While cheating in sports is nothing new, and professional bicycling is not one of the less notorious arenas for such cheating, rarely has cheating as innovative as this been seen in the world of sports.
At the Finnish National World Championships stage race this month, the Submarine Classic Team had been consistently leading the field, until the team’s leader, George Narwhal, forgot to pedal—and continued accelerating while climbing a steep hill. Investigation into this surprising phenomenon eventually revealed that powerful superconducting electromagnets had been pulling the team into first place.
The typical modern racing bicycle contains less iron than the typical modern athletes’ body. The frame and many of the components are molded from ultra-light carbon fiber, while what metal is found in the bicycle is titanium or aluminum: even the ball bearings can be ceramic. However, the Submarine Classic Team were unique in riding steel framed bicycles, and, with the help of modern science, they translated that extra steel into extra speed.
Recently, it was discovered that the magnets strategically placed along the course had been stolen from the recently decommissioned Tevatron, the proton-antiproton particle accelerator where the top quark was discovered in 1995, as well as the party and hat quarks in 1999 and 2003. Investigation into this stunning heist continues.
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