They asked the other companies what the best configs were for bikes with a certain pad x/y. And how these companies wanted the payload carried. (I’m trying to imagine how those conversations went.) They say they wanted to give the competitors' bikes every chance. They did not identify which bike was which (I found that gentlemanly.)

How does the P5X test against bikes in a sprint distance? Don’t know what happens when you take all of that stuff off.

Here’s one thing in the bike’s favor: they seem to have tested without an aero front bottle, that is, simply with a standard front bottle. I got into a friendly argument with Caroline Steffen at this launch. She races just grabbing these bottles at aid stations and sticking them in her cages. “What about an aero front bottle?” I asked. “Grab the bottle from the aid station, squirt, squirt, squirt, into the aero bottle, toss the round bottle?

She wasn’t having any of it, and neither was Cervelo. But I stand by my view. I and certain of those racing under the Quintana Roo banner have for 25 years have not gone wrong with squirt, squirt, squirt into an aero bottle.

That hinge can be a problem, he says, but it doesn't have to. “The Steering angles tend to be very small when trying to ride in a straight line. The airflow can zigzag a bit. The width of the downtube can take this into account. So it can work, whether it does in each individual case is a different story I guess.”

The problem and its solution recalls a comment by TriRig’s Nick Salazar when describing his new Omni, to “move the clean air from the head tube to the rear wheel with as few trailing edges as possible.” Which of these new moonshots – the Omni, the Andean or the P5X, or some other bike – achieves this better than the others?