An Amusement & Diversion for The Genteel Cyclist. Daily.

Monday, October 29, 2007

PFN Contest! Win valuable prizes!

In all likelihood, the second formula applies to you, and it will make it much harder for you to set a new One Hour Record.

What do the formulae represent, and what's it got to do with the One Hour Record?



y = -1.12x2 - 1.90x + 99.9 (R2 = 0.973)

or

y = 0.178x3 - 1.43x2 - 4.07x + 100 (R2 = 0.974)




First one to guess correctly wins a handful of PFN stickers. (And yes, the usual knuckleheads win kudos for clever jokes.)

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

It's the cost versus coolness of aerospokes, an inverse relationship.

Anonymous said...

no, it's how little the world actually cares about the One Hour Record, versus how little the world actually cares about pro cyclists.

brother yam said...

BAC field measurements with and without a penny in your mouth.

Pinchy, those are superscripts for the x2 and x3, yes?

Use the sup and sub tags as shown below -- substituting for the correct angle brackets (comments don't allow 'em).

y=-1.2x[sup]2[/sup]-1.90x+99.9 (R[sub]2[/sub]=0.973)
or
y=1.178x[sup]3[/sup]-1.43x[sup]2[/sup]-4.07x+100 (R[sub]2[/sub]=0.974)

Gah, I do too much of this...

Nathan said...

hmmm. . .

I'm assuming the "R2" values are actually an "R-squared" value, which is a measure of how well the model fits reality, so we'll leave them out of the equations.

after taking a look at the equations, and plotting out some test values here
it looks like the second equation, at least, is some sort of exponential growth equation. I'm gonna guess it might have something to do with resistance, because it increases exponentially. Maybe wind resistance?

Maybe the first one is for one of those recumbent superbikes or something? But it goes negative after 8, which wouldn't make sense for a resistance equation. . .
I fear that my nerd instincts have failed me.