Froome already discovered it but he f*cked up his preparation for the Tour by not delivering in the spring classics. So I think LBL was the key prep here, period.
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The more I think the less yesterday makes sense. 3:30 on the previous record, set by Pantani (the greatest climber in cycling history before yesterday) in 1998 Tour, at the end of a very tough stage? Motors?
Jonas and Remco also beat Pantani, and Landa was almost there.
people need to stop comparing climbing times to Pantani, he was just bald Landa
Yeah and Jonas with perfect preparation may have been up there with Pogacar, so the same question would apply to him too.
Remco was ridiculous too, I think the motors question may apply to all 3 teams and their superdomestiques.
It was like watching cycling from before they introduced EPO tests (& even before hematocrit ceiling was brought in). I don't think they're motordoping but I do believe blood doping & playing with the science is completely out of control. The UCI is probably totally corrupt as well, as is the ASO.
All the usual excuses we've heard in recent years which attempt to handwave the destruction of the climbing records set by the most notorious dopers of the 1990's went out the window yesterday.
Long stage (197km), hard stage with 4 cat 1 cols & 1 HC col, fast pace with Visma drilling it on the front so the break was never over 4 minutes ahead & it was stage 15, just before the second rest day when riders should be theoretically cooked (for example the similar stage in the 2020 TdF was the Grand-Colombier stage 15 in which Jumbo drilled a small bunch to the line & 12 riders were within a minute of each other at the end).
There are no excuses for what we watched yesterday. It was farcical. It's not the same sport as 4 years ago. Hell, it's not the same sport as 12 months ago. In 2020 LPdBF was the outlier, in 2021 & 2022 it became the norm. In 2023 Combloux was the outlier, now in 2024 it's the norm.
It's an express elevator down into cycling delirium.
What kind of motor would you like to use here…? I can agree some exhibitions e.g. Cavendish is looking extremely suspicious with chain dropping at the finish line (not for the first time), but I wonder how could it help on a monstrous climb. You need to sacrifice the bike weight for power, the batteries weight a lot. You want to use such setup for 10-20 minutes which is really long, and it's producing noise, heat when there are tons of spectators around. Any random spectator can measure a temperature of your bike with remote FLIR camera, they can observe major fluctuations on the fly.
Monitored CO poisoning is some interesting path for sure. You can combine CO poisoning with a fresh, oxidated blood bag and you are getting a huge boost in theory. The typical downside is probably the risk for your health. CO is highly toxic so it's not something you can do on your own, you need to work with your team. You can also have to calculate the dosage carefully for each rider and monitor the CO concentration effects frequently.
I also think some guys can feel very unwell under such treatment or simply refuse to poison themselves with CO (as if using other steroids or hormones weren't consider poisoning by your body).
Today, Remco brought the tsar bomba to the race. Biggest nuke ever dropped on the peloton. Shattered Pantani's record (Remco has no business breaking Pantani's records!).
He learned a lesson. Never bring a nuke to an anti matter fight. Better bring a bigger weapon
We are in an all out arms race by 3 of the biggest historical doping teams
Just wait until Red Bull really gets into this. That's when the arms race gets even more absurd (because they actually have the budget to make bikes much faster. They'll spend what they need to to win, see what they do in F1)
He learned a lesson. Never bring a nuke to an anti matter fight. Better bring a bigger weapon
We are in an all out arms race by 3 of the biggest historical doping teams
Just wait until Red Bull really gets into this. That's when the arms race gets even more absurd (because they actually have the budget to make bikes much faster. They'll spend what they need to to win, see what they do in F1)
As per @noob's request let me share something.
I was at a conference the other day and I found a science gem I thought you guys might enjoy for better or worse.
This was one of the Keynotes:
It's pretty crazy, what that means that they are trying to make something like artificial photosynthesis for animals (in this case the target group is humans), so we can cover 20% of our energy needs by just spending time in light. Via permanent gene therapy. They already tested it on some worms and they actually got 20% older than the controll group.
So while I don't think this is what they are doing, it just goes to show what apparently is possible and what kind of roads are thought about in medicine to manipulate our bodies. Who knows what on earth they good be doing.
I was at a conference the other day and I found a science gem I thought you guys might enjoy for better or worse.
This was one of the Keynotes:
It's pretty crazy, what that means that they are trying to make something like artificial photosynthesis for animals (in this case the target group is humans), so we can cover 20% of our energy needs by just spending time in light. Via permanent gene therapy. They already tested it on some worms and they actually got 20% older than the controll group.
So while I don't think this is what they are doing, it just goes to show what apparently is possible and what kind of roads are thought about in medicine to manipulate our bodies. Who knows what on earth they good be doing.
As a free range, variable pace sport cycling is not very intuitive to assess in terms of performance levels, at least for the non-cycling followers. That's why power is handy in the first place.
But assume someone (preferably a Slovenian dude, they are awesome in endurance sports) lobbed a 1:55-1:50 marathon. The latter number is very over the top, just a mechanic extrapolation from Pog taking 3min30 from pantani during a 40min effort. Even the first one is more than a bit tongue in cheek.
