“A closer look at the data, however, shows that Floyd’s performance that day was well within his physical and mental capacity,” said coach Dr. Allen Lim. “In fact, the most important contributors to Floyd’s comeback was the tactics that developed during the ride – the hesitation by the peloton to chase and Floyd’s intelligent use of water.”
Landis had previously used a power meter in the 2005 Tour and Lim had published all his performance data. Analyzing his stage 17 results in 2006, Lim concluded that “Floyd averaged 281 watts for the entire 5 hour and 23 minute ride”. He went on to add that, “In training before the Tour and even before the Tour of Georgia, Floyd would regularly perform 6-hour rides at 300-310 watt averages.”
Lim also pointed to other figures: “As a point of reference, the overall average for the mountain days in the 2006 Tour de France was 269 watts +/- 16 watts [253-285], while the average in the 2005 Tour de France for the mountains was 274 watts +/- 20 watts [254-294].”
Going into the stage, Lim calculated that if Landis produced 380 watts on the climbs he would stay with the field; anything over and he would put time into them. Producing 370 watts would mean losing time. Using Landis’s stage 17 data, Lim published the following figures for the climbs.
* Col des Saises: 36 min 55 sec at 395 watts (gains time on field)
* Col des Aravis: 16 min 49 sec at 371 watts (loses time on field)
* Col de la Colombiere: 27 min 45 sec at 392 watts (gains time on field)
* Cote de Chatillon: 11 min 7 sec at 374 watts (loses time on field)
* Col de Joux-Plane: 37 min 34 sec at 372 watts (loses time on field)
Comparing the power data above to Landis’s performance in 2005 is illustrative. His best performance was on the mountains stage in the Alps, stage 11 to Briancon where he averaged 285 watts. In two tough consecutive days in the Pyrenees, stages 14 and 15, perhaps more comparable to stage 16 and stage 17 in 2006, for example, Landis averaged only 262 and 249 watts – the second day to Pla d’Adet showing the strain of consecutive stages.
Lim’s data for stage 17 shows several impressive power performances for periods over 30 minutes – 395 watts on the Col des Saises, 392 watts on the Col de la Colombiere, and 372 watts on the Col de Joux Plane. In 2005, on stages 14 and 15, his 30 minute peak power performances were 379 watts and 361 watts. It was these repeated efforts on the stage 17 climbs that were the winning formula.
Landis clearly made some improvements in his average power and peak power outputs for certain timeframes from his Tour ride in 2005 to his 2006 performance. What is interesting, though, is Lim’s claim that Landis was doing training rides at notably higher average wattages than any of his Tour performances in 2005. Now that’s hard training!