Who is a better athlete: A world class marathon runner or a WC tour de France biker?
Who is a better athlete: A world class marathon runner or a WC tour de France biker?
Very easy answer: The wc marathon runner is due to NOT relying on motion-assisted apparatus such as a 30K ($) 7 lb carbon fiber bike that allows him/her to REST on the down hills (and/or straight aways) versus a marathon runner who has NO rest period as it is a matter of physics: The pure human body weight versus natural gravity. The biker has two wheels coasting them forward as their legs and arms are inactive IF they are not using them while hitting the down hills when the intentionally rest them for a oncoming uphill. I can bet 100 million dollars that a WC marathon runner from Kenya who runs a marathon in two hours will have a much better resting pulse rate compared to a WC biker. (Give /take 10-20 percent). Note: I just think that bikers are over rated and there are bikers that are better than other bikers but since those bikers cannot afford a 20 thousand dollar carbon fiber bike, they will remain behind the rich, sponsored biker that can afford the special bikes. In the world of marathon running, there is never a problem like this...
Who cares, both are chemically induced.
Ha ha but what about the 40-60 percent them who are not?
Can we go with "cyclists" rather than "biker"?
I might go with the cyclist. Riding in a pack requires a lot more skill than running in a pack. Way more dangerous.
Plus the effort of riding (even accounting for drafting and coasting) that many days is pretty demanding.
at first I was going to say that they'd be equal, but then you need to consider what pools of people are drawn to those sports. whoever has the most participants probably has the best elite athletes. So I'd say that runners beat the cyclists. there could be some outliers who go against this logic, but that's fine.
more people around the world are doing running events than cycling events.
Hasn't it been demonstrated that elite marathoners make pretty lousy cyclists and vice versa?
No amount of training makes an elite marathoners an elite cyclist
Therefore which do you think makes one more of an 'athlete' ? The sport that literally anyone can an least master the basics of or the one that requires team Dynamics, pack strategy, attacks, and considerable bike handling skills.
Note the question was not 'who is the best at exercising'. But even that is arguably to the cyclist as they are on the bike about 2x the time any elite thon'er is on their feet
The Ironman was created to settle this very dispute.
Some 40 years later the jury is still out on the main topic, but we at least know who wears the ugliest kit.
Actually now most elite runners are relying on carbon fiber so this is no longer true as of 2017. It is just a lot cheaper than 30K. $250 carbon fibre springs.
reed wrote:
at first I was going to say that they'd be equal, but then you need to consider what pools of people are drawn to those sports. whoever has the most participants probably has the best elite athletes. So I'd say that runners beat the cyclists. there could be some outliers who go against this logic, but that's fine.
more people around the world are doing running events than cycling events.
You might be wrong.
In reality the most talented athletes chase sports that actually pay.
Galen Rupps salary is measly compared to the 100th ranked cyclist.
The TdF alone has more money being paid to cycling athletes than all the professional running salaries and race purses combined. The TdF is also the most attended sporting event in the world. Single stages often attract a million fans plus. You'd have to combine all the Olympics to equal a single years TdF fan count.
Fitness-wise, not even close.
TdF riders use more calories per stage than a marathon racer does in a single race. Then they do it again the next day.
TdF riders expose themselves to extreme danger even death every stage.
If Gale Rupp ever experienced a 45 mph crash while wearing basically underwear he would quit the sport forever. Mist would. Pro road cyclist are nuts.
Cyclist can train high end aerobic system 4 to 6 hours a day, everyday. (Equivalent to a long run everyday)
Cycling actually takes athleyic skill.
Most elite disrance runners couldn't dribble a basketball and run at the same time without tripping.
The most telling fact though is the chicks.
I have never ever seen presenters on the podium of a running race that look like the ladies awarding the daily winners of the TdF.
Of course, the most dominant runner today is Caster Semenya so you running fans get to gawk at that. You really got that going for you. In that regard, running is more dominant than cycling if you're a hermaphrodite with y chromosomes....
Cyclists. They have close to 100 race days/year
gargon fibre wrote:
Actually now most elite runners are relying on carbon fiber so this is no longer true as of 2017. It is just a lot cheaper than 30K. $250 carbon fibre springs.
+ 1.
They are both being aided by carbon fiber mechanical devices so that argument is now invalid.
I actually think cyclists, swimmers, triathletes, canoeists, kayakers, rowers, gymnasts, fencers , cross country skiers, biathletes, speed skaters etc. work a lot harder, work a lot more and need to hurt lot more than runners do...
I think the whole 'they rest on the downhills' thing is preposterous. How much descending do you think there is in cycling? You do realise that in order to coast down the mountain, they first had to spend an hour cycling to the top? Races don't just start at the top of a mountain and end at the beach.
