Tour de France 101: Banana Hammocks and Jesus

What do these share? They were both spotted on the sidelines along the climb up the Tourmalet during stage 9 of the Tour de France on Sunday. The banana hammocks were extreme- of the thong variety- and were worn by a pack of shirtless Aussies sporting fluorescent green afro wigs and their country's flag draped about their shoulders. If not for the flag, I would have bet these were Americans, but I now have proof that frat-boy antics are universal. As for Jesus, I just don't know what was going on there.

Today is a rest day for the Tour cyclists, and somewhat of a rest day for me. I was out of town for a few days and missed all the action from the latest stages. So I've just been reading news summaries and thought I'd skip any form of cycling "lesson" or discussion of strategy to talk about something that doesn't have anything to do with cycling per se, but everything to do with the Tour de France: fans.

One of the most enjoyable aspects of watching the Tour during its mountain stages especially are seeing the legions of fans that line the route along the tough climbs, waiting for a glimpse of their cycling heroes, running alongside, and even touching them. In no other spectator sport can you get this close.

Ridiculous costumes and animated gesturing abound, and there are the requisite antler helmets and naked guy or two. I am dreaming of going to see the Tour in person, and part of that dream is to be included in the fan melee. I have this notion that it must be like a big, beer-tinged, international funfest- a sharing of the love of sport among loud brutes Americains, flamboyant Aussies, laddish Brits and crazy Euros alike.

Antler Guy- a US export

The flipside of this is how out-of-hand some of these fans seem to get. I often worry that one of them is going to push over one of the cyclists or let a stray beer bottle roll out onto the road. Seriously, I don't know how this doesn't happen, and I think it has in the case of a rider getting knocked over.

Dieter "Didi" Senft as El Diablo- a Tour regular

But this doesn't even compare to the avid fans of the original Tour de France races in the early 1900s. Below is an account of over-zealous fans in the 1904 Tour, who felled trees to hold back rivals and beat up others at night outside the city of St. Etienne.

In the climb of the col de la Republique, leaving St-Étienne, supporters of the regional rider, Faure, assault the Italian, Gerbi. He is thrown to the ground, beaten like plaster. He escapes with a broken finger... A bunch of fanatics wielded sticks and shouted insults, setting on the other riders: Maurice and César Garin got a succession of blows, the older brother [Maurice] was hit in the face with a stone. Soon there was general mayhem: "Up with Faure! Down with Garin! Kill them!" they were shouting. Finally cars arrived and the riders could get going thanks to pistol shots. The aggressors disappeared into the night. (1)

I'd like to think the modern-day fan, though at times idiotic in his or her fervor, has progressed to a more civilized state.

fandemonium in Basque country

1. Chany, Pierre (1986), La Fabuleuse Histoire de Cyclisme, La Martinière, France, p 60

Tour 101: Fresh Horses

All day I've resisted sneaking a peak at today's stage results, and am now reaping the benefits as I watch the drama unfold on Versus as I write. This will probably be my last entry for a couple days, as I'm off to lands where a wireless connection can find no purchase. The commentary I've found interesting today is the talk of how crazy week one of the Tour is. All the riders are fresh, all the riders are strong. It's a free-for-all for the sprinters, the climbers, the time trialists- everyone wants to ride up front. There are also a lot of riders on the road. 180 riders have started this race, but not all of them will finish. With all those guys out there, a lot of chaos and (it follows) a lot of crashes occur. We saw some of that in yesterday's team time trial, and also several isolated crashes so far on today's ride.

Recap

So now I've got the results for today's Stage 5 from Le Cap d'Agne to Perpignan. Vive la France! Redemption for French team BBox after yesterday's horrific dirt crash came with Thomas Voeckler's stage win. He attacked early and managed to hang on through to the end. The always bold Mark Cavendish came in third and was a bit deflated.

Selected standings:

1. Fabian Cancellara
2. Lance Armstrong
3. Alberto Contador
4. Andreas Cloden
5. Levi Leipheimer
9. David Zabriskie

Today's Lesson: Echelon

If there is one thing I hate on a ride, it's wind. I can handle heat and rain to an extent, but wind makes any ride miserable. Not only must you work harder unless you have a tailwind (which I have yet to experience), but descending in strong winds is downright, death-grip scary.

