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Remco Evenepoel
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I always look at the consistency of a rider and Evenepoel dominated ITTs since hist junior years. The only season when he was frequently beaten was 2021, the year after the Lombardy crash. Besides that season, he missed the podium in an ITT only twice:
- 2019 Tour of Romandy (not in great form and he crashed twice in the Tour)
- 2024 Basque country (fourth place, after a crash earlier in the ITT)
I don't think you'll find a more consistent time trialist over such a long time.
The thing that blows my mind about Evenepoel is that he's able to produce the pure watts required to win a flat TT when he's at least 15 centimeters shorter than most of his main competitors at 171cm tall. The flat TT has always been a race for the tanks, because the big guys are able to produce more absolute watts and the increase in drag for a tall rider is usually not proportional to the increase in power they're able to generate with their added muscle mass. In today's race he was the shortest rider in the race bar none, with Tratnik (27th) and Sainbayar from Mongolia (28th) being the only other riders in the race shorter than 175cm and Vauquelin in 15th being the second best rider under 180cm. He's such an incredible outlier in TTs, even if you ignore the fact that he's actually WINNING these races.
Looking at results in TT WCs and Olympics, and the hour record for that matter, over the last 30 years, the top performers are usually in the 185-195cm range, which includes the likes of Indurain, Cancellara, Ganna, Wiggins, Rogers, Tarling, Phinney, Voigt, Brändle, van Aert, Martin, Millar, Froome, Asgreen, Dumoulin, Larsson and Zülle. Below 180 is rare, with Grabsch (179cm) and Roglic (177cm) being notable, but Boardman (175cm), Campenaerts (173cm), Castroviejo (171cm) and Evenepoel (171cm) are the only ones of note I can find below 175cm. Evenepoel is also more than 10kg lighter than Boardman and Campenaerts, and the same weight as Castroviejo, but his results are by far the most impressive out of any of them. If he keeps this up he'll even be the best TT rider ever, regardless of height, by a comfortable margin.
His TT ability is so good it goes beyond just the plain old rocket fuel we like to discuss here, although he's obviously supercharged this summer. For a kid his size to be this good on the flats, dope or no dope, is honestly mind-boggling to me. His raw power is just astonishing and his position on the bike might genuinely be the best ever. I've got to give him credit for what he's done on the TT bike so far in his career.
The thing that blows my mind about Evenepoel is that he's able to produce the pure watts required to win a flat TT when he's at least 15 centimeters shorter than most of his main competitors at 171cm tall. The flat TT has always been a race for the tanks, because the big guys are able to produce more absolute watts and the increase in drag for a tall rider is usually not proportional to the increase in power they're able to generate with their added muscle mass. In today's race he was the shortest rider in the race bar none, with Tratnik (27th) and Sainbayar from Mongolia (28th) being the only other riders in the race shorter than 175cm and Vauquelin in 15th being the second best rider under 180cm. He's such an incredible outlier in TTs, even if you ignore the fact that he's actually WINNING these races.
Looking at results in TT WCs and Olympics, and the hour record for that matter, over the last 30 years, the top performers are usually in the 185-195cm range, which includes the likes of Indurain, Cancellara, Ganna, Wiggins, Rogers, Tarling, Phinney, Voigt, Brändle, van Aert, Martin, Millar, Froome, Asgreen, Dumoulin, Larsson and Zülle. Below 180 is rare, with Grabsch (179cm) and Roglic (177cm) being notable, but Boardman (175cm), Campenaerts (173cm), Castroviejo (171cm) and Evenepoel (171cm) are the only ones of note I can find below 175cm. Evenepoel is also more than 10kg lighter than Boardman and Campenaerts, and the same weight as Castroviejo, but his results are by far the most impressive out of any of them. If he keeps this up he'll even be the best TT rider ever, regardless of height, by a comfortable margin.
His TT ability is so good it goes beyond just the plain old rocket fuel we like to discuss here, although he's obviously supercharged this summer. For a kid his size to be this good on the flats, dope or no dope, is honestly mind-boggling to me. His raw power is just astonishing and his position on the bike might genuinely be the best ever. I've got to give him credit for what he's done on the TT bike so far in his career.
I always thought he looks like a bullet on a TT bike. It's rather amazing to watch, as it's so smooth and nearly seamless. It's like he almost cuts through air. So a bullet is what I see.
