I'm not saying that I could do it, but don't those guys ride pretty easy for most of the stages? I remember watching one time, and the commentator said that lance's heart rate was at 140 riding in the peloton. That's a very easy jog. Even lance said that the marathon was the hardest physical thing he's ever done.
Maybe someone with more knowledge on this subject can correct me if I'm wrong.
a very easy jog for 5 hours a day suddenly aint so easy Mr Troll.
Is the difficulty of the marathon exaggerated? Running 3:00/km isn't very hard for a world class runner, and yet only so many people have run 2:06:36.
not to mention 140 is not the heartrate of a very easy jog
_ wrote:
a very easy jog for 5 hours a day suddenly aint so easy Mr Troll.
How does asking a question make me a troll, Mr. Troll?
Ask anybody who's done both running and cycling competitively, and they will tell you that it's much easier to ride easily on a bike for a long period of time than it is to run easily for a long period of time.
get ugly wrote:
I'm not saying that I could do it, but don't those guys ride pretty easy for most of the stages? I remember watching one time, and the commentator said that lance's heart rate was at 140 riding in the peloton. That's a very easy jog. Even lance said that the marathon was the hardest physical thing he's ever done.
Maybe someone with more knowledge on this subject can correct me if I'm wrong.
The pounding is something his body isn't used to.
It's a different kind of pain in a bike race. Sell your 20" bike with the basket and horn, and go buy a Trek Madone. Then go bike a century. Then realize that most of the stages in the tour are 20-40 miles longer than that, and up mountains. Then do that 21 days in a row. Then come back and tell us what your back and legs feel like. It's a different kind of pain than running a marathon. Also most of us don't run with shin splints like Lance did yesterday.
Yep, it's just different. I think lance was counting on cross-over fitness carrying him through this race, and he found out it isn't that easy. Although he surly did better than most given the minimal training he put into it.
I think if any runner tried to hop on a bike and ride in a peloton it would be easy...for a while. After hours or days of this it's a different story. Then you have to consider the days on the tour where they're climbing which is a totally different pain than running. You just have to go with the burn and put up with it, whereas in running your legs just die on you without that burn.
It seems to me that in biking you really can will yourself to keep going whereas in running sometimes you just can't keep going.
Yes the Tour de France is really easy. They just pretend to be suffering up those mountains in 100 degree heat and high humidity. It's all a show for the crowds and cameras.
Even the crashes at 40mph are faked.
Yes there is a lot of money at stake, but the results are decided before the race starts.
Bicycle racing is as difficult as your competition wants to make it and as hard as you are willing to work to make the race. It is much more tactical than running generally, especially for multiday tours where you may chose to attack one day and sit in the pack the next, expending the highest effort only when it will most damage your opponent. Consistency is at a premium, you can not win the Tour in a day, but you can easily lose it.
In the end, the winner is the one with the best combination of training, tactics, and willingness to endure extreme physical discomfort. Same as running.
The truth is that only 30 mins per stage is hard. For these guys racing on a flat road for 3-4 hours deep in the bunch (taking no wind) is no different from sitting in the sofa watching TV.
abhd wrote:
The truth is that only 30 mins per stage is hard. For these guys racing on a flat road for 3-4 hours deep in the bunch (taking no wind) is no different from sitting in the sofa watching TV.
Truth is the first half of a marathon is not hard either.
Any good runner could get on a bike and ride 100 miles in a day....the only problem is getting on the bike the next day with saddle soreness.
The tour would be like elite marathoners running 6 min. miles for 50k then racing a 10k. Still better than most people can do, even though relatively "easy" for them...
Different sports, different muscles, apples, oranges.
I have done both, a 8 day Pro 1/2 Stage Race and a 2:35 marathon.
You do the marathon and it is done in 2.5 - 3 hours. Boom Said and done!
The Stage race was much harder, travel, and pushing your body hard day after day.
Nothing like the tour. 8 days is only 1/3 of the tour and i was on my ass for weeks. I can't fathom racing something like that.
I think any runner that is seriously curious about this question should invest in decent bike, a USCF license, join a good local bike club for a year or two, and find out for themself. After I retired from running after the 1988 Olympic Trials I did exctly that. I joined the Northeast Bike Club of Bedford, MA. Bike racing is really fun. But it's also more dangerous than running. I met folks there who had just as much knowledge about physiology of exercise as most of the runners I'd known. Some trained "high miles" (350+/week, like I did) and some alot less. After a couple of years I was able to place high enough in the New England USCF Time Trial Championships to go to the Masters National TT Championships in Borego Springs, CA where I was soundly beaten by dozens and dozens of better riders.
A few reasons I eventually returned to running:
The amount of free time I have in my day. I found that to get the equivalent of a one hour run I needed to spend about twice as long on a bike. If you are married with children then you know how precious that hour can be. Maintenance time needed to keep your running shoes in top mechanical condition: almost none. Unless you have enough money to employ a technician or a GREAT sponsor who can staff the team with one, plan on devoting a decent amount of time to keep your bike tuned up perfectly.
Mechanical difficulties. The physical demands on the body during competition I found to be very similar. However, having to DNF in a bike race because of a flat, or another mechanical difficulty when I had invested so much into the training and I had paced myself well the first 3/4 of the race was frustrating.
Injuries? The myth that bike racers don't get injuries is bunk. Ask a cyclist how many times he's missed a season due to a broken collarbone or the like. (I had one.)There are plenty of injuries to cyclists, some are even fatal. To both runners and riders, be careful out there!!!
The team aspect. The team stuff on bikes can get pretty political sometimes. I brought a pretty darn good cardio system to NEBC when I came, and as a result had some decent early success in the pack races (crits and road races). But even a good novice rider should plan on having to "Pull" during the race (let other more senior team members draft behind them, thus conserving their energy), not to mention "lead out" in the late stage of the race. This is done by letting the team's best sprinter draft behind you from say a mile before the finish line, you go as hard as you can until they slingshot past you to the win. You have to pay these "dues" before you'll get your crack at the top.
As the title of Lance's book sugggests "It's not about the Bike" you don't need the most expensive bike to beat riders of similar quality. But I'd have to admit that if you don't have a pretty good bike for things like Time Trial you won't have a chance. When I went to Nationals the fastest guys had great bikes and more importantly the man and the machine were one, perfectly syncronized.
The TDF is a tough enough event to make _everyone_ who does it want to take *sdiorets* and *ope* to get through it.
When the going gets tough those guys are usually up at around 170, for hours on end. You also have to be concentrating the whole time on not crashing. I'd argue that pushing yourself to the absolute limit is difficult no matter what you are doing.