I already talked about the benefits of pacelining, and with today's crosswinds, the same idea applies, though it's not a straight end-on-end line of cyclists. A cyclist in a crosswind will ride just back and to the side of the rider in front of him, forming a diagonal line or "echelon" (see far right image in above graphic). The echelon will pivot in response to the direction of the wind. When you can see an aerial view of the echelons in motion, it is a thing of beauty. But I'm fascinated by road racing, so that's just me.

Photo: (PASCAL PAVANI/AFP/Getty Images)

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)

Tour 101: Stage 3 and some old scoundrels

Recap

Today's stage was 122 miles from Marseille to La Grand-Motte. Mark Cavendish phones it in at the end (sorry couldn't resist) with another handy sprint finish. Fabian Cancellara retains the maillot jaune while Lance Armstrong moves up to third in the individuals standings! Where is Contador? This should make for some interesting dynamics for Team Astana on Tuesday.

Selected standings:

1. Fabian Cancellara
2. Tony Martin
3. Lance Armstrong
4. Alberto Contador
8. Cadel Evans
10. Levi Leipheimer

Bienvenue a la Grande-Motte!

Dirty Rotten Scoundrels

Cheating looms large in major sports of late, especially in professional cycling. How about before, in the early days of the Tour, before modern doping (there were plenty of drugs used back then too, and those were legal, but that's for another post)?

Maurice Garin was the winner of the first Tour de France in 1903. He won again in 1904 but was later stripped of his title for cheating. He wasn't injecting himself with anything, but was accused of hanging onto or riding in cars and even taking trains to get ahead of other riders! He was in fact one among a number of cyclists who were accused of this. (1)

Maurice Garin

Modern day riders certainly couldn't get away with this what with live broadcasts (but wouldn't it be fun to see?). The modern day cheater is a doper. This can mean many things, but when I first started to learn about the subject, I was astonished to discover this was often in reference to blood doping. Blood doping boosts the number of red blood cells in the bloodstream in order to enhance athletic performance. Red blood cells are the vehicle for oxygen that the lungs and muscles need, so you can see how a marked increase in red blood cells would improve an athlete's aerobic capacity and endurance. Earlier dopers would get a transfusion of their own stored blood (or someone else's blood- eww) just before an event.

More recently, boosting red blood cells is achieved with the hormone erythropoietin (EPO). EPO stimulates the production of red blood cells, is easy to inject, and can boost the blood cell count for weeks.

While I don't support cheating, I would take the old-school cheaters over these modern guys any day, seeing them hopping in and out of cars that probably drove slower than modern cyclists can ride, like some farcical silent movie.

(1) The Unknown Tour de France, by Les Woodland. Van der Plas Publications.

Vive Le Tour! Tour de France 101

One of the best parts of summer is when it's once again Tour de France time, and I get to geek out on cycling even more than usual. Thank goodness for Versus channel, which lets us keep up with the action. I love it all- the riders, Bob Roll and Phil Liggett commentating, crazy naked Euros, and even the little jingle they play at the end of the broadcast when they show you the animation of the next day's route.

Most people don't realize that road racing is a team sport. A few years ago, I also thought it was just every man for himself. The truth is there is a lot of team strategy involved, and every rider on a team has his specific role, which is often one of sacrifice for the team's superstar.

I've been gradually learning the intricacies of road racing over my past few seasons following the Tour. One of the best ways to know something is to teach it, so besides just writing about what happened in each day's stage race, I want to detail an aspect about riding as a team that most people wouldn't necessarily know.

Recaps

The Tour began yesterday with the July 4 Prologue in Monaco. It was a time trial stage and Fabian Cancellara came out on top, which is not a big surprise since he's a time trial specialist. As an added girly note, Cancellara has taken over as my Tour hottie, replacing Tom Boonen (busted for cocaine too many times), and Ivan Basso before that (busted in the Operacion Puerto blood doping scandal).