The thing that blows my mind about Evenepoel is that he's able to produce the pure watts required to win a flat TT when he's at least 15 centimeters shorter than most of his main competitors at 171cm tall. The flat TT has always been a race for the tanks, because the big guys are able to produce more absolute watts and the increase in drag for a tall rider is usually not proportional to the increase in power they're able to generate with their added muscle mass. In today's race he was the shortest rider in the race bar none, with Tratnik (27th) and Sainbayar from Mongolia (28th) being the only other riders in the race shorter than 175cm and Vauquelin in 15th being the second best rider under 180cm. He's such an incredible outlier in TTs, even if you ignore the fact that he's actually WINNING these races.
Looking at results in TT WCs and Olympics, and the hour record for that matter, over the last 30 years, the top performers are usually in the 185-195cm range, which includes the likes of Indurain, Cancellara, Ganna, Wiggins, Rogers, Tarling, Phinney, Voigt, Brändle, van Aert, Martin, Millar, Froome, Asgreen, Dumoulin, Larsson and Zülle. Below 180 is rare, with Grabsch (179cm) and Roglic (177cm) being notable, but Boardman (175cm), Campenaerts (173cm), Castroviejo (171cm) and Evenepoel (171cm) are the only ones of note I can find below 175cm. Evenepoel is also more than 10kg lighter than Boardman and Campenaerts, and the same weight as Castroviejo, but his results are by far the most impressive out of any of them. If he keeps this up he'll even be the best TT rider ever, regardless of height, by a comfortable margin.
His TT ability is so good it goes beyond just the plain old rocket fuel we like to discuss here, although he's obviously supercharged this summer. For a kid his size to be this good on the flats, dope or no dope, is honestly mind-boggling to me. His raw power is just astonishing and his position on the bike might genuinely be the best ever. I've got to give him credit for what he's done on the TT bike so far in his career.
Well if you think about it, as speeds go up aerodynamics matters exponentially. According to the announcers he's putting out over 100 watts less than Ganna & Tarling. Maybe that explains some of it?
Well if you think about it, as speeds go up aerodynamics matters exponentially. According to the announcers he's putting out over 100 watts less than Ganna & Tarling. Maybe that explains some of it?
On the flats the required power increases exponentially per unit of velocity, so if his output is truly that much lower his aerodynamics have to be on an absurdly different level to compensate. I mean, he definitely looks incredible on the bike, but that's a wild difference in drag. I think the answer lies somewhere in the middle. The difference in output is probably smaller than 100W, but he's definitely gaining some speed from his superior position as well.
His performance today probably does not even enter the top 10 outrageous things that happened in the last month or so, I was way more surprised with WVA's amazing recovery.
His performance today probably does not even enter the top 10 outrageous things that happened in the last month or so, I was way more surprised with WVA's amazing recovery.
So is Evenepool clean and just a guy with exceptional genetics?
And if this new Gen Z era is dirty- it is biological or mechanical, or a little of both?
Back in my day, it was much easier to figure this out because take the 90s for example - everyone that mattered was using rocket fuel. It wasn't banned yet & riders could dope with impunity. And we have Riis stating that the use of EPO was the "normal preparation of a professional cyclist."
Even in the LA dynasty years when a test was developed for EPO & it was banned, nothing changed much - more or less the same level & frequency of doping as in the 90s. But there was a ton of doping positives, and raids breaking up doping rings - many involving big name riders.
It's hard to draw a parallel with this era when no one that matters is testing positive for anything nor any doping rings are being exposed (Operation Aderlass was several years ago & it was a whistleblower who dropped a dime on that clandestine operation).
I did not claim that he's clean, a brief check of my previous posts will reveal that. What I was saying that, his performance was nothing outrageous compared to what happened during TDF.
Well, I do not know why the current riders are way more silent compared to ~20 years ago, and why we are not seeing police raids like Festina or Puerto anymore. I don't have an informed opinion about both.
For my own entertainment, I looked at some numbers for all the medallists at the ITT World Champs and Olympics to compare height to results. Keep in mind that I haven't gone through course profiles and removed results from races with hilly profiles like the WC in 2018 and 2017 and the Olympics in 2021, so this list is not based purely on the ability to go fast on the flats. Dumoulin, Roglic and Dennis were the big winners of that hilly time trial fad, winning three golds, three silvers and one bronze between them in the three aforementioned races. I've also bumped up Olano to bronze in the 2000 Olympics since le Texan is in third with a big fat line through his name.
