Teams & Riders Froome Talk Only

[Big Doopie]

Because froomeodopucci claims to have a super high result, so why does he keep the number a secret.

hitch, u got me wrong.

not questioning questioning froome.

i'm questioning the stupidity of asking someone to do the test or reveal the number. it means squat. and has meant squat since epo drove the likes of delion, van hooydonck and lemond out of the pro peloton.

what's the need to have a stratospheric VO2max when you can simply manufacture it?

 

[Big Doopie]

and even if he were clean (ahem, ahem), why reveal the number? it would simply arm the dopers with the knowledge of how much (or how little) they needed to dope to surpass that..?

didn't the great contador say that he had learned a lot by following froome and sky and seeing their power numbers.

surprise, surprise, the following season he improves just enough to squeeze by froome but not set off alarm bells.

if i were clean (and winning) or doped to the gills (and winning) i would not reveal my numbers.

having said that "Long Live Pinot!! Long may he reign!"

 

[TailWindHome]

Those french guys always get it wrong. Even when they use marginal gains it's the wrong gains.

That's why they rely so heavily on secret TUEs

 

[djpbaltimore]

and even if he were clean (ahem, ahem), why reveal the number? it would simply arm the dopers with the knowledge of how much (or how little) they needed to dope to surpass that..?

didn't the great contador say that he had learned a lot by following froome and sky and seeing their power numbers.

surprise, surprise, the following season he improves just enough to squeeze by froome but not set off alarm bells.

if i were clean (and winning) or doped to the gills (and winning) i would not reveal my numbers.

having said that "Long Live Pinot!! Long may he reign!"

Excellent post. I completely agree with your reasoning.

 

[red_flanders]

They don't care about ceilings and potential - all they care about is actual performance. And for that you need to use lactate threshold tests, not V02. They also have the added advantage of not needing in-lab facilities, all the kit needed is portable.

If you had two tests that could be used as a measure for performance - one is easy and acturate, the other is difficult and inaccurate, which would you use?

So first of all what evidence do you have for the bolded statement? Is this your opinion? Something you've read? Something that's been confirmed somewhere?

If they don't care about potential, that would be odd. Standard practice since...well...forever, has been to test a rider when he comes onto the team to understand what his potential is. This has been done with a variety of tests, generally including V02 from what I've read and heard over the years.

Why would Sky not care about the potential of a newly hired rider? I find it difficult to understand why that would be the case and why you would state it as fact, but open to hearing an explanation.

Lactate threshold testing is an indication of potential as well, though it's much more trainable than V02 max.

It's fairly well understood that V02 max, lactate threshold and muscular efficiency are cornerstones of determining what an athlete is capable of. I find it very hard to believe Sky have decided to ignore this. What evidence other than them saying they didn't test Froome is there for this approach? Have they never done a V02 test on a rider? Have they moved away from this test generally? Why don't they (according to you) not care about new riders' potential?

All seems very hard to believe. There appear to be much simpler explanations...

 

[red_flanders]

and even if he were clean (ahem, ahem), why reveal the number? it would simply arm the dopers with the knowledge of how much (or how little) they needed to dope to surpass that..?

didn't the great contador say that he had learned a lot by following froome and sky and seeing their power numbers.

surprise, surprise, the following season he improves just enough to squeeze by froome but not set off alarm bells.

if i were clean (and winning) or doped to the gills (and winning) i would not reveal my numbers.

having said that "Long Live Pinot!! Long may he reign!"

All good points if you're not talking about a team that has heralded itself as clean and all about transparency. But...we're talking about Sky who have done this.

Or are they transparent only from September 2011 on?

 

[the sceptic]

That's why they rely so heavily on secret TUEs

They do? News to me.

 

[IzzyStradlin]

didn't the great contador say that he had learned a lot by following froome and sky and seeing their power numbers.

surprise, surprise, the following season he improves just enough to squeeze by froome but not set off alarm bells.

That is really the only conceivable way the power data could be used against someone in a race.

 

[TailWindHome]

They do? News to me.

Here you go
Whole thread about it

http://forum.cyclingnews.com/showthread.php?t=25881

Glad to help

 

[veganrob]

They don't care about ceilings and potential - all they care about is actual performance. And for that you need to use lactate threshold tests, not V02. They also have the added advantage of not needing in-lab facilities, all the kit needed is portable.

If you had two tests that could be used as a measure for performance - one is easy and acturate, the other is difficult and inaccurate, which would you use?