Would the media or sport sciences community blink? I don't know. The shoe argument couldn't possibly cover all of that.
So I wouldn't expect much noises lamenting this tour. Viewers apparently love nuclear riding. What I personally find weird is the argument that what we are seeing is at least entertaining. How so? The outcome is pretty much known in advance. At a point some mutant just rides away.
But assume someone (preferably a Slovenian dude, they are awesome in endurance sports) lobbed a 1:55-1:50 marathon. The latter number is very over the top, just a mechanic extrapolation from Pog taking 3min30 from pantani during a 40min effort. Even the first one is more than a bit tongue in cheek.
Would the media or sport sciences community blink? I don't know. The shoe argument couldn't possibly cover all of that.
So I wouldn't expect much noises lamenting this tour. Viewers apparently love nuclear riding. What I personally find weird is the argument that what we are seeing is at least entertaining. How so? The outcome is pretty much known in advance. At a point some mutant just rides away.
My gut feeling is that a far lower percentage of the peloton is doped than 10-15 years ago...
probably partially because of the back-lash meaning more guys than before would just say no, especially if they already have contracts for multiple years and perform at an okay level.
But whatever has happened in the last ~3-4 years? I find it pretty inconceivable that a decent %, including most of the top GC guys, are pushing the limits of what is legal, and stepping over those limits.
Dumoulin, Pinot and Bardet are the same age as Landa. Their performances over the last ~5 years (pre-retirement for Dumoulin and Pinot) from what should have been their "peak" at say age ~24-27? Yeh, they either got worse or stagnated. As human physiology says they should have.
Yet Landa (their peer who at age ~24-30 was a very similar level rider overall to those 3) is now putting up numbers that would have made him DOMINANT from 2014-2020... a time when he generally was fighting for podiums.
probably partially because of the back-lash meaning more guys than before would just say no, especially if they already have contracts for multiple years and perform at an okay level.
But whatever has happened in the last ~3-4 years? I find it pretty inconceivable that a decent %, including most of the top GC guys, are pushing the limits of what is legal, and stepping over those limits.
Dumoulin, Pinot and Bardet are the same age as Landa. Their performances over the last ~5 years (pre-retirement for Dumoulin and Pinot) from what should have been their "peak" at say age ~24-27? Yeh, they either got worse or stagnated. As human physiology says they should have.
Yet Landa (their peer who at age ~24-30 was a very similar level rider overall to those 3) is now putting up numbers that would have made him DOMINANT from 2014-2020... a time when he generally was fighting for podiums.
But what if their performance remains the same but good becomes mediocre, wins become hard to achieve top 10s, what if you have to push the watts you needed to get into a break, just to stay in the peloton?
It's really not just Landa, apparently Thomas (!) was pushing his best watts ever last season. Ever, that's better than when he won the Tour and he got beaten by a beat up Roglic for the Giro. Bernal also pushing his best watts ever this season (guess not at the tour, but the fast they are going, who knows? And it's really not just them, the overall level of many many riders has just made a jump. The overall speed has gone up, all the climbing times are much better than before, even absurdly better as we've seen on the weekend on two occasions. Not only did even Remco beat Pantani's time (and it wasn't close) a lot of riders did times competetive in the 90ies.
So while Pogacar's and Vingegaard's dominance are extreme, they are the tip of the iceberg. A very sharp tip, but only the tip. There's also the possibility that they are just really extremly talented and this is massively amplified by whatever is going on.
Maybe these types of performances will cause race organizers to use some unknown climbs in the future? Because I think Alpe d'Huez and Ventoux may be no go zones after this. (Although yesterday already tells the story given that Plateau de Beille was a commonly used climb in the past)
I think it's also a case of UAE & Jumbo being massively ahead of curve & everyone else is playing catch-up.
Someone on another forum (in French) described the peloton's situation as the equivalent of "chicken thieves mixing it up with serial killers", i.e. from petty criminals to all time most wanted. But they're all bending the rules one way or another to various degrees. There are no saints here.
That's how it was in the 1990's as well hence why Christophe Bassons had no friends in the sport whatsoever. And he still doesn't for what it's worth, i.e. all the former pro consultants working for the media are... former dopers. Clean guys aren't welcome.
Kelly, McEwen, Jalabert, Durand etc all get cosy jobs for life.
Crime pays.
Someone on another forum (in French) described the peloton's situation as the equivalent of "chicken thieves mixing it up with serial killers", i.e. from petty criminals to all time most wanted. But they're all bending the rules one way or another to various degrees. There are no saints here.
That's how it was in the 1990's as well hence why Christophe Bassons had no friends in the sport whatsoever. And he still doesn't for what it's worth, i.e. all the former pro consultants working for the media are... former dopers. Clean guys aren't welcome.
Kelly, McEwen, Jalabert, Durand etc all get cosy jobs for life.
Crime pays.
When I have more time, I will discuss what happened yesterday, but for now, I want to say that unfortunately, it is almost certain that this sport will soon go to the bottom like it happened 20/15 years ago.