The full list of riders, sorted by height, is here:
Rider
Height (cm)
TT medals
Gold
Silver
Bronze
Phinney
197
1
0
1
0
Larsson
194
2
0
2
0
Tarling
194
1
0
0
1
Ganna
193
5
2
2
1
Küng
193
2
0
1
1
Millar
191
2
0
2
0
Wiggins
190
4
2
2
0
van Aert
190
3
0
2
1
Andersson
189
1
0
1
0
Indurain
188
2
2
0
0
Rich
187
4
0
3
1
Bodrogi
187
2
0
1
1
Cancellara
186
9
6
0
3
Froome
186
3
0
0
3
Martin
185
8
4
4
0
Dumoulin
185
5
1
3
1
Rogers
185
4
3
0
1
Zülle
185
1
1
0
0
Gonzalez de Galdeano
185
1
0
0
1
Ullrich
183
4
2
1
1
Zabriskie
183
2
0
1
1
Foss
183
1
1
0
0
Dennis
182
3
2
0
1
Kiryienka
182
3
1
1
1
Malori
182
1
0
1
0
Julich
182
1
0
1
0
Olano
181
3
0
2
1
Clement
181
1
0
0
1
Gutierrez
181
1
0
1
0
Peschel
179
2
0
1
1
Grabsch
179
1
1
0
0
Mauri
179
1
0
1
0
Coppel
178
1
0
0
1
Honchar
177
3
1
1
1
Vinokourov
177
2
0
0
2
Roglic
177
2
1
1
0
Ekimov
176
2
2
0
0
Jalabert
176
1
1
0
0
Boardman
175
6
1
2
3
Botero
175
2
1
0
1
Rominger
175
1
0
0
1
Tuft
175
1
0
1
0
Campenaerts
173
1
0
0
1
Chiurato
173
1
0
1
0
Evenepoel
171
5
2
1
2
Castroviejo
171
1
0
0
1
Leipheimer
170
1
0
0
1
The most successful rider in each height range:
Height range (cm)
Rider
Total medals
Gold
Silver
Bronze
170-174
Evenepoel (171cm)*
5
2
1
2
175-179
Boardman (175cm)
6
1
2
3
180-184
Ullrich (183cm)
4
2
1
1
185-189
Cancellara (186cm)
9
6
0
3
190-194
Ganna (193cm)*
5
2
2
1
195-200
Phinney (197cm)
1
0
1
0
*Still active
Then a little bit of processed data...
Height range (cm)
# of riders
Total medals
Medals per rider
Gold
Silver
Bronze
170-174
5
9*
1.8
2
2
5
175-179
13
25
1.92
8
7
10
180-184
11
20
1.82
6
8
6
185-189
12
40
3.33
17
12
11
190-194
7
20
2.86
4
11
5
195-200
1
1
1
0
1
0
*Evenepoel accounts for five of these and is the only one within that height range who has won more than one medal, with the others amassing 1 silver and 3 bronzes. Thus, he's also the only rider there that has won gold medals.
I was surprised to see that the 175-179cm group was the largest by number of riders, but of course, in this list each rider counts as only one regardless of how many medals they've won. When looking at total medal haul, however, we see the 185-189cm range dominating, in large part thanks to Tony Martin and Fabian Cancellara who have 17 medals between them. We also see that the riders within the 185-194cm range win 1-1.5 medals more on average compared to other height ranges.
Here's how many of each medal the riders have won within the height ranges
Height range (cm)
Gold per rider
Silver per rider
Bronze per rider
170-174
0.40
0.40
1.00
175-179
0.62
0.54
0.77
180-184
0.55
0.73
0.55
185-189
1.42
1.00
0.92
190-194
0.57
1.57
0.71
195-200
0.00
1.00
0.00
Again, Martin and Cancellara with 10 gold medals skew the statistics for gold medals per rider heavily in favour of the 185-189cm range, with Martin's four silver medals also accounting for a third of his group's second place finishes. We also see that the slightly taller riders win a disproportionate number of silver medals (five out of the seven riders in this group - Wiggins, Ganna, van Aert, Larsson and Millar - have won two silvers). The two shortest groups are the only ones where the bronze medal ratio is the highest of the three medals.
Lastly, a couple of charts:
First, a scatter chart. In this chart I've sorted riders by points, where one gold = 2pts, one silver = 1.6pts and one bronze = 1.2pts. The points are equal to the TT points a rider gets for each of the podium spots in ProCyclingStats' ranking system, divided by 100.
