"PRO" Cycling Discussion

[boysa]

Thanks! Always wondered about that, as well.

[Rob81]

So I've been doing some reading out of interest to see what Froome was running throughout the tour. Shocked at his gargantuan cassette. Anyone know what size his chainrings were?

Compact Osymetric= 52-38
Using the same setup (11-28) and it's a good range of gear.

[KB]

The Crits - yes, they've always been rigged. They were also controlled by two agents as well (Daniel Dousset and Roger Piel). They would deal with the organisers and the rates to the riders would be set. For many riders it was how they made their money because the salaries were rubbish, but the travelling was a real bind for them and tiring, so many used phets to get by.
Winning a Tour stage or getting a jersey meant good earnings. Winning the Tour itself meant megabucks for the winner. However, some riders were so popular it didn't matter. For instance, Poulidor earned as much money as Anquetil even though he could never beat him in the Tour. Sometimes the riders would ride at two events in one day.
They even used to have an announcer who would stoke up the crowds to hand money for primes and they would get a cut.

[Kjetil]

Lets talk about the spacers!

LA always used plenty.

[Wingnut]

Who else thinks Anquetil, Indurain, et al were clean? Honestly, I felt like Armstrong had to go down for two reasons - a. he was a bully b. there was reason to believe he had doped in his comeback.

But to see the Tour celebrating the 5 time winners on the podium, and honoring Anquetil, made me gag. Armstrong didn't invent this shit, he was just better at it than his competitors.

Yep, I wanted to throw up too when I saw this on CyclingTips...
http://cyclingtips.com.au/2013/07/chasi ... s-elysees/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[maquisard]

Indeed, whilst I have the greatest respect for Anquetil, he doped by his own admission. The same can be said for Indurain whose performances in the EPO era speak for themselves. Similarly Merckx failed drug tests and the peloton rides past monuments to doped riders like Simpson and Pantani around the parcours.

Like it or not, doping is part of the history of the sport. Whether we celebrate it or not is debatable.

[Tapeworm]

...As for the PED's after watching what the racers went through i am not sure how you could be competitive in that kind of race without using something. The real problem is recovery, to race a hundred miles mostly up hills is one thing but to do it for 22 almost strait days is something completely different. The body just does not naturally recover in one day. Going to the gym and really working out hard your sore for the next two day and it is even more painful on the second day. When i ride hard my legs hurt the next day and the day after that, so when i heard the announcer say that they guy is getting faster as the tour went longer that cannot happen with out the aid of something. I am not saying that something is illegal, all i am saying is that body tissue does not heal on its own overnight. To speed up recovery that fast PED's are the only thing i know about that could do the job in that little time window. Supplements help reduce muscle fatigue and speeds recovery but there is still fatigue and if you keep pushing it how do you really ever recover? That is just MO.

Hi, liketoride. I strongly you suggest you read up on sport physiology cause there are a lot of misconceptions in your post there. In short, unless you are an elite athlete of some description, you cannot compare anything you have experienced to what these guys are and what they do. Your longest hardest ride, that's a recovery ride for these guys. Think of the best amateur you know, the guy that wins all those races. Put him up against the slowest rider in the peloton, the ones that are in the grupetto, and the amateur would get canned.

This does not preclude the use of doping/PEDs but even without that these are elite athletes and really are on a different level.

[tymon_tm]

Yesterday I was riding up a climb in Santa Barbara with a friend. We came across an older guy with no helmet riding with a small child that was on a Scott road bike killing it up this climb (maybe 5 or 6 years old). The man had a thick accent (French or Belgian). Upon closer inspection he was on the Rca with 9070. Said rider claimed to be a former pro for Cofidis and said he owns a bike factory (we think he said in France) that produced 1.5 million bikes last year.

Does anyone know who this guy could be?

1,5 million? maybe he owns Merida...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_bicycle_industry

[maquisard]

The list of 1998 EPO re-tests:

Positive:

Andrea Tafi, Erik Zabel, Bo Hamburger, Laurent Jalabert, Marcos Serrano, Jens Heppner, Jeroen Blijlevens, Nicola Minali, Mario Cipollini, Fabio Sacchi, Eddy Mazzoleni, Jacky Durand, Abraham Olano, Laurent Desbiens, Marco Pantani, Manuel Beltran, Jan Ullrich (twice), Kevin Livingston

Suspicious:
Ermanno Brignoli, Alain Turicchia, Pascal Chanteur, Frederic Moncassin, Bobby Julich, Roland Meier, Giuseppe Calcaterra, Stefano Zanini, Eddy Mazzoleni, Stephane Barthe, Stuart O'Grady, Axel Merckx

[Geoff]

@wingnut, great pics...

[MarkGiardini]

Julich can be moved to the positive side..

[Wingnut]

Did Stuart O'Grady have prior notification? Earlier than anticipated retirement the best option then?

[aerozy]

Olano was one of the few spanish rirders (along with Indurain) that had yet to come clean or get a positive. No surprise there though.

Little bit dissapointed with Erik Zabel. He has always been very vocal about doping and being a sprinter he wouldnt have had as much to gain with doping as others. Just think of all of those classic monuments and grand tour stage races he won which are all now tarnished.

His son just signed his first professional contract. Lets hope he doesnt follow his fathers footsteps as Axel Merkx seems to have done.

Also, Stuart O'Grady! Another symbol of the sport who cowardly bows out just in the nick of time. Good riddens!

[pastronef]

offtopic: do you know what happened to the Cyclingnews.com Forum? it's been down for days now
thank you

[boysa]

Disappointed with Zabel? He admitted to using EPO to prepare for '96, no reason to think he wasn't using it his whole career.