neal@druxv.UUCP (Neal D. McBurnett) (07/11/84)
Thanks for the update, Bruce. One point, though: as I understand it, the drag at 6000' is about 80% of sea level, not 50%. It is directly related to air density, and as I recall, the density at sea level is around 1.2 kg/m**3, vs a little less than 1 kg/m**3 at 6000'. Still quite an advantage, though! Since the international records-keeping bodies do not yet take altitude into account, I've heard that one of the best places to set a long-distance road race time is in the San Luis valley of Colorado. Rt 17 is straight and level for 40 miles north of Alamosa, at nearly 8000' elevation. Offhand I don't know the air density at that elevation, but if we use .9 kg/m**3 as a guess, the drag would be .75 of the sea-level drag. Since, at high velocity, speed is roughly proportional to the CUBE-root of power supplied, if we assume constant power, someone could go faster by roughly the cube root of the density ratio, or about 110% in this example. Hope I didn't blow anything in this quick analysis... -Neal McBurnett, ihnp4!druny!neal, DR x4852