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Teams & Riders The Remco Evenepoel is the next Eddy Merckx thread

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Ok, but what's the biopassport got to do with fat percentage?
Biopassport measures biological metrics rather than the means of how those metrics were achieved. You can't have wild swings in hematocrit and then simply say "crazy what my top secret sport science has achieved, isn't it?" BF% is just one more direct metric.

How can you put a minimum limit and not basically stop performance science from seeking optimal ratios between power per kilos? It's just too fundamental to the sport, in my opinion.
You know how I know this is false? Because I've never heard someone bring up skinniness in a GOAT discussion. "OMG Eddy Merckx was the frailest waif of all time", said no one ever.
 
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I think we're once again discussing tomatoes and tomatoes between "Evenepoel can't win any more GTs" compared to "Evenepoel can beat the best of the best in a GT"
Yeah, he's 24 years old and already has one Vuelta (that didn't have a A field).
I think it's safe to say he'll win at least one more GT. Question is, will he ever be able to win a TdF against top contenders such as Vingegaard or Poggy. A lot less sure about that.
 
Biopassport measures biological metrics rather than the means of how those metrics were achieved. You can't have wild swings in hematocrit and then simply say "crazy what my top secret sport science has achieved, isn't it?" BF% is just one more direct metric.


You know how I know this is false? Because I've never heard someone bring up skinniness in a GOAT discussion. "OMG Eddy Merckx was the frailest waif of all time", said no one ever.
So we are talking regular dexa scans and some arbitrary number as a max body fat? When is this scan performed? The day before the race? This sounds ridiculous.

Pushing the boundaries have always been fundamental to the sport and nutrition is just part of that.
 
Biopassport measures biological metrics rather than the means of how those metrics were achieved. You can't have wild swings in hematocrit and then simply say "crazy what my top secret sport science has achieved, isn't it?" BF% is just one more direct metric.


You know how I know this is false? Because I've never heard someone bring up skinniness in a GOAT discussion. "OMG Eddy Merckx was the frailest waif of all time", said no one ever.
Come on, I'm aware of this, but doping aside, if a rider seeks optimal performance by lowering body fat percentage, then that's cycling baby and it has always been this way. It used to be said, stop eating when you are still hungry and after 20 minutes you won't be. How then can you prohibit a cyclist's dietary regime? Tell them, eat more or you can't compete? It goes against the very discipline required.
 
This is peak Remco weight, no one can tell me it's not

KttOAgs.jpeg

This is his only chance to win the TdF. He will smash Skeletor before the race even starts!
 
We should praise riders for the right reasons and those reasons are their character, how they win and loose, not their talent. They didn't choose to be born with some power output or lung capacity, but they surely can be praised or blamed for behaving in such or such a way.

I don't completly agree with this.
First, you can't dictate (but you can try to educate the willing (you did try to reason it)) what one should or should not like, you can do all sorts, even prove something is bad for the person and the society, but you can't make a person like something or not, even if you force them to act some way.
Second, in cycling as a competition, some measures are given in advance. Being able to perform well in races (with regards to ones role) is one such important measure and very much related to the talent (lung capacity, regeneration,...) one is "born with".
But I agree that cyclists as persons and their character is of course also a very important measure, one that goes wider than just cycling.
 
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It speaks volumes about how some users seem to lack minimum reading skills and emotional intelligence regarding how they misinterpreted the "buy my book" pun for a description of reality. That they additionaly got mad, enraged or resentful about what I wrote and still remember posts I made weeks ago just states how toxic this thread is and how the only way to deal with some "personalities" is having a sense of humour.
You really think too much of yourself and the weight of your words
 
So, considering his weight and previous discussions. I just came across an older article, that stated he weighed 61.5kg going into the Vuelta '22. And that he weighed 63kg going into the Giro '23. Because they had seen his TT "numbers" -though he convincingly won it- in the Vuelta were not among his best. So for the Giro they wanted to weigh more. So maybe i don't need glasses after all, @shadowrider. And it looks like i was right all along in '22 @Valv.Piti considering his projected target weight. :fearscream:

In a recent article with his trainer, Koen Pelgrim, he (his trainer) says for longer climbs it is better to weigh a little less (hinting about the Tour). And yet in the article prior to the Giro they wanted him to weigh less for the short steep climbs in the '22 Vuelta. His trainer said that weighing 63kg in the Giro would not be an issue in the first week of the Giro... What the article doesn't say however, is what about the second half of the Giro? Were they going to do a liposuction after the 2nd TT? Were they going to muck around with his diet (like they might very well have done in the Vuelta before he bonked)? Or was the knowledge of weighing less being better for longer climbs unknown to them at that moment or did they get Vuelta and Giro climbs mixed up, in terms of length?

Anyway, again proof that they would risk a good climbing performance and not losing minutes in the mountains, for gaining a few seconds in the TT.
 
So, considering his weight and previous discussions. I just came across an older article, that stated he weighed 61.5kg going into the Vuelta '22. And that he weighed 63kg going into the Giro '23. Because they had seen his TT "numbers" -though he convincingly won it- in the Vuelta were not among his best. So for the Giro they wanted to weigh more. So maybe i don't need glasses after all, @shadowrider. And it looks like i was right all along in '22 @Valv.Piti considering his projected target weight. :fearscream:

In a recent article with his trainer, Koen Pelgrim, he (his trainer) says for longer climbs it is better to weigh a little less (hinting about the Tour). And yet in the article prior to the Giro they wanted him to weigh less for the short steep climbs in the '22 Vuelta. His trainer said that weighing 63kg in the Giro would not be an issue in the first week of the Giro... What the article doesn't say however, is what about the second half of the Giro? Were they going to do a liposuction after the 2nd TT? Were they going to muck around with his diet (like they might very well have done in the Vuelta before he bonked)? Or was the knowledge of weighing less being better for longer climbs unknown to them at that moment or did they get Vuelta and Giro climbs mixed up, in terms of length?

Anyway, again proof that they would risk a good climbing performance and not losing minutes in the mountains, for gaining a few seconds in the TT.

I don't think 1.5 kg would make a difference in the sense of losing or not minutes in the mountains.

Talking about the vuelta 2023, i think the problem for him could had be the specific work he did in the preparation for the Vuelta. He tried to do at the same time specific work for the WC TT, and specific work for the Vuelta, and that didn't benefited him for the Vuelta.
 
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I don't think 1.5 kg would make a difference in the sense of losing or not minutes in the mountains.

Talking about the vuelta 2023, i think the problem for him could had be the specific work he did in the preparation for the Vuelta. He tried to do at the same time specific work for the WC TT, and specific work for the Vuelta, and that didn't benefited him for the Vuelta.
I don't know, when you look at w/kg, 1.5kg does have an impact. I can imagine over a long period of time (3 weeks), this can take it's toll
 
I don't think 1.5 kg would make a difference in the sense of losing or not minutes in the mountains.

Talking about the vuelta 2023, i think the problem for him could had be the specific work he did in the preparation for the Vuelta. He tried to do at the same time specific work for the WC TT, and specific work for the Vuelta, and that didn't benefited him for the Vuelta.
lol, yes it makes a huge difference. Why would Vingegaard weigh 58kg if 1.5 don't matter? Why would Rasmussen peel the paint off his bike? One of the trainers of Dumoulin at Sunweb said (back then) every kg means 30s loss per half hour climbed. So 1.5kg would mean 45s per 30 minutes. That's not taking into account the efforts of previous climbs when you have to waste more energy in order to keep up. So in the final climb you might well lose more than 45s.