The two runaway outliers in terms of points are obviously Cancellara and Martin. Behind them, the two short kings in that gaping chasm below the trendline on the 5+ points side of the chart are Boardman and Evenepoel, the two clearest outliers in terms of height versus success. The fact that Remco is only just starting his career and will likely accumulate enough points to leave Boardman in the dust within a few years only makes his position on the chart that much more impressive and anomalous.
Secondly, a bar chart. Here I've taken the best rider from each group and removed their results from their group to calculate a "points per rider" average for the remaining members of each group using the same scoring system as previously. I've then created a ratio using the best riders' own points scores compared to the averages of their groups, essentially a number of points per point. In other words, if the best rider in a group has a ratio of 5, he scores five times more points than the average rider in his height group. I've excluded Phinney since he's the only rider in his height range.
This again shows that Evenepoel's results are extremely disproportionate to those of riders of similar height to himself. Again, the fact that he's only at the start of his career makes this even more ridiculous, as this ratio will continue to grow rapidly unless he either stops winning medals or another sub-175cm Watt-pumping freak comes along and starts sweeping medals on TTs. Both seem very unlikely at the moment, with his most recent medal coming literally yesterday and Campenaerts being the only other active medal winner in his height range. Ganna also has a few years left to pump up his ratio to challenge Boardman and Cancellara, although given that van Aert, Küng and Tarling are all of similar height and very much still challenging for medals he has far more competition than Evenepoel does.
Conclusions and curiosities:
- Short riders can be good at TTs, but a short rider being as good as Evenepoel was completely and entirely unheard of before he came along.
- Tony Martin and Fabian Cancellara were really, really, really, really, really good at time trials.
- Chris Boardman is the most hilariously specialised pro rider of all time.
- There seems to be an upper height limit as well. I'd guess that there's a point in endurance sport where a taller rider's heart has to do too much additional work to get blood to the extremities for the additional power they can generate to compensate for it. There are plenty of World Tour and Pro Conti riders in the 195+ range (Norsgaard, Hoole, Walscheid, Rutsch, Stake Laengen, Wærenskjold) and former hour record holder Ondrej Sosenka was 200cm, but in the sport of fine margins that is elite time trials, they seem to come up slightly short compared to riders in the 185-194cm range.
- Good grief, there's a lot of proven dopers out there that never had their results stripped! Cheating is worth it, guys...
- I miss the old days when random dudes, particularly Germans, would show up once or twice a year and crank out a blistering TT and then go back into hibernation for 11 months. The TT nerds are increasingly infiltrating other parts of the sport and I don't know if I like it.
- 75% of Olympic champions have been at least 31 years or older at the time of winning. For the TT World Champs it's only 16%.
No way, not on real physiological talent. He closed the gap with Ferrari (why else did he pay him 1 mil per season, if not to falsify the contest?) and Jan's discipline problems. The difference between Armstrong and Ullrich is that if everybody were clean Lance wouldn't have won even one Tour, Jan many. This is why doping doesn't level the playing field. Some are on the A+ program, others on the B or C program. For Lance it truly was money well spent, while it lasted.
For my own entertainment, I looked at some numbers for all the medallists at the ITT World Champs and Olympics to compare height to results. Keep in mind that I haven't gone through course profiles and removed results from races with hilly profiles like the WC in 2018 and 2017 and the Olympics in 2021, so this list is not based purely on the ability to go fast on the flats. Dumoulin, Roglic and Dennis were the big winners of that hilly time trial fad, winning three golds, three silvers and one bronze between them in the three aforementioned races. I've also bumped up Olano to bronze in the 2000 Olympics since le Texan is in third with a big fat line through his name.
I am wondering if mostly that's because shorter riders are typically pigeonholed into being climbers, Remco is not built like a spindly 52 kg climber. He's no Lenny Martinez for example (Eat a sandwich and do some squats Lenny btw).
His TT ability is so good it goes beyond just the plain old rocket fuel we like to discuss here, although he's obviously supercharged this summer. For a kid his size to be this good on the flats, dope or no dope, is honestly mind-boggling to me. His raw power is just astonishing and his position on the bike might genuinely be the best ever. I've got to give him credit for what he's done on the TT bike so far in his career.
He's a bullet man. He looked excellent yesterday on the bike. Obviously his absolute power is good but not as monstrous as you imagine: if that was the case he wouldn't have lost so much time to Pogacar uphill, given his low mass.
