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Tour de France: How professional cycling teams eat and cook on the road

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Tour de France: How professional cycling teams eat and cook on the road

#111

Post by hinkley »

deff wrote: post #25

Regarding drugs, yes it´s most likely still happening, but nowhere near the levels it used to be. Riders are tested a lot and have to provide year-round whereabouts for random testing. They also have a frequently updated blood passport to detect sudden changes in values caused by PEDs. It can never be fully waterproof, but at least serious efforts are made.

At the Track and Field qualifiers for the 2024 Olympics they kept talking about how one of the runners was disqualified from Tokyo because she violated the whereabouts rules. They didn't say how.

Is that like parole where they check in, or is it like house arrest where you have an ankle monitor?

Re: Tour de France: How professional cycling teams eat and cook on the road

#112

Post by hinkley »

deff wrote: post #102
flosstop wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have moved on from pharmaceutical doping due to the extensive testing to what is referred to as "mechanical doping". Motors are hidden in hubs/frames and the organisation is busy doing everything they can to pretend that it isn't a problem.

Impossible to use mechanical doping now with the current inspections. Has it been used before these inspections were implemented? Very likely. An hungarian engineer developed a motor with spools in the rims and the stator in the forks. For sure at some point this offered a better risk/reward than PEDs.

Greg LeMond was one of the people calling for more scrutiny of bikes for mechanical tampering. One of the best pieces of evidence he provided were thermal cameras pointed at bikes while they were in motion. Lots of thermal blooming in places no professional bike mechanic generate a tenths that much friction.

One of the problems is that bikes can be made so light with unobtainium that there are rules in place requiring a minimum weight so that poorer teams can compete. So if you make a bike that's 10 lbs you have to stick weights into it to bring it up to spec. What else could you put in that bike besides chunks of iron pipe?

Re: Tour de France: How professional cycling teams eat and cook on the road

#113

Post by ricw »

hinkley wrote: post #105
eloycoto wrote: post #16

Nowadays, some riders use glucose monitoring devices during training with relation to how long it takes from ingesting and getting into blood. They are now measuring more and more things, and food is a crucial role. Glucose monitoring is banned during races, but I guess that is why you don't see some cyclist collapsing like as 15 years ago is because they understand their glucose levels. For sure, doping it's still a…

I haven't been a cyclist since about the time that the market of energy drinks first exploded. And at the time there were a number of articles that said that really all you need is Gatorade, that most of these new drinks were advertising more calories per liter, but Gatorade was already tested out on absorption rates and dialed in to the maximum calories per liter of water that the average human stomach can absorb. T…

that is outdated advice. for one, some people sweat more than others, the salt levels in the sweat is totally different too. this means that if you're really serious about sport or are doing endurance races (ie 2 hours+) you should really not just use gatorade, but something where the mix of salt/water is closer to whatever you're sweating.

if i personally use gatorade for endurance exercise, i'll just cramp up after 90 minutes and not be able to ride normally. if i use a high salt mix instead, this isn't an issue whatsoever. I'm sure the exact same is true about food itself. remember that for the tour de france, last years time difference between the winner (Vingegaard) and the second (Pogadcar) was 8 minutes out of 82h 05' 42", aka only 0.16% faster overall. every single sub-percentage matters here.

there are tons of products that cater to this. the one i've been using is https://www.precisionhydration.com/ which is cheaper and more tailored than gatorade (i have no affiliation to them).

Re: Tour de France: How professional cycling teams eat and cook on the road

#114

Post by 0_____0 »

hinkley wrote: post #105
eloycoto wrote: post #16

Nowadays, some riders use glucose monitoring devices during training with relation to how long it takes from ingesting and getting into blood. They are now measuring more and more things, and food is a crucial role. Glucose monitoring is banned during races, but I guess that is why you don't see some cyclist collapsing like as 15 years ago is because they understand their glucose levels. For sure, doping it's still a…

I haven't been a cyclist since about the time that the market of energy drinks first exploded. And at the time there were a number of articles that said that really all you need is Gatorade, that most of these new drinks were advertising more calories per liter, but Gatorade was already tested out on absorption rates and dialed in to the maximum calories per liter of water that the average human stomach can absorb. T…

I still use Gatorade because I'm a cheap bastard.

The limits aren't wrt water absorption, but gut tolerance of sugar.

I get about 100g of sugar into a bottle by doing roughly 50:50 Gatorade and maltodextrin, and then throwing in some extra Na an K salt if it's going to be hot. Although with the super hi carb stuff you should make sure that you have some plain water as well - it sucks to be super thirsty but only have carb drink on the bike.

Re: Tour de France: How professional cycling teams eat and cook on the road

#115

Post by hinkley »

kergonath wrote: post #72
flosstop wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have moved on from pharmaceutical doping due to the extensive testing to what is referred to as "mechanical doping". Motors are hidden in hubs/frames and the organisation is busy doing everything they can to pretend that it isn't a problem.