Stage 1 was today, from Monaco to Brignoles, 187 km (about 116 miles). There were some rolling hills in the beginning, but the route flattened out made for an exciting sprint finish. The stage was won by consummate sprinter Mark Cavendish, from the Isle of Man, UK.

So after the first two days of competition, some of the individual standings are as follows:

1. Fabian Cancellara
2. Alberto Contador
6. Levi Leipheimer
10. Lance Armstrong

Today's Lesson: Domestique

In today's telecast there was great coverage of a domestique in action. A domestique (literally "servant" in French) is a rider on a cycling team who has a specific support role to help his teammates and the team leader. He may do anything from setting the pace, to leading a breakaway, to fetching water for his teammates.

The latter example is exactly what was shown today. A cyclist was pictured riding alongside the team car, fetching bottles of water- six in all- to carry and deliver to his teammates. He had one in each of his two water bottle cages, and two in each of his two jersey pockets. I always marvel at these guys riding alongside the team cars so closely, especially for a prolonged time, grabbing bottle after bottle of water. Even more impressive was that he would then need to catch up with his teammates to hand all the bottles off.

Kings and Queens of the Mountain

I've done it! America's Most Beautiful Bike Ride was last Sunday June 7, and all the training and mental preparation paid off. My time was 2 hours faster than when I first conquered this ride as a newbie back in 2007.

Thanks to all who helped me along the way- whether you were able to donate or just give your well-wishes and moral support. Team In Training nationwide raised more than $6.8 million to help find a cure for leukemia, lymphoma, and other blood cancers!

I did this ride along with a few good friends, all of whom had a great day and made some spectacular accomplishments- Congrats to Meena for completing her first century! For me, the ride was good for the most part, but it was not without its troubles.

Saturday- The Arrival

We got to the Embassy Suites around 11:30, and here I was in flip-flops in 50 degree temps and drizzle. Yes I had read the weather reports, but I didn't believe them. Wishful thinking on my part. At 1PM our team had a short tune-up ride, and at this point the drizzle had become rain. I stupidly wore the jacket I planned to wear on event day, and it became muddy and sand-encrusted by the ride end. I actually took my clothes into the shower with me, and used the hotel shampoo to wash all the crud off my gear. Not to mention my bike, made recently shiny by my own careful polishing, was now streaked in grease and grit.

On our way to the tune-up ride

Everyone's big fear was that the weather would be horrible on event day. There was a 30% chance of rain at 6am, which was exactly when we were supposed to start. The thought of descending Spooner Summit with wet brakes was terrifying. This is a downhill where faster cyclists can easily reach 50mph, and chickens like me who feather the brake still hit 35mph. Imagine trying to slow yourself on slick roads with wet rims? No way.

Saturday ended with an early Inspiration Dinner at 4pm, team meeting afterward, and bedtime around 10pm (I should have gone to bed earlier, of course). I know for a fact that more than one teammate prayed for dry weather on Sunday, and the gods did indeed answer.

Event Day

Waking up at 5am is hard to do any day. Waking up at 5am and knowing that particular day you have to ride your bike 100 miles at altitude is really daunting. I was my usual dry-heaving self, queasy from the ungodly hour at which we had to rise, and also from pre-ride jitters.

Getting ready

One positive about the morning was that Jason and I were in a family suite with Meena and Tory, so it was fun to actually be getting ready together. I wasn't hungry at all but forced myself to scarf down my breakfast (which partially contributed to some later troubles). I was downstairs to meet my team by 5:40am.

Legends in Our Own Time

Rather than give an entire account of the day and its minutiae, I want to highlight a few stories that I think will become TNT lore.

Jake-

What can I say about my friend Jake? Jake is a monster on a bike. He got next to no sleep the night before the ride, and he was still a monster. On Saturday Jake dj'd a wedding in the North Bay until midnight. His dad drove him up to Tahoe in the middle of the night and he arrived at 5am with just enough time to check in and throw his stuff into his hotel room.

One of the things I'll remember about that morning was seeing Jake's teammates pinning on his bib number, putting on his bracelet, sticking a ride sticker to his helmet, and otherwise putting him together as a group effort. The other thing I'll remember was later seeing Jake around mile 50, leading his entire team out of Truckee.