I always said that I didn't care about doping, as long as it didn't reach scandalous proportions and there wasn't so much disparity in usage between the best teams, but that has clearly stopped happening.
Going from 6.2 w/kg to almost 7 w/kg in 1 year or 2 is too much....I saw this movie happen years ago, and it didn't end well for this sport.
They got me, i didn't expected this. It would be easy to say that Visma needs to have to reduce the gap to Emirates and increase the budget to win this war, to improve his programm to Vingegaard plus he can benefit more of them without the injuries, but it would be hypocrite, because this will end really bad, very soon.
I always said that I didn't care about doping, as long as it didn't reach scandalous proportions and there wasn't so much disparity in usage between the best teams, but that has clearly stopped happening.
Going from 6.2 w/kg to almost 7 w/kg in 1 year or 2 is too much....I saw this movie happen years ago, and it didn't end well for this sport.
They got me, i didn't expected this. It would be easy to say that Visma needs to have to reduce the gap to Emirates and increase the budget to win this war, to improve his programm to Vingegaard plus he can benefit more of them without the injuries, but it would be hypocrite, because this will end really bad, very soon.
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Anti-doping pressure has only eased in the last 10-15 years. The media talks about it A LOT less often, top riders are obviously getting away with it, and the last notable biopassport case was some time in 1659, coincidentally just around the time a few quite prominent riders who obviously intended to contest any sanctions were cleared in baffling circumstances. There is no reason why doping would be less prevalent now than 10-15 years ago
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My "gut" says we will probably get to that saturation point again very soon if what seems to be happening is happening... and if that is correct then quite a few decent riders aged ~25-30 will fall off very quickly and not get another contract or retire.
People joke about guys like Alaphilippe, S. Yates, Hindley, Gaudu, Carapaz, Bardet and Bernal falling off a cliff, having bad tours/years etc... but when you look at their actual numbers they look the same as ever (ofc predicted going off times)... just there are ~10-15 guys who got a lot better while they stayed the same or followed a normal age curve in some cases.
Ofc, we will probably never know precisely who is doing what and to what extent. But from say ~2015-2021 or so? Things looked a lot more "normal" across the board.
Tbf probably should have said 15-20 years ago aha. 2010 still feels 10 years ago to me.
This is the perfect time to increase the difficulty of the race - longer TTs, less flat days, longer days in the mountain. I don't see how this is not win-win for everyone unless of course the whole things blows up like 1998 or 2006. Im thrilled about watching hard racing with massive gaps and its certainly much, much better than say2008-2019, especially in TdF.
Saddest post I saw yesterday was @Tonton mentioning it was Bastille Day
I didn't know, there's never been a need to make a mental note of it because you get reminded when there are loads of French riders going like hell in a big breakaway with fans screaming and commentators talking about them 'making a special effort today because it's Bastille Day'. All I saw was Bardet trying once at the start and then getting swallowed up and spat out by some drone, I think Martinez was there for a short while?
Top Frenchman is 1 hour 17 minutes down, no wonder they're fed up of it. The mutant attacks are fun for a moment but it's very fleeting, tiktok cycling. I think they have a point about a lot of the romance and charm being sucked out of the sport, there is still the odd nice moment like on stage 1 but they are becoming more few and far between. Sky were boring tactically but at least the other guys had their chances at glory, The Tour started well but as soon as the GC teams took over you realised the difference in medical preparation.
There needs to be a suspension of disbelief involved, it's gone.
I didn't know, there's never been a need to make a mental note of it because you get reminded when there are loads of French riders going like hell in a big breakaway with fans screaming and commentators talking about them 'making a special effort today because it's Bastille Day'. All I saw was Bardet trying once at the start and then getting swallowed up and spat out by some drone, I think Martinez was there for a short while?
Top Frenchman is 1 hour 17 minutes down, no wonder they're fed up of it. The mutant attacks are fun for a moment but it's very fleeting, tiktok cycling. I think they have a point about a lot of the romance and charm being sucked out of the sport, there is still the odd nice moment like on stage 1 but they are becoming more few and far between. Sky were boring tactically but at least the other guys had their chances at glory, The Tour started well but as soon as the GC teams took over you realised the difference in medical preparation.
There needs to be a suspension of disbelief involved, it's gone.
I do hope they include Alpe d'huez in next years route. Can't wait for the first 5 riders to do sub 35 minutes!
Pantani didn’t attack the climb the way they did yesterday. Yesterday’s gap to Pantani was larger than the one Pantani had to super climber Bobby Julich in 1998 at 1:30.
I just don't know why you think, maybe I misunderstand you though, that only 10-15 guys got much better. Respectively there may be 10-15 guys better in their respective races to compete in (even though Alaphilipe is making a comeback it looks like and he rides for the same team as do nearly Pantani Landa and better Pantani Remco). There have been plentyfull voices from the peleton talking about doing their best watts ever, some of them pretty late in their carreers. The rational offered is that they hacked nutrition and training science like never before.
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