Just curious, but what makes you such an expert?

 

[Parker]

Just curious, but what makes you such an expert?

I'm not an expert, but in the land of the blind the one-eyed man is king. I've read about it and talked to some sport scientists about it. Enough to know that a VO2 test isn't much practical use beyond initial talent identification.

It's really quite simple. VO2 measures potential ability, lactate testing measures actual ability. And the latter is easier to do.

Faster by Michael Hutchinson (V02 max of 90) is a good layman's guide.

 

[thehog]

Lactate testing is to measure efficiency. Vo2 = potential. Back in the junior days there was always a formof Vo2 max testing. Lactate via Copeland and the like.

Saw pleny of guys with really good Vo2 and poor lactate simply because they were untrained. The coaches selected non-athletes from schools based on Vo2 alone. The AIS was doing it for the rowing program for years.

Lactate kinda took over since the vector doping days because it didn't matter if you were 78 or 98, if you had supreme lactate efficiency you could beat better non-doping athletes.

Froome with his talents should be in the high 90's. I think Cound sent out a French link on this forum and he was low 80's. She then realised how bad that was and promptly disappeared.

From memory Brett Aiken and McGee were in the mid 90's at and hold the record at the AIS.

It used to matter. Now with doping, no. It will only show that you shouldn't be doing what you're doing.

 

[Mellow Velo]

Here you go
Whole thread about it

http://forum.cyclingnews.com/showthread.php?t=25881

Glad to help

LOL
Pwnd....

 

[Benotti69]

I'm not an expert, but in the land of the blind the one-eyed man is king. I've read about it and talked to some sport scientists about it. Enough to know that a VO2 test isn't much practical use beyond initial talent identification.

It's really quite simple. VO2 measures potential ability, lactate testing measures actual ability. And the latter is easier to do.

Faster by Michael Hutchinson (V02 max of 90) is a good layman's guide.

So teams do not want to identify riders talent anymore....... especially Sky who do everything to improve the marginal gains

 

[red_flanders]

Lactate testing is to measure efficiency. Vo2 = potential. Back in the junior days there was always a formof Vo2 max testing. Lactate via Copeland and the like.

Saw pleny of guys with really good Vo2 and poor lactate simply because they were untrained. The coaches selected non-athletes from schools based on Vo2 alone. The AIS was doing it for the rowing program for years.

Lactate kinda took over since the vector doping days because it didn't matter if you were 78 or 98, if you had supreme lactate efficiency you could beat better non-doping athletes.

Froome with his talents should be in the high 90's. I think Cound sent out a French link on this forum and he was low 80's. She then realised how bad that was and promptly disappeared.

From memory Brett Aiken and McGee were in the mid 90's at and hold the record at the AIS.

It used to matter. Now with doping, no. It will only show that you shouldn't be doing what you're doing.

These are the salient points here.

 

[Parker]

So teams do not want to identify riders talent anymore....... especially Sky who do everything to improve the marginal gains

The talent gets identified when the rider is in the junior ranks, not when they've signing a contract with a World Tour team. It's for separating the wheat from the chaff, not for grading the wheat.

 

[thehog]

So teams do not want to identify riders talent anymore....... especially Sky who do everything to improve the marginal gains

Parker is incorrect. Lactate doesn't test "actual" ability. It's a fitness test. It tells you where you based on your efficency. It's a moving target based on your training gains. It's used as a marker to measure improvement.

Vo2 would demonstrate Froome is what he says he is. If he wants to shut down the doping talk he'd do a test tomorrow. But he'd never do that because he knows it would show that he's probably the level of a good nationally ranked rider and not much else.

I still shake my head at Froome. I never seen a more obvious case of doping in my life.

 

[Benotti69]

The talent gets identified when the rider is in the junior ranks, not when they've signing a contract with a World Tour team. It's for separating the wheat from the chaff, not for grading the wheat.

Riders get tested for everything. Be stupid not to. Vo2max is not everything but it still helps identify ability.

JTL got tested before signing a contract, by Garmin and Sky. He didn't get signed because of what he did as a junior. Garmin test everyone they are interested in.

 

[red_flanders]

Riders get tested for everything. Be stupid not to. Vo2max is not everything but it still helps identify ability.

JTL got tested before signing a contract, by Garmin and Sky. He didn't get signed because of what he did as a junior. Garmin test everyone they are interested in.

