional riders. A setup of six machines linked up to a big screen were being used to give riders a chance to race each other over set distances, mimicking track riding as well as giving riders the chance to try and achieve the highest possible peak power output in a six second burst of vein bulging effort.

SPORT at The University of Manchester in conjunction with Wattbike and everydaycycling.com is one of a small number of institutions trialling a pilot programme to encourage staff, students and the general public to get into cycling. Wattbikes are also on campus at Roehampton, Bristol, Nottingham and Plymouth Universities.

The peak power test was the big draw of the day with keen riders lining up against other sportsmen and women. The top 10 leader board saw a lot of movement over the course of the day, but in the end top honours went to strongman Joni Purmonen, who cranked out close to 1600w. After his ride, Joni admitted that power squats in the gym were his secret weapon. Although Chris Hoy’s record remained out of reach even for the strongest riders, the Manchester Uni cycling team seemed to get a real buzz out of the event. Team Captain Jonno Wood, said ‘the team put in a gargantuan effort at the weekend and so most of them were recovering from their races, but we couldn’t wait to come down and get involved’.

Fancy a go? Participants are registered onto an online league where they can compare their results with friends and participants at the other 4 universities. When logging on to the Wattbike online ranking, participants have been given free registration to Everyday Cycling, British Cycling’s online cycling community where cyclists can find out everything they need to know about day to day riding. The University of Manchester has smashed original targets for participation and as a reward for this success, British Cycling will allow the university to retain a number of Wattbikes for use on Campus. For further details contact The Armitage Centre in Fallowfield:
Tel: 0161 306 9988

 Email: arm.centre@manchester.ac.uk