I would give it to the cyclist. A top marathon runner suffers for a little over two hours on a single day. If we're talking grand tour cycle racing (the only type of race most people are aware of), we're talking 21 straight days of racing at pace. Well, no, they generally get a rest day once per week. A stage generally lasts 5-6 hours. So 5-6 hours, at race pace, for nineteen days in three weeks. Different hotel / bed every night. Sharing rooms with teammates. Stage ends, it's not like you go home and get in your own bed. You get off the bike and into a bus seat and spend X number of hours on the road, transferring to the next stage's start.
This all to say nothing of the weather. Three weeks, you race through whatever the weather is doing (though they are these days, like everywhere else, starting to pu$$y this out quite a bit, sidelining stages for being too hot or cold or windy or rainy). Sweltering heat. Snow. Wind. Sand. Rain. Whatever. You deal with it.
You also fail to mention that while they're "resting" on the downhills (leaders actually pedal just as hard on the downhills as they do on the ups), they're also careening down a twisting cliffside road at 60 mph on a 6-kilo piece of plastic, wearing microns-thin spandex. Many cyclists have died from crashes in races. How many elite marathoners have died while pushing the limits racing? The descents in pro cycling are not just some long gentle ramp they coast down while they take a breather. The downhills are often the most nerve-racking and gruelling part of the stage.
And, as has been mentioned, contrary to popular knowledge the tour de france is not the only race in cycling. These guys race 100+ days of the year. Other races. Other styles of race. A one-day race requires entirely different tactics and mindset from a 3-week race. As does a shorter stage race of 7 days. Racing in australia or dubai is totally different from racing in belgium in the spring. And how many races does an elite marathoner do in year? And how different, tactically and terrain-wise, are those races?
Not world class but national level cyclist here, I'm rubbish at running! I don't think its comparable. I know very few runners who came into cycling and did well, those who did were specialist at shorter distance events, sub 4min hill climbs mainly.
At the same time I don't know many great cyclists who went into running and did anything.
As a competitive runner and a recreational cyclist, I'd say at the recreational level, runners and cyclists are about equal. Both are probably less athletic than the recreational Crossfitter.
But at the world class level, there is no comparison. TdF cyclists put in massive 4-hour efforts for three weeks. I am in awe of their skill on downhills. Even riding in the pack is dangerous.
The majority of posters on LetsRun could run world-class marathon pace for a minute or two. I doubt if any could survive two minutes of Alps downhill at 60mph.
fisky wrote:
As a competitive runner and a recreational cyclist, I'd say at the recreational level, runners and cyclists are about equal. Both are probably less athletic than the recreational Crossfitter.
But at the world class level, there is no comparison. TdF cyclists put in massive 4-hour efforts for three weeks. I am in awe of their skill on downhills. Even riding in the pack is dangerous.
The majority of posters on LetsRun could run world-class marathon pace for a minute or two. I doubt if any could survive two minutes of Alps downhill at 60mph.
This is the thing here. Cycling is a tough one to gauge because very few people have experience with the parameters these guys deal with. Riding in a 100-man pack for hours, at speed, mere inches from other riders on every side of you, that's a task whose difficulty can't be gauged because most people have never ridden in a peloton. Same with the climbs and the speed of the climbs because most people haven't ridden up the Tourmalet or Alpe d'Huez. Even standing on the side of the road as a spectator lends you little insight because you have little frame of reference for how fast they are going, nor for the fact that they've been going that fast for the last 4 hours.
And yes, the downhills are simply unbelievable. I have some experience with cycling and have ridden up some of the marquee climbs and compared my times against the times of the world-class and it is simply unbelievable how fast they go.
Here's a story. I'm an alright amateur descender. It helps to have regular access to legit mountains, and I do. Live in europe, with an HC climb right out my back door. Couple months ago I'm coming back down to the house. Just like you see on TV, single-lane road, twisting mountain descent, steep cliffs off the side of the road with no barriers. I'm not trying to PR or anything, but was moving right along. Now here comes some other dude by me on the left, in top gear, on a f-ing time trial bike. Passes me literally like I'm standing still. I got down and tried to hang with him but couldn't even remotely hold his wheel. Within a km he was so far down the road I couldn't even see him on the distant upcoming switchbacks. I later looked him up on strava and he was just some guy. Not even a continental pro.
So if some non-pro but talented weekend warrior can blow past me on a downhill like that, to point that I can't even keep him in sight at my absolute limit, I literally cannot fathom what it must be like to descend like the world-class guys, Sagan or Nibali or that level of rider. Hell for that matter I can't even imagine what it must be like to have to follow them on a camera motorcycle.
Monte wrote:
I can bet 100 million dollars that a WC marathon runner from Kenya who runs a marathon in two hours will have a much better resting pulse rate compared to a WC biker. (Give /take 10-20 percent).
You have no idea what you are talking about.
Miguel Indurain had a resting pulse rate of 28 bpm
Big Mig wrote:
Miguel Indurain had a resting pulse rate of 28 bpm
Is that like his VO2 max of 88 that was actually 79? Another made up number?