Me & Jake 6am

Antonio-

I didn't get to know Antonio very well, but we all knew him as the ex-bike messenger who wore jeans to every training ride. He finally broke down and came out in a pair of actual cycling tights with padding on event day. The problem was he wore boxers under them (ouch!). That, and he also wore only his TNT jersey (it was 48 degrees that morning) and no gloves.

Amanda-

Amanda's story wasn't so much anything that happened on event day. It was more that she could ride on event day at all. She took a number of spills during the season, the worst of which landed her in the hospital after crashing on HWY 1 near Stinson Beach during our 80 mile buddy ride.

My ride group came across that crash not long after it happened, and I can say there is nothing more scary than seeing fire trucks and ambulances and knowing it's a bike accident. When you realize it was one of your teammates, it chills you to the core. Thankfully no one was seriously hurt, but I can't imagine how tough it must have been for Amanda to get back on the bike.

Sheryl-

Sheryl Braum is one of our Honorees. She is a cancer survivor who had a stem cell transplant 6 years ago and has only one working lung. Riding around Tahoe involves climbing some serious hills, and most of us are pushed to limits of our cardiovascular thresholds. How Sheryl can do what we do with one lung is really beyond amazing.

Me-

I'd like to think I had a pretty incredible story that day. A comeback story.

Before our first big climb, at about mile 7, I started to feel nauseous. I'd eaten the same breakfast I always eat, but I'd also doubled the dosage of the sports drink mix I used that morning after doing some ounces-to-liters calculations. Every time I took a sip, I could feel my stomach burn.

Coach Scott and I planned to ride at the back of the group early on, and he was riding behind me as I got increasingly queasy. Then it happened. I threw up in my mouth. Scott was behind me. I couldn't hit him with it, so I held it. Yes, I held it in my mouth. Probably for 5 minutes (luckily it tasted mostly like Cran-Razz Clif Shot).

I started to slow down big time, and Scott passed me. He called out that he was going to catch the rest of the team, and I simply nodded and grunted, my mouth full of electrolyte and bile, and probably a little Amy's Organic Pocket Sandwich. Once Scott got past me, I spit everything out, miraculously avoiding hitting my clothes.

And I kept riding. In fact, I had to climb up Emerald Bay not long after. I can honestly say I felt completely like sh*t. When I rode around Tahoe in 2007, I also got sick (though I didn't vomit). But that happened at mile 70. This time, I was only at mile 10 and didn't know if I could face pushing through 90 more miles.

What if I didn't feel better? What if I had to call Jason to pick me up at the first rest stop? What if I had to let down everyone who donated money to me? How could I go to the Victory Party that night, having not finished the ride? I felt desperate, and the tears almost came. But I just rode. It was the only grounding force at that point.

Eventually I caught up with my team at the first rest stop at Homewood around mile 20. They'd been there for a while, and I knew I needed time to pull myself together, and most importantly dump out the sports drink from my Camelbak and replace it with water and my tried-and-true Nuun tablets. So I told them to go and that they should wait for me at the lunch stop at mile 70.

I rode alone for the next 50 miles. This is not really a bad thing for me, because it let's me ride intuitively. I can hammer when I want to hammer. I can ride slow up a hill when I need to. But I didn't want to finish the ride alone. I really wanted to finish with my team.

I found them at the King's Beach lunch stop. They had arrived there just 5 minutes earlier. I was proud of myself, because it really took some effort to close what was probably a 20 minute gap between me and them. Granted, they stopped for the bathroom once or twice. But hey I threw up in my mouth earlier.

The last 30 miles of the ride went off without a hitch, and we rode pretty hard to the end. There was nothing more rewarding than seeing the Horizon Hotel (the ride finish) looming in the distance from about one mile out, and then crossing the finish line with my team after a long day filled with so many mental and physical highs and lows.

