Tour 101: A Hair's Breath

That is Fabian Cancellara's lead over Lance Armstrong, who has moved his way into second place after today's Stage 4 team time trial in Montpellier. Seriously, how do they measure this stuff? Thousandths of a second?! An interesting Tour is shaping up early on, as Lance seems poised to take the maillot jaune perhaps in tomorrow's flat stage from Le Cap d'Agde to Perpignan.

Selected standings:

1. Fabian Cancellara
2. Lance Armstrong
3. Alberto Contador
5. Levi Leipheimer

I was thinking the whole time that Lance would be riding as a domestique for Alberto Contador, who was named team leader for Astana. But I wondered about that last night while I listened to Lance in an interview at the conclusion of Stage 3:

"I have tried to stay out a little bit of the debate about who is the leader?" Armstrong said. "I have won the Tour seven times, so I think I deserve a bit of credit."

But going back to this morning's team time trial... I have to say the whole orchestration of the team time trial is awesome. And it brings me to today's lesson for friends not familiar with cycling strategy.

Today's Lesson: Paceline

The guys in today's team time trial were riding wheel-to-wheel in a tight line called a paceline. When you're riding like this, the rider out in front is doing the majority of the work by pulling the group, setting the pace, and blocking the wind for his teammates.

If you're following another rider this closely and they're providing a wind block, you're said to be "drafting" off him, or riding in his "slipstream." It really makes a difference, probably a 30% decrease in needed effort for the riders at this level.

Team Columbia-High Road in a paceline

The cool thing to watch today was the way one rider would lead for a while, then peel off and let his teammates go by until eventually joining onto the back of the paceline. Riders will rotate like this, taking turns pulling the paceline, like a well-oiled machine. It's awesome to watch and I can appreciate just how expert they are, especially after my own failed attempts at pacelining at a fraction of their speed, with various friends on recreational rides. Riding that closely behind another cyclist takes practice and concentration, and any careless mistake can take everyone down.

Nifty diagram of a paceline and various formations (like a flock of birds)