No way, not on real physiological talent. He closed the gap with Ferrari (why else did he pay him 1 mil per season, if not to falsify the contest?) and Jan's discipline problems. The difference between Armstrong and Ullrich is that if everybody were clean Lance wouldn't have won even one Tour, Jan many. This is why doping doesn't level the playing field. Some are on the A+ program, others on the B or C program. For Lance it truly was money well spent, while it lasted.
I have no reason to think Jan wasn't juicing just as much as Armstrong, and it's not as if those doctors in Freiburg didn't know what they were doing, even if Ferrari was regarded as the top doping guru. I also have no idea how we are supposed to know what each of their "real physiological talent" was.
Regarding height and historical comparisons, average height of Danish men increased by ~10 cm from the 1910 cohort to the 1962 cohort and has been fairly stable since then. That may be affected by immigration, so perhaps the cohorts since 1962 would have continued to become taller than their predecessors without that. But it still suggests that comparisons of riders from 1994 to the present are not too affected by that.
One thing that's always important to note with these height distribution things is population size - the talent pool especially at the far right end of the bell curve is gonna be way smaller than for riders in the 175-179cm range for example. I haven't ran the numbers but I don't think the argument that height is the problem.
The second part IMO is developments in aerodynamics and bike technology. Like, TTs now aren't what they used to be even 10 years ago. If I look at Cancellara TTing in 2016 his position looks awful by current standards and he just had extreme power. In a way aerodynamics being more important should help the smaller riders compared to rolling resistance being more important at the slower speeds
My final observation is Evenepoel doesn't even seem to have the body type of a time trialist. That body type is longer legs. Evenepoel meanwhile has a super compact build
Yeah, I have the same impression, but the praying mantis position was outlawed during Cancellara's reign, iirc. I think it was allowed again shortly afterwards (to some degree).
No way, not on real physiological talent. He closed the gap with Ferrari (why else did he pay him 1 mil per season, if not to falsify the contest?) and Jan's discipline problems. The difference between Armstrong and Ullrich is that if everybody were clean Lance wouldn't have won even one Tour, Jan many. This is why doping doesn't level the playing field. Some are on the A+ program, others on the B or C program. For Lance it truly was money well spent, while it lasted.
That's a fair point that doping unlevels the playing field because of the different responses athletes get from PEDs. There will be inter-individual differences not only based on the type of drug but dosages as well (you see this a lot in clinical pharmacology).
There's also the synergistic effect of multiple drugs used by dopers. Virtual all dopers use more than one PED: EPO/blood transfusions + testosterone/albolic steroids is one of the more popular basic stacks used by endurance athletes over the decades.
However, we've seen top GT riders use a smorgasbord of compounds (e.g. Pantani & Rasmussen were using over 6 drugs!). Even Operation Puerto, primarily known for blood transfusions, was dispensing testosterone, anabolic steroids, HGH, IGF-1 & HMG.
One thing is for certain though, when cycling went "high-octane" with EPO in the early 90s, those that didn't partake were simply left behind no matter how naturally talented they were. LeMond, one of the most talented riders in the history of the sport, and having one of the highest VO2max of any endurance athlete, met this sobering reality in the 91 Tour. On his best form & healthy, he finished a dismal 7th - 13 minutes down - behind Big Mig:
That's a fair point that doping unlevels the playing field because of the different responses athletes get from PEDs. There will be inter-individual differences not only based on the type of drug but dosages as well (you see this a lot in clinical pharmacology).
There's also the synergistic effect of multiple drugs used by dopers. Virtual all dopers use more than one PED: EPO/blood transfusions + testosterone/albolic steroids is one of the more popular basic stacks used by endurance athletes over the decades.
However, we've seen top GT riders use a smorgasbord of compounds (e.g. Pantani & Rasmussen were using over 6 drugs!). Even Operation Puerto, primarily known for blood transfusions, was dispensing testosterone, anabolic steroids, HGH, IGF-1 & HMG.
One thing is for certain though, when cycling went "high-octane" with EPO in the early 90s, those that didn't partake were simply left behind no matter how naturally talented they were. LeMond, one of the most talented riders in the history of ther sport, and having one of the highest VO2max of any endurance athlete, met this sobering reality in the 91 Tour. On his best form & healthy, he finished a dismal 7th - 13 minutes down - behind Big Mig:
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