Christian Vande Velde

[wattage]

What happened to this in guy? I used to consider him quite clean even though he had been in some shady teams (Postal and Liberty Seguros). At the 2006 TdF he was doing 390W at 69kg, that's 5.65w/kg which is totally possible being clean.

In 2008 he jumped from finishing outside the top20 to 4th and in 2009 TdF he finished 8th. Why did he went on the juice in 2008?

 

[Digger]

What happened to this in guy? I used to consider him quite clean even though he had been in some shady teams (Postal and Liberty Seguros). At the 2006 TdF he was doing 390W at 69kg, that's 5.65w/kg which is totally possible being clean.

In 2008 he jumped from finishing outside the top20 to 4th and in 2009 TdF he finished 8th. Why did he went on the juice in 2008?

New diets apparently....

 

[Mambo95]

What happened to this in guy? I used to consider him quite clean even though he had been in some shady teams (Postal and Liberty Seguros). At the 2006 TdF he was doing 390W at 69kg, that's 5.65w/kg which is totally possible being clean.

In 2008 he jumped from finishing outside the top20 to 4th and in 2009 TdF he finished 8th. Why did he went on the juice in 2008?

In 2007 he was a CSC domestique supporting Sastre and to a lesser extent Schleck and Cancellara (who was in Yellow for a week). In 2008 he was a team leader riding for himself.

Are you really so clueless about cycling that you think everyone's riding to be as high on GC as possible? Outside the top 15 no-one cares where you finish. 23rd or 123rd, it's all the same. Once you've done your job for the day you take it easy and save energy.

Honestly, learn something about how a Tour team works.

 

[Digger]

In 2007 he was a CSC domestique supporting Sastre and to a lesser extent Schleck and Cancellara (who was in Yellow for a week). In 2008 he was a team leader riding for himself.

Are you really so clueless about cycling that you think everyone's riding to be as high on GC as possible? Outside the top 15 no-one cares where you finish. 23rd or 123rd, it's all the same. Once you've done your job for the day you take it easy and save energy.

Honestly, learn something about how a Tour team works.

Hold on a second here now Mambo, the guy asked a question. A fair and reasonable one, not a trolling one. Maybe you should consider giving an answer without the lecture or condescending remarks. No need for it in this instance.

And to be fair, there's far more involved in CVV improvement than simple domestique duties.

 

[Oncearunner8]

What happened to this in guy? I used to consider him quite clean even though he had been in some shady teams (Postal and Liberty Seguros). At the 2006 TdF he was doing 390W at 69kg, that's 5.65w/kg which is totally possible being clean.

In 2008 he jumped from finishing outside the top20 to 4th and in 2009 TdF he finished 8th. Why did he went on the juice in 2008?

lost the weight.

 

[fatandfast]

Simple answer was he got labeled the team leader and crumbled. I am sure that like Sastre and others they start buying into the press is my friend thing when everybody is telling you are a stud. They start saying or asking why are you a pud it's too much to handle for some guys. Sastre left 1000's of watts at the TDF press conferences, yelling at everybody to respect him. Body weight and wattage are have little to with anything other than winning a roller race in December. Garmin just had a week of winning and I am sure that the guy in first didn't have the highest weight to wattage ratios of his other competitors. There is lots that can't be measured in the way of mental prep and CVV may be coming up short.CVV had 3 months post TDF of the US press telling him it was his turn, before him they told Danielson, Pate and Zabriskie the same thing. They forgot to send the memo to the rest of the pros. Maybe Contador can't read English otherwise he would have waited for all these US superstars.

 

[Mambo95]

Hold on a second here now Mambo, the guy asked a question. A fair and reasonable one, not a trolling one. Maybe you should consider giving an answer without the lecture or condescending remarks. No need for it in this instance.

And to be fair, there's far more involved in CVV improvement than simple domestique duties.

If he was innocently asking a question then I apologise. But he did go straight in there with a doping accusation, so it wasn't that innocent

And no, there isn't much more to it than team tactics. He was well down the pecking order at CSC. Armstrong detractors (and sometimes I'm one) have in the past pointed to the fact that CVV was rumoured to have better 'numbers' than LA at USP. Now he gets the chance to show it, he gets accused.

