Post Tour Analysis

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Post Tour Analysis

I have said before that most of stage racing is mistake management. If you coach cycling, you will spend most of every stage race trying to minimize or recover from your mistakes and/or trying to take advantage of everyone else's mistakes in subsequent stages. If you can, you try to get the other top competitors to make mistakes.

One thing you have to learn to do is to know who your competition is and is not so that you don't waste time and energy racing against riders who will not finish ahead of you on GC anyway. Bike racing is energy efficiency management and stage racing requires even greater management of your energy reserves because you only have so much energy you can expend within any given period of time or event. Everything has to be built around that.

Basso made his first mistake by riding sick in the Giro when he should have quit and recovered to prepare for the Tour. That cost him time in the first time trial, stage 10 mountain stage, and maybe even in the second time trial because he started fast and faded. I hope he and Riis don't take his problems as having been from just riding the Giro and Tour in the same year because there is a huge difference in damage to the body from winning the Giro and riding hard in any event when ill or even just recovering from being ill. The latter does much more damage and requires much more recovery time.

The T-Mobile team succumbed to Lance's sucker punch on stages 8 and 9 costing them considerable energy reserves plus their internal team problems added to this. They paid for it dearly in stage ten with all their top riders losing a lot of ground. The latter problems haunted them until late into the Tour costing them dearly. Great team chemistry is a must for any team sport.

Mancebo, Leipheimer, Rasmussen, and EVans all lost too much time in the time trials, team time trial, and had to make up that time on those who didn't when they got to the mountains. I hope everyone realizes just how much climbing there was in this Tour with it being designed to beat Lance. Normally, a Tour has about three or four mountain stages and five our six mountain stages being considered a lot of mountain stages. This year, there were 10 mountain stages with climbs of category 2 or higher. That gave the climbers considerably more advantage than normal and made it possible for them to get into and remain in the top ten easier than the time trialists.

The rule of thumb for losing time in the Tour and still being able to win is that you don't want to lose more than a maximum of one minute in any GC stage such as time trials, team time trial, and mountain GC stages and, if you lose more than 5 minutes, you are out of contention for the Yellow Jersey because you will have to make that time up against the best GC riders in the world which is incredibly difficult to do and pretty much impossible to make up that much time on some one once it is lost. Many have tried and failed.

By the time they reached stage 10, the first significant mountain GC stage, Mancebo had lost 3'41", Leipheimer 2'33", Rasmussen 5'14", and Evans 3'31" just from the first time trial and team time trial. Those are huge holes to dig your way out of in the Tour. Rasmussen was permitted to accidently make up his lost time by racing for KOM and the peloton letting him finish too far ahead in one stage.

Lance's sucker punch caused Ullrich to lose 2'14", Vino 5'18", and Kloden 2'14" in stage 10 alone. Causing others to make mistakes which will lose them valuable time is very desired in stage racing. If you add to that what they had already lost in the first time trial and team time trial then Ullrich had lost 3'52", Vino 6'41", and Kloden 4'45". They were bleeding time all over the place and pretty much out of the race by that time. Only Ullrich had even a prayer where as Basso had only lost 2'30" in those two stages and was still a serious contender in the Tour until the closing stages.

All these mistakes caused Lance's competition to lose so much time so that when his mistakes began to bear fruit, the other riders' mistakes saved Lance's butt. But it was still close because Discovery broke in every stage with a major climb from stage 14 on leaving Lance exposed and one tactic Lance used to handle this crisis or his crisis management strategy was to let riders like Vino who were really down on time go up the road while he watched those closest to him. For example, he knew that he could let Vino get four or five minutes up the road before he became concerned and had to expend energy to keep him from gaining more time. Lance does this so brilliantly that, even with his team breaking, he wasn't in serious trouble until stages 16 and 18 when his legs were starting to tire, Lance had to call to get Bruyneel to send Hincapie back into the fight to help, Ullrich attacked Hincapie back out of the fight, and forced Lance to set pace to suppress Ullrich and Basso's relay attacking and save Lance's legs. In stage 18, it was interesting to see Lance countering the attacks and, when he finally was forced to set pace to suppress the attacks from Ullrich and Basso, to see Basso attack by Lance and try to drive Lance off his wheel. Prior to this, Lance was strong enough that when he set pace at the front, everyone else was either driven to Lance's wheel or off it. This was the first time in the Tour that some one had been able to attack him while he was setting pace. It is possible that his legs were tiring enough that, if there had been a cat 1 or better climb following that climb, they may have been able to break his legs in this Tour, as happened in two previous Tours. We will never know but it sure was touch and go for a minute. Lance held on for a great win and I congratulate him.