Again, teams have been doing all kinds of tests on their athletes forever to evaluate their potential. Since the 70's at least. It's standard practice and common sense. While it's possible that it's literally true that Sky have not performed a V02 max test, it's absurd to imagine they didn't want to know what it was when they hired him as part of the general information they'd want on a rider.

We have no facts on this matter, only Sky's claim that they haven't tested him for it. May be true, may be not. Of course it sounds absurd that they haven't, given their stance as the most thorough, most scientific team out there.

Parker, your argument is unclear. Not sure if you are saying only Sky don't do the test or no one does. You are arguing it's not a useful or critical test? Would stand to reason that if this were the case it would be widely known, or are you and Sky in on something new?

Any literature on this topic discusses V02 max, LT and ME.

Parker, it seems to me that you are arguing that it's not important not based in the best information, but because it excuses Sky from what appears to be yet another stance/statement which is inconsistent with their other declarations.

Is this not the case?

 

[Parker]

Parker, your argument is unclear. Not sure if you are saying only Sky don't do the test or no one does. You are arguing it's not a useful or critical test? Would stand to reason that if this were the case it would be widely known, or are you and Sky in on something new?

Any literature on this topic discusses V02 max, LT and ME.

Parker, it seems to me that you are arguing that it's not important not based in the best information, but because it excuses Sky from what appears to be yet another stance/statement which is inconsistent with their other declarations.

Is this not the case?

I'm sure there are some teams that test it. But what are they going to do with that information once have it? Say they test a rider and he has a VO2 max of 80 ml/kg min. How does that figure help them? That value has no actual practical application. (As opposed to lactate threshold, which does).

 

[the sceptic]

Here you go
Whole thread about it

http://forum.cyclingnews.com/showthread.php?t=25881

Glad to help

I don't see anything about secret TUEs? Got any link to that?

 

[TailWindHome]

Got any link to that?

That gambit only makes sense when the poster hasn't already supported his statement with a link.

Silly Sceptic.

Joignez-vous aux points

 

[Dear Wiggo]

This is my understanding.


The thing with VO2max and FTP (or lactate etc) testing is you use them together - not in isolation.

If you have an FTP test, you're unlikely to hit VO2. It can happen, but it's unlikely.

So yes, a step test or lactate test is useful because it's real world. Correct. Very true. No denying. Ferrari's lactate test + 4 hour ride + lactate test is even more real world.

But is that the best the rider can do? And how would you know?

Simples: do a VO2max test. Now you know how much oxygen they can process per kg of weight per minute.

Now compare watts at VO2max to their FTP test watts and you can determine what % of VO2max they are riding at, as well as efficiency, etc, at different points on their lactate graph.

If someone is doing 400W at FTP, that's awesome. But if they are only riding at 60% of their VO2max, you'd say - hang on this kid (probably) has room to improve. What training have they been doing, and what impact has that had, etc, etc.

Keeping in mind you can also improve your VO2max through training, EPO, etc, and it will differ, obviously, depending on fitness. The test also tends to take a very short amount of time vs step test (to exhaustion or not) or lactate test or Ferrari's 4+ hour test.

Without the VO2 max test it's closer to impossible to be able to determine if the athlete has room to improve.

So when Froome or Kerrison or Brailsford say, "Froome has room to improve" they must be basing it on something. Personally I think they are basing it on preemtpive unlikely performance explanation theatre, but regardless - in a real world situation where you have a rider and you want to know if they are hitting their genetic potential at the FTP level, a VO2 max test can help determine if that is in fact the case.

This is at the purely physiology testing level. Says nothing about recovery, tenacity, force of will, experience, team environment, diet, etc, which all play significant parts in how an athlete performs.

At the very least, you would expect they would VO2max and FTP test their riders when they join the team. Even more so if you are claiming to be more scientifically advanced and attention to detail than everyone else.

 

[thehog]

Dear Wiggo, excellent post. Well constructed.

 

[red_flanders]

I'm sure there are some teams that test it. But what are they going to do with that information once have it? Say they test a rider and he has a VO2 max of 80 ml/kg min. How does that figure help them? That value has no actual practical application. (As opposed to lactate threshold, which does).

If you exclude understanding what a rider's ceiling is from "practical" I guess that could be true.

I have no understanding of why a team would not want to know the answers to both the V02 max and LT numbers. They aren't useful in isolation.

EDIT: I see Wiggo covered it well. So again Parker, are you arguing that you know Sky don't do this, or are you just floating the idea out there? It sounds like the latter as a defense for Sky.