They do systematic checks for the winner, whoever has suspicious performance jumps one day, as well as random racers. They do take it very seriously and what you are saying is a bit far from the truth. Some people will try, and some scandals will happen, sure. But it is not a widespread problem and is unlikely to become one. See here, for example: https://velo.outsideonline.com/road/road-racing/tour-de-fran...

I've lost track of how many bike changes I've seen and I've only watched the first 3 days of coverage so far.

Plus if your lieutenant uses a motor in order to pull you up to the front, then your bike is clean.

Re: Tour de France: How professional cycling teams eat and cook on the road

#116

Post by 0_____0 »

ricw wrote: post #113
hinkley wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't been a cyclist since about the time that the market of energy drinks first exploded. And at the time there were a number of articles that said that really all you need is Gatorade, that most of these new drinks were advertising more calories per liter, but Gatorade was already tested out on absorption rates and dialed in to the maximum calories per liter of water that the average human stomach can absorb. T…

that is outdated advice. for one, some people sweat more than others, the salt levels in the sweat is totally different too. this means that if you're really serious about sport or are doing endurance races (ie 2 hours+) you should really not just use gatorade, but something where the mix of salt/water is closer to whatever you're sweating. if i personally use gatorade for endurance exercise, i'll just cramp up after…

I basically just add salt to Gatorade and cut it with extra sugar and malto. It's a couple extra steps but I train regularly enough that I make a concentrate (100ml=200kcal) that I put in bottle and dilute as needed.

Re: Tour de France: How professional cycling teams eat and cook on the road

#117

Post by hinkley »

fuzzylightbulb wrote: post #70
flosstop wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have moved on from pharmaceutical doping due to the extensive testing to what is referred to as "mechanical doping". Motors are hidden in hubs/frames and the organisation is busy doing everything they can to pretend that it isn't a problem.

Mechanical doping, a problem so wide-spread that only one person at the elite level has ever been found to have been doing it. To date, no one has ever provided hard evidence of another rider using a motor. I am not saying that this doesn't happen at the amateur level (it certainly does) but to imply that this is a pervasive problem in elite cycling is little more than a baseless conspiracy theory until someone shows…

Only one person has been caught. It's been a long time since I bothered to look into this, but LeMond suspected at least half a dozen people, with video evidence of varying degrees of plausibility. The thermal imaging and the fallen rider with the spinning wheels were especially damning.

But if you're analyzing old races how do you get a conviction? You can't.

Re: Tour de France: How professional cycling teams eat and cook on the road

#118

Post by tpm »

bell-cot wrote: post #91
NoPicklez wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not a sport of the 0.0001% when anybody can go buy a bike and ride. At the top level of any sport and in the top race or competition of that sport, it is going to represent the pinnacle of that sport.

From a quick skim here - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_teams_and_cyclists_in_... - all but one team are from well-to-do Western countries, or rich Gulf States. Cyclists seem similarly all-but-a-few white. Anyone can learn a bunch of gymnastic moves, too. But last I heard, "Olympic Gymnast" implies a >1k hour/year training regimen, starting at an extremely young age.

Primoz Roglic was a ski jumper before he was one of the best cyclists. There are several others like him.

Most of the cyclists are white, yes, for me this is an issue (and I am white), but what I like is that there are now many from Colombia (because of the mountains there? And probably also some cycling culture), a few days ago a cyclist from Eritrea won a TdF stage.. it's slowly getting more diverse.

Re: Tour de France: How professional cycling teams eat and cook on the road

#119

Post by hinkley »

fsckboy wrote: post #110
fuzzylightbulb wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mechanical doping, a problem so wide-spread that only one person at the elite level has ever been found to have been doing it. To date, no one has ever provided hard evidence of another rider using a motor. I am not saying that this doesn't happen at the amateur level (it certainly does) but to imply that this is a pervasive problem in elite cycling is little more than a baseless conspiracy theory until someone shows…

the long history of cheating at the highest levels of every sport indicates that if there is not mechanical doping in cycling, it's because the mechanical technology is not as good at hiding yet as it needs to be. We are talking about human beings here.

I really, really want someone to commercialize the mechanical doping tech they've been using. Get caught and go straight please.

Give me a bike that looks like a normal bike and gives mere mortals like me an extra 5 mph (power law makes that a lot worse for pros).

Re: Tour de France: How professional cycling teams eat and cook on the road

#120

Post by 0_____0 »

matsemann wrote: post #95
prmoustache wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is usually a point where you can't get those gel inside. It is nice to mix with other stuff.

After my longest ever bike ride, 300 km, I didn't touch a gel for years, heh. Got so sick of 3+ gels per hour for those ~8 hours.

I dropped gels pretty fast. Hard to get if you're not somewhere with sports stores, and expensive.

These days I cram haribo and peanut butter M&Ms, although I think the latter are more useful for multiday things.

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