Next Year

As a speculative look into what we might expect for next year and to teach you how to analyze your performance to modify your training and improve your performance, I want to show you how to do a brief coach's performance analysis. I want to look at the performances of the returning riders for next year (assuming that Ullrich will return) from second to ninth on GC plus Hincapie, Valverde, Savoldelli, Popobych, and Kloden. You have to keep in mind that a lot will change but this is how a good coach should evaluate his riders following an event to see where he has to make modifications in their training to improve their performance, assuming all of these riders want to be GC riders.

First, it has to be stated that, at this time, Basso has to be the rider to beat next year. Therefore, my analysis will be based on a comparison to Basso where we are looking at improving riders to beat Basso or to improve Basso to keep him from being beat.

If Riis wants to improve Basso to keep him from being beat next year, understanding that his competition should also be trying to improve their riders to beat Basso so that Basso shouldn't be facing exactly the same racers he did this year, we see that where Basso was still weakest was in the individual time trials. The team did really great keeping Basso 2" seconds behind Discovery in the team time trials.

Basso finished 7th among the 13 riders I am considering for the Tour GC for next year losing 1'26" to Zabriskie. Ullrich, Leipheimer, Vino, Landis, Hincapie, and Popovych all beat him by anywhere from a few seconds to Vino and Hincapie beating him by over 20" in a 19 km TT. In the last time trial, Basso did better beating all but 2 of the riders being considered with Ullrich beating him by well over one minute and Vino only beating him by seconds. But, even Hicapie, after towing everyone all over France for three weeks, didn't lose that much time on Basso; just 31" down. Riis will almost definitely continue developing Basso's time trialing while trying to also at least maintain his climbing, if not improve it.

For the umpteenth year in a row, Ullrich started slow and got stronger as the Tour progressed giving Basso the same advantage Lance has enjoyed by being able to put time on Ullrich before Ullrich gets his racing form. Ullrich beat Basso by only 18" in the first time trial and by over one minute in the second time trial but he lost time to Basso in every mountain GC stage. Clearly, Ullrich has to improve his climbing if he wants to beat Basso next year and he has to be in better form at the beginning of the Tour so he doesn't spend the Tour trying to dig his way out of a time hole.

Mancebo's weakness should be obvious. He lost over 5 minutes in the two individual time trials putting him out of contention for the Yellow Jersey. He really needs to improve his time trialing if he ever wants to wear the Yellow Jersey in Paris. But his team also lost him 1'10" in the team time trial so their team needs some time trialing work as a whole or he will have that time hole to dig out of every year. They should try to get that down to 30 seconds or less. In spite of expending a lot of energy racing for KOM until he reached the top ten on GC, Mancebo managed to beat Basso in stage 10 and still finish reasonably close to him for the rest of the mountain GC stages. He could use a little improvement on climbing but not racing for KOM will take care of most of his losses in the mountains. It has been fun watching Mancebo develop to this level over the last five or six years. If he improves his time trialing, he could become Basso's biggest threat.

Leipheimer beat Basso by a few seconds in the first time trial but lost over a minute to him in the last time trial so he clearly needs to work on his time trialing. He also lost from one minute to over two and half minutes to Basso on the mountain GC stages so he needs to work on his climbing even more. Then his team lost him 1'20" in the team time trial so his team needs to work on that.

Vino beat all of these guys in the first time trial and only lost to Ullrich in the last time trial by 53". He clearly showed he can climb but did so consistently in the wrong mountain stages costing him time in the right mountain stages. He is a very aggressive rider and may have to temper and control that aggression to be more strategic in his racing. This may be his biggest weakness. He will need to work with his new team for the team time trial and should just keep developing. With the right coach, he could be a threat to Basso next year.

Rasmussen finished last out of this group in the first time trial and, I believe, he succumbed to the stress of trying to hold onto third on GC and part of this was probably because of it being such a surprise. It was very clear that he started racing for KOM and just accidentally found himself in second on GC. He clearly needs to learn to ride a road bike better and deal with the stress if he wants to contend for GC in the future. He is an excellent climber and poor time trialist. He needs a lot of work on time trialing and most likely will never finish above top five on GC unless he does improve his time trialing.

