Well the first week of the tour is over, and the body is almost adapted to very late nights and early mornings. I hope the tour riders understand the what we are going through to follow them!
There have been a few strange happenings prior to the race. Mechanical doping has reared its head, with a youtube clip basically accusing Fabian Cancellara of having a motor in his bike. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Nd13ARuvVE
Then a few other ex-pro cyclists piped up and said – “see I told you that you should be checking for motors”. The engineer in me looks at this and goes – sure it is feasible, but I really doubt that it is happening. The big problem I see is not in putting the motor and gearing in – but the batteries to actually give enough grunt to make it worth while. Using the battery off my “dazzle all other road users” rechargeable light battery, and assuming 100% efficiency, you get 35w for 1hr. So you either need to be able to carry quite a few batteries, or your don’t get much return for lugging an engine and battery pack around a for a while. The other problem is the risk of getting caught. It is a bit different to drug doping (or blood doping) – where it can be just one persons decision. Mechanical doping would need to be a team decision – the rider, the mechanic and others associated with the team would need to be involved.
Another doping related idea also emerged. Basically if you do a “super human performance” you must have cheated. So if you climb a hill faster than what someone thinks is physiologically possible, then you must be a cheat. While I think changes in performances should be a red flag for the drug testing system, performance as such cannot be used. Cyclists are already very highly tested, and that should be the way they go. Here are the rules, break them and you are out. Just because someone is good – that does not mean they are a cheat – there are plenty of physiological “freaks” out there!
So on to the racing. The flat and cobble stone stages caused some havoc – as anticipated. Perhaps not quite where expected though. One of the down hills was ridiculously slippery – and probably not from the water falling out of the sky. After several big names had crashed, the yellow jersey - Fabian Cancellara – enforced a go slow across the finish line. There was talk of a strike due to the courses being dangerous. This did not eventuate and really they knew about the courses well in advance, and in most cases it is the way the riders ride that makes them dangerous! The first few hill stages have now passed and the contenders are being whittled down to a few. It is exciting racing – both from a team and an individual basis. In tours, it is seldom about gaining time – it is more about trying not to lose time. That is certainly the case so far. Two of the contenders prior to the start have effectively been taken out of contention due to losing big chucks of time when they have had a “bad day”. Lance Armstrong and Cadel Evans have gone from looking like strong contenders to making up numbers. Crashes have not helped their causes, but at this point most of the contenders have fallen during the race. To a certain extent, you can make your own luck also. If you ride at the back of the bunch – you are more likely to be involved in a crash. If you push your handling limits going down hills, you increase the chance of crashing. You have to make choices – do I push the pace to try to catch-up or get ahead, with that the increase chance of a crash. Play it safe, with lower chances of a crash and lose some time (potentially). That is what racing is about!
All in all it is great stuff!!
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