Opportunity and tactics can make far more difference than doping ever can.

 

[Race Radio]

You can't discount that a large portion of the front of the field suddenly got slower. You no longer have multiple riders holding over 6 w/kg

 

[erader]

You can't discount that a large portion of the front of the field suddenly got slower. You no longer have multiple riders holding over 6 w/kg

that's a good point. Lance made the same observation when he made his comeback.

ed rader

 

[BroDeal]

Armstrong detractors (and sometimes I'm one) have in the past pointed to the fact that CVV was rumoured to have better 'numbers' than LA at USP.

Half the peloton has numbers better than Armstrong.

 

[craig1985]

I doubt CVV was on any program at Liberty Serguros, his Spanish left a lot to be desired, they took their time in getting him his visa to let ride in Europe, and CVV said he felt like a loner at LS.

 

[MTBrider]

How do you know a threshold wattage of 6.0watts/kg imply someone doped? That value is crazy high, but in my experience is not impossible.

I don't know the threshold power of many top male cyclist, but values around 5.5 watt/kg are found in top female cyclist who I know are clean.

 

[I Watch Cycling In July]

Are they hot?

 

[Dr. Maserati]

How do you know a threshold wattage of 6.0watts/kg imply someone doped? That value is crazy high, but in my experience is not impossible.

I don't know the threshold power of many top male cyclist, but values around 5.5 watt/kg are found in top female cyclist who I know are clean.

I don't think anyone implied that over 6.0 watts/kg automatically means doped.

Here is what Allen Lim had to say on the subject in 2008, and there is a reference to CVV also.

To win the Tour de France you need to be able to hold 5.9 to 6.0 watts per kg for 30 to 45 minutes at a time, 3 to 4 times over the course of a 5 to 6 hour day in the mountains. My sense is that if you can do more, something is wrong.

At this year’s Tour, Christian is holding about 5.5 to 6.0 watts per kg on the long cat 1 to HC climbs when the smack is going down and 5.0 to 5.5 watts per kg when the teams are setting the hard tempo.

 

[Escarabajo]

In 2007 he was a CSC domestique supporting Sastre and to a lesser extent Schleck and Cancellara (who was in Yellow for a week). In 2008 he was a team leader riding for himself.

Are you really so clueless about cycling that you think everyone's riding to be as high on GC as possible? Outside the top 15 no-one cares where you finish. 23rd or 123rd, it's all the same. Once you've done your job for the day you take it easy and save energy.

Honestly, learn something about how a Tour team works.

Mambo, I don't agree with you here. Especially for the Tour de France. I personally see a big difference between being top 20 or 30 than being 100 - 120. To me that is a big difference. And I believe than most of the riders try hard to be top 20, but some of them fall short of that and fall between 20 to 30. Do you think that they are not proud of that? Especially in this time of age when you know a lot of riders dope. Some of those guys could be even riding clean like for example Moncoutie and try to bust their butts off.

Now to the OP question. I'll put it this way, I believe more in VDV improvement than I believe in Wiggin’s transformation. For some reason after watching a lot of tape, I used to see VDV get dropped very late during the mountain stages. That tells me something about his talent before 2008.

 

[Race Radio]

How do you know a threshold wattage of 6.0watts/kg imply someone doped? That value is crazy high, but in my experience is not impossible.

I don't know the threshold power of many top male cyclist, but values around 5.5 watt/kg are found in top female cyclist who I know are clean.

I do not think that 6.0 is the line but it sure is close.

It gets very questionable when a rider is able to suddenly hold 6.8 w/kilo for 30 minutes. As Lim has said this is not possible.

 

[Cooper]

What happened to this in guy? I used to consider him quite clean even though he had been in some shady teams (Postal and Liberty Seguros). At the 2006 TdF he was doing 390W at 69kg, that's 5.65w/kg which is totally possible being clean.

In 2008 he jumped from finishing outside the top20 to 4th and in 2009 TdF he finished 8th. Why did he went on the juice in 2008?

Maybe the others stopped juicing after the '06 and '07 messes and created a more level playing field.

And really, are you going to say certain teams are shady? What team was not shady pre '07?

