... or, has Sky changed cycling forever?
We have all seen the movies. New manager arrives at new team with a whole new outlook and philosophy on the sport. First they don't get many results, their revolutionary ideas seem to fail. The coach doesn't have the team play the way the management wants to. They get laughed at by other teams, fans and experts alike. But they continue their way and soon they get some remarkable results. Before you know it they start winning everything, it seems like they can't lose. They start breaking all the records, and finally they win the Super Bowl, the World Series, the NBA, the Tour de France.
Now even the last teams start waking up, while most teams have already started adapting Brad Pitt's revoltionary philosophies. "The team that doesn't is stuck in the stone age". Teams start buying staff and riders from Brad Pitt's team. And there you have it: the sport has changed forever. All because of one man. Brad Pitt. And his fat assistant whose name I can't remember.
I used to think sports were not an exact science. I believe Sky's Tour de France win has effectively disproved this. You can indeed plan every single detail. In the end, it's a simple equation. You run it through computers, you isolate all the variables and you run them through again. And again and again until there is not the slightest margin of error or any room for unpleasant surprises.
Of course the comparison to "Moneyball" is not 100% accurate. As opposed to Brad Pitt's team, Sky is the richest there is. And, as we were recently reminded, they didn't have to hire "some s--t rider(s) who came out of nowhere". And of course cycling has been a complex science of SRM files and "marginal gains" at least since Greg LeMond.
But it seems that by applying a mathematic and scientific approach to every possible detail of cycling, Sky have finally succeeded in isolating and eliminating every last variable. They use computer programs to determine the ideal stand point of their service course. They use weather vans. They use oddly shaped chain rings. They have their own mattresses and pillows that riders use all year long, even at home.
Is this it? Have we entered the "moneyball" era of cycling? Will Dave Brailsford be depicted by Brad Pitt in an upcoming movie?
We have all seen the movies. New manager arrives at new team with a whole new outlook and philosophy on the sport. First they don't get many results, their revolutionary ideas seem to fail. The coach doesn't have the team play the way the management wants to. They get laughed at by other teams, fans and experts alike. But they continue their way and soon they get some remarkable results. Before you know it they start winning everything, it seems like they can't lose. They start breaking all the records, and finally they win the Super Bowl, the World Series, the NBA, the Tour de France.
Now even the last teams start waking up, while most teams have already started adapting Brad Pitt's revoltionary philosophies. "The team that doesn't is stuck in the stone age". Teams start buying staff and riders from Brad Pitt's team. And there you have it: the sport has changed forever. All because of one man. Brad Pitt. And his fat assistant whose name I can't remember.
I used to think sports were not an exact science. I believe Sky's Tour de France win has effectively disproved this. You can indeed plan every single detail. In the end, it's a simple equation. You run it through computers, you isolate all the variables and you run them through again. And again and again until there is not the slightest margin of error or any room for unpleasant surprises.
Of course the comparison to "Moneyball" is not 100% accurate. As opposed to Brad Pitt's team, Sky is the richest there is. And, as we were recently reminded, they didn't have to hire "some s--t rider(s) who came out of nowhere". And of course cycling has been a complex science of SRM files and "marginal gains" at least since Greg LeMond.
But it seems that by applying a mathematic and scientific approach to every possible detail of cycling, Sky have finally succeeded in isolating and eliminating every last variable. They use computer programs to determine the ideal stand point of their service course. They use weather vans. They use oddly shaped chain rings. They have their own mattresses and pillows that riders use all year long, even at home.
Is this it? Have we entered the "moneyball" era of cycling? Will Dave Brailsford be depicted by Brad Pitt in an upcoming movie?
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