October 8, 2009
A teammate and I were having a discussion today about bike racing (of course!). He posed a question for which neither one of us could really come up with a great answer. We both thought that you’d definitely be the man with the answer for this one though… How can teams like Columbia HTC control the sprint/flat stages so well in a grand tour, but seem to be helpless when it comes to the classics? Thanks for the insight on this one!
Scott Carmichael - Sparta, TennesseeScott, you and your buddy are indeed correct. I will be able to give you an answer to this one. Realize though, that I am friends with the team's directors, so I can tell them what you said if you don't send me some money.
You know, I walked up to Brian Holm at the Tour of California this year, and he told me he nearly didn't recognize me because I looked like "a eeepy" (hippy)
But to answer your question -- I believe there are several reasons why certain riders and teams murder it in the stage races and then seem to come up a bit short in the classics.
First, you have to understand that the two forms of races are almost completely separate sports. In modern cycling, a rider needs to jump into the classics head first and be totally dedicated to success in that period of the season. It's basically a question of priorities - do you use up all of your ammo in April, or do you cool your jets a wee bit and wait for the races that matter more (perhaps) to your sponsor? With that said, you have to realize that not every rider on the team can maintain that season-long awesomeness that somebody like Sean Kelly seemed to be able to do. A lot of the domestiques can only keep the top-form up for a month or two, so if the TdF is priority numero uno, form is scheduled for July.
Next there is the problem that the classics are awfully hard to ride. If my cobweb-filled brain isn't failing me on this, there really haven't been that many teams that were ever completely dominant in the classics. In my era, it was Panasonic, and I honestly believe they did it better than anyone else - but it was a different time. Most riders need a year or two or more before they begin to understand the classics and are able to stay in the front when the racing starts happening. Seriously, the run-up for the Oude Kwaremont starts heating up 10km out, and you feel like you're pedaling 50km per hour and in a boxing march at the same time. If you don't make it onto the hill in the top 20 or so, you're screwed. See this little, flat-looking section of the Oude Karemont? That is one of the most painful sections of road in the entire world. A new rider to the classics might think he understands this, but until he experiences the insanity, he'll most likely find himself in the wrong place at the wrong time.Adding to that, people often assume that the classics are like the flat stages of the Tour de France or any other stage race. They are not. In fact, they are probably closer to a lot of the mountain stages. They're just designed for a different rider style and body type. With all of the wind, rain, cobbles, mud, and crashes, these single-day races become a war of attrition in which team leaders are often left all alone, just like in the mountain stages.
I remember the first day I was in Belgium, watching a videotape of the Ronde van Vlaanderen from a few days before. I remember thinking, "what is so hard about this?" I didn't really see any hills but dudes were detonating left and right. Man ... was I wrong.
Oh, remember also that the Manx sprinter guy they have can find his way around a classic pretty darn good.
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5 Responses to “A teammate and I were having a discussion today about bike racing (of course!). He posed a question for which neither one of us could really come up with a great answer. We both thought that you’d definitely be the man with the answer for this one though… How can teams like Columbia HTC control the sprint/flat stages so well in a grand tour, but seem to be helpless when it comes to the classics? Thanks for the insight on this one!”
Great stuff! I like your style. Bookmarked.
As usual, great post! Don’t the roads also have a lot to do with it? Much harder to control a pack when the road is 4 feet wide (and there are really only two decent troughs to ride in) when compared to a freshly paved 4-lane thoroughfare.
Thanks for sharing the knowledge on this one. I think where I went wrong is that I (and I suspect both my teammate and I) was under the assumption that the classics must be like a flat or hilly stage in the Tour. Also, I know that in our opinion, the classics ARE bike racing, and I guess we just figured that sponsors must think this way too. But you’re right, I’m sure sponsors have the Tour in mind way before the classics even start (at least the American sponsors do).
If I could pick any bike race I wanted to win more than any other, it would be Roubaix. So I figured lots more of the classics dudes and their teams would bring some pretty monstrous form into the race. But maybe I’m in the minority on this one?
Thanks again, Joe. Now I gotta lick this envelope and drop your check in the mail!
[...] Joe Parkin responds to the question of why a strong team like Columbia can’t control a spring classic the way it can control a stage of a Grand Tour. [...]
Hi Joe,
Greg LeMond once told me that he considers the absolute most-intense moments in cycling to occur during Flanders. He said that ten minutes leading into the Oude Kwaremont are like an all-out, sprint finish, with speeds reaching towards 70 kph as the top guys all try to get to the front and stay there.
Then the hard part of the Flanders course starts…
He used this as an example of why cyclists should focus more of their training time on developing power.
It’s cool to watch Flanders from one of the bars in Melden, just outside of Oudenaarde. Usually, a huge pack of racers goes by on the motorway at a seemingly-leisure pace, heading toward Berchem, where the Kwaremont starts. Then, in an ungodly-short time, many fewer riders come back into Melden on one of the small roads on its southern side, having completed a ~50 km loop of cobbles and short, steep climbs. Then they make a sharp right turn and head up the Koppenberg, for some more sorting-out… The first time I saw this, I didn’t understand how the riders could complete that section of the course so quickly or, what had happened to the breakaway group that had seemed to be comfortably up the road on the pack.
On another note: I was very sorry to read about VDB. He was just an amazing talent– I had really hoped that he would sort it all out and make a decent career again.
Best Regards,
Mark
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