Evans finished 9th in this group of 13 riders in the first time trial and 5th in the last time trial showing he can time trial better when motivated to do so. But he still needs a lot of work on time trialing. His team also lost him the most in this group on the team time trial, losing 1'50". He also consistently lost too much time in the mountain GC stages but climbed strong in the KOM mountain stages. He needs to work on his climbing and, over all, has quite a bit of work to do but is young with plenty of time.

Landis did very well in the first time trial only losing 9 seconds to Vino and beating Basso by 24 seconds. That is easily in a competitive range. He did lose over a minute and half to Ullrich in the last time trial but still only lost about 8 seconds to Basso. Landis' team lost him 50" in the team time trial and his team needs to improve a little on that. The thing that killed Landis is that he clearly broke in the 15th stage because of the length and so many tough climbs losing 4'30" to Basso putting him out of the race. In stages 10 and 14, he did much better only losing anywhere from 35" to over a minute. When you are that close in time trialing, even those little loses count a lot in the mountains. He needs to work on his time trialing a little and climbing a lot.

Valverde can only be analyzed for the first part of the Tour because he had to drop out because of injuries from a crash. He lost almost a minute to Basso in the first time trial and really needs to work on his time trialing. His team lost him 1'10" in the team time trial and needs a lot of work on this. He won stage 10 being the only rider Lance couldn't drop with his attacking in that stage showing he can climb very well. So his greatest weakness is time trialing and he really needs to work on it a lot, plus keep his face off the ground. That helps.

Savoldelli won the Giro showing he is a strong GC rider but he should still analyze his performance for improvement because the other riders will try to improve and he wants to win the Giro more than once in the rest of his career. He only lost 9" to Basso in the first time trial but lost almost five minutes to Basso in the last time trial telling me he was probably dead meat and not too motivated from towing Lance and the peloton all over France for three weeks. We saw in the Giro that he does need to work on his climbing for next year or Basso will beat him in the Giro as well as the Tour.

Popovych is a young rider who just won the White Jersey and did quite well finishing 12th on GC. He beat Basso in the first time trial and worked as a domestique for Lance during the Tour though he was clearly being protected for the White Jersey much more than the other team mates. He has a lot of time to improve, showed he can time trial and climb, and should just generally keep developing. It could take him from three to five years to make the top three to five on GC the way it has Basso and Mancebo but he could surprise us. He has a lot of potential.

Kloden did poorly in the first time trial losing over half a minute in a short time trial. He was 10th out of our 13 riders though he only lost a little over 30 seconds to Basso. He should work on getting that down to where he can beat Basso. In spite of racing hard in the KOM mountains stages of 8 and 9, he kept his loses to Basso down to only about one minute for stages 10 and 14 but lost a lot of time in 15, which I assume was from fracturing his wrist in a crash and having to quit a few stages later. I think a good general GC program would turn Kloden into a Tour hopeful in the near future.

Last but not least is Hincapie. He finished second in our group in the first time trial only losing 4 seconds to Vino and beating Basso by 29". Even after towing half the world around France for three weeks, he got 6th in our group in the last time trial only losing 31" seconds to Basso. He lost a lot of time in the mountain GC stages because of working as a domestique for Lance but still managed to win the most difficult GC mountain stage in the Tour this year, stage 15. Yes, he had to do very little work in the break to win that stage but for anyone to win that stage with tired legs from towing for two weeks even after sucking wheel up to the final climb is quite an achievement especially when you realize that all the other GC riders including Lance sucked wheel on the Discovery Team all the way to the end of the stage. He is clearly one of the best time trialist in the world, can climb with the best, and, with the right team and coach could give Basso a run for his money. Even after all the work he did for Lance, Hincapie still finished 14th on GC with everyone who finished ahead of him and many who finished behind him on GC having been protected riders. I hope some one realizes Hincapie's potential and gives him a chance. That would be fun.

So, you should do a performance analysis like this and use what I teach in my e-book to help you custom design your training program and fine tune it after every event your ride whether competitive or reacreational. Always look to eliminate your weaknesses and build on your strengths.

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