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I have found a blog post on Electric trike mentioning some threads on BROL forum about trikes with all three big wheels. There is definetely a big demand for large size wheels on trikes as same as people want to have two 26″ or even 28″ wheels on their two wheel recumbents. Yes, it make sense to have biger wheels. They are definetely faster on flat roads and more comfortable, but I think a standard recumbent rider can hardly feel the difference. (there is bigger difference when you change from 1,5 to 1,1″ tires). Big wheels have also also some disadvantages. On two wheel recumbents, the bike is pretty high than so it is hard to get on and off it, it is worse to ride in difficult situations and I think that if you have less than 180 cm a suspended dual 26″ wheel recumbent is a non-sense for you.

With trikes, the biggest problem is in the life time of those wheels. Bicycle wheel is simply not designed for side powers which appears when going through curves on trikes. Than the spokes loose their tension quickly and the ride is also not that stiff. Well with such carbon rims, it can be far better, but with standard width of the hub and standard rims, the properties will not be that good. Just look at the logo of Greenspeed. They had a 26″ wheel in the rear but at the moment they do not have a single model with 26″ wheel. And I take them as the trike producer which test their trikes by far the most on this planet. They were simply not happy with the behaviour of the 26″ rear wheel.

At the end, I would like to say, that the pictures seen mostly here are impressive. For those who want to ride really fast on their trikes, this might be a good solution, kind of road racing trike, for those looking for comfy rides during weekends, 20″ should be better. It is like a difference between super light road racing bike and some touring bike when talking about uprights.

Here is a pretty nice video. It is interesting to look at it even he is not going to race in Battle Mountain this year. The spirit, the story and also the way how the video is made. We like it.

It is said to hear Graeme will not attend in the Battle Mountain this year. According to the article on Humans Invent, he has some troubles with producing the fairing of his streamliner and he plans to try to to break the speed record in UK in next comming months. Every time you read about him and the development of his bike, you find a new very interesting pictures. And it is the same this time too. I recommend to read the whole story here: http://www.humansinvent.com/#!/8856/obree-set-for-land-speed-record-attempt-in-great-britain/

French cyclist Aurélien Bonneteau is already pretty known among recumbent riders. During last weekend in May he broke the world hour record with unfaired recumbent and he covered a distance or 56,597km. This is better than 16 years old record of Chris Boardman on an upright bike Lotus who covered a distance of 56,375km.

The Aurélien’s bike is a specialy built bike with help of M5 which has a super reclined or in fact fully recumbent poistion, one speed only, an disc wheels from MAVIC. As you can see it is a full carbon bike with special aerodynamic pedal coveres.

You can find more info about Aurélien on his blog.

Ben Godall of australian Trisled trikes and velomobiles has announced on his Facebook page he plan to fight in the World Human Powered Speed Championships in Battle Mountain, Nevada, USA in autumn 2012. Here is what he writes there just yeasterday:
“Ever since I was a boy I have loved going fast, especially under my own steam in a human powdered vehicle! I’ve always loved exploring this limit and there has always been little voice in my head asking “how fast can you go Ben?”

Half a lifetime of experiences, relationships and building my business of building HPV’s for others have prevented me from answering this question. Until now!
I’ve decided to spend most of my free time and funds in 2012 training and custom building a Speed bike HPV to enter the World Human Powered Speed Championships in Nerada desert USA.

I’m not treating this as a land speed record attempt, but rather a well being exercise. To achieve my highest speed I’ll need to tap into all the knowledge and resources of my community, all of my experience of HPV building and prepare both my body and mind.
I don’t think I can set a new land speed record and simply aim to be within reach of the elite few…But who knows! All I do know is I’ve got to have a go at this before I get to old ”

There was a race of four wheel pedal vehicles in Hradec Kralove, Czech Republic in the middle of July 2011. Such race is the only one in the Czech Republic and is organised just once a year, but there are more of them mainly in France. Also most of the racers came from France. You can see that not only speed is important but also a look of the vehicle. We do not have more info so if you know something more, just post a comment.

You can find a video under the link here under. Unfornatenuly only in Czech, but with nice shots and good atmosphere.

Source: TV Hradec