 

[wattage]

Sorry about jumping to the conclusion about doping, but you have to see my point don't you. Not once in top20 in any GT, then two straight years in top10 at the TdF. And the 2009 was definitely more jacked up year, and he rode as support rider for Wiggo and still finishing 8th.

If it's all down to weightloss then great. It will be interesting to see his performance this year.

 

[Sheltowee]

What happened to this in guy? I used to consider him quite clean even though he had been in some shady teams (Postal and Liberty Seguros). At the 2006 TdF he was doing 390W at 69kg, that's 5.65w/kg which is totally possible being clean.

In 2008 he jumped from finishing outside the top20 to 4th and in 2009 TdF he finished 8th. Why did he went on the juice in 2008?

CVV is glueten free.

 

[Race Radio]

Rice cakes have been shown to add 10-15 watts

 

[ChrisE]

I despise these threads insinuating something is shady with Yardstick, and they confuse me because I thought everybody understood what his results mean.

Yardstick is the litmus test of a clean or doped peloton, christened that honor by the internet forum doping jury that just knows those types of things. He was the beacon of squeaky pure light in the doping fog that was USPS and Liberty Seguros. Whether he knew Spanish well or not, as one poster stated above, means little when your have a higher calling of being the peloton clean/doped yardstick.

Hopefully, Yardstick will finish high this year and thus prove the peloton is clean. Where must Yardstick place to prove a clean race? Is it 4th, to be consistent with 08? What if Valvpits (if allowed to race) or Contadope, or Pharmstrong finish higher than the clean/dope line of demarcation that is Yardstick's placing, instead of the equally "clean as Yardstick" Sastre and Evans? Ouch, that makes my head hurt so I better stop thinking about that.

I wait for July with gleeful anticipation, hoping to see a high placing by yardstick to carry us out of this sorry chapter in cycling.

 

[Race Radio]

Yardstick is not an internet forum invention. Here is Alim Lim's words on Armstrong claim of 6.7 w/kg

I’ll say is that 6.7 watts per kg at threshold is not physiological or humanly possible, unless you’re a hybrid human horse or a grey hound human dog or another species. I don’t even think Frankenstein could hold 6.7 watts per kg at threshold. Though, I must say that, unlike most artificially manipulated creatures of science, Frankenstein did have a uniquely low carbon footprint as he was made of recycled body parts and was activated with a clean bolt of lightning. But that’s a totally different story.

 

[biokemguy]

Power numbers

Maybe this deserves a different thread, but here's some interesting numbers from a Cat 1 that raced Redlands. (Story from Velonews)

http://velonews.competitor.com/2010...the-pros-wattage-numbers-from-redlands_109894
The rider in question held 5.4 w/kg for an ~11 minute prologue. Then the article goes on to say...

Doing some rough calculations, we can estimate that Fly V’s Ben Day (68kg) probably averaged over 6.6 w/kg (or better!) to win the prologue.

How does that relate to Lim's statements? He doesn't mention a time frame for holding the 6.7 w/kg.

Would you assume Ben Day is a doper based on this data?

 

[Cerberus]

Maybe this deserves a different thread, but here's some interesting numbers from a Cat 1 that raced Redlands. (Story from Velonews)

http://velonews.competitor.com/2010...the-pros-wattage-numbers-from-redlands_109894
The rider in question held 5.4 w/kg for an ~11 minute prologue. Then the article goes on to say...


How does that relate to Lim's statements? He doesn't mention a time frame for holding the 6.7 w/kg.

Would you assume Ben Day is a doper based on this data?

I see Lim's statement as referring to a 30-60 minute effort at the end of a stage in the middle of a GT. An 11 minute effort, with nothing to tire you out before at the start of a race is obviously a different kettle of fish. Also I believe it's harder to estimate power from TT's than from climbs because wind and posture makes a really big difference.

 

[wattage]

I despise these threads insinuating something is shady with Yardstick, and they confuse me because I thought everybody understood what his results mean.

I wanted to find out what the general opinion was about VDV. Is he truly still the Yardstick? I don't know. Astarloza finished 11th and he was popped from EPO use although not at that race.

I think that majority of the riders are cleaner than in the 90's but you have to still hit the magic 6.7w/kg number to win TdF. That hasn't changed.