Ride time in the saddle- 6 hours 40 minutes

Overall time including stops- 8 hours 30 minutes

Team Chaos just before roll time




Team Chaos at the finish

Elevation map of the ride

The Agony and the Ecstasy

This past Saturday was definitely the most grueling ride I've ever experienced, and everything that could go wrong that day, did. We rode 80 miles in the Livermore Valley, in 90+ degree heat. Unless you're regularly training in hot weather, you will never be completely prepared for the toll high temperatures will take on your body and mind. The upside of the ride was that it was a relatively flat, fast route. Team Chaos finished the ride in about 6 1/2 hours. But let me rewind to the start of the day...

An Untimely Timeline

6:21am
Received a call from one of my SAG volunteers. She cancels due to a close friend's medical emergency. It's bad for us, but no comparison with how bad it is for her.

6:35am
My ride picks me up. I lag, we get gas, we get our third passenger. We're running late. I call Coach Doug to formulate a new gameplan for the cancelled SAG stop.

7:40am
Arrive in Livermore. Consult with Coach Doug and we find a new SAG volunteer.Doug goes to buy food.

8:30am
Team Chaos rolls.

Mile 5
My first flat of the day.

Mile 20
Team Chaos riders not keeping single file. Speeding car passes us in opposite lane and forces oncoming car into shoulder. Coach Scott is not happy.

Mile 25
Rachel stops for a bike adjustment. I stop with her and we are separated fromTeam Chaos.

Mile 28
We find Iyer sitting under a tree. He has early signs of heat exhaustion.

Mile 34
David swerves to avoid a squirrel, crashes and cracks his carbon road bars. He SAGs out.

Mile 40
Rachel needs a nature break. We separate from Team Chaos once again. Just me and her for the next 20 miles.

(The heat is becoming oppressive)

Mile 50
Third SAG stop. We regroup with Team Chaos.

Mile 54
Stop in Sunol. My first feelings of nausea.

Mile 60
Begin Palomares climb. (The heat is now unbearable). I get my second flat, same tire.

Mile 62
I'm riding strong, albeit feeling like crap. I notice teammates sitting and laying on the ground at various points along climb.

Mile 63
One of our Mentors gets heat stroke. He has stopped sweating and is disoriented.

Mile 68
SAG stop 4. I sit for a while. I'm woozy. I accidentally step on Meena's dog's tail.

Mile 73 Slow ascent up Dublin Grade. No one speaks. All are exhausted and ill.

Mile 74
I spot Iyer laying under a bush.

Mile 76
My tire is going flat again. Scott tops it off with Co2. 2 1/2 miles to go. I am at my limit and start to dry heave a little.

Mile 77
One of my teammates, separated from Team Chaos, breaks down and sits on the curb one mile out from the finish, crying. Anonymous Mormon family in a van with 10 kids picks her up and takes her to the end.

Mile 78
3:30pm
We're done! We sit on curb outside Chevron station. Mark buys us all water. It's all any of us can manage to stomach.

4:30pm
Waiting for my carpool buddies to roll in...

5:30pm
We leave.

The Journey Home

Somewhere on 580 in Oakland, my bike almost falls off the bike rack. We pull into the shoulder on the fast lane side, and I'm terrified. You hear about people getting killed when they step out of their car on the freeway. Obviously, we survived it unscathed.

One of our passengers has a medical issue and urgently needs to go to the bathroom. We try to take the last Oakland exit, but the driver instead gets in the bus-only diamond lane. We are promptly pulled over and issued a ticket. We ask the officer if our friend can use the bathroom just on the other side of the freeway wall (by the Bay), but are yelled at and told to "go in the car."

That's not really an option, so we try to make it to Treasure Island. Traffic is at a standstill and it takes forever. It must be prom night because numerous stretch Hummers roll alongside us, with hoochies and meathead boys bursting out of moonroofs. Our teammate is on a downward spiral and bangs on the doors and sobs while she considers her bathroom options (or lack thereof). We finally make it to treasure island and she hops out and goes on the side of the road, just as a limo of promgoers whizzes past. We later stop again in downtown for another bathroom break.

I finally arrive home at 8:10pm. Friends from Sacramento have been waiting there for me since 7:00, and I am sun-baked, salty, grease-covered and smelly.

All heat, no shade in Livermore