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Tour de France riders are inhaling carbon monoxide in 'super altitude' recipe

escapecollective.com

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Re: Tour de France riders are inhaling carbon monoxide in 'super altitude' recipe

#11

Post by Swizec »

its_ethan wrote: post #9
MBCook wrote: post #6

This sounds very stupidly dangerous. I’m amazed this is legal, and that people would do it in the first place. I get wanting to win at all costs but this is nuts.

I don't know what it is about cycling that seems to concentrate some of the most insane physiological manipulation (not sure if that's the right phrase tbh). Other sports like baseball/tennis/etc seem to have some issues with like general steroids. But the level that cyclists go to always seems to exceed them by orders of magnitude. I don't know how true it is, but I've heard that some cyclists had/have to set alarms…

> I don't know how true it is, but I've heard that some cyclists had/have to set alarms throughout the night so they wake up to do jumping jacks to get their heart rates back up above the "artificial" 15bpm that their training + cocktail of drugs has caused.

Even as a casual runner (top 20% in a marathon, def not competitive), I have had to silence low heart rate alarms on my apple watch because my heart rate regularly drops below 40bpm at night. When I’m in peak condition for a race, I’ve seen it drop as low as 30.

Professional cyclists have the highest VO2max of any athlete. Even without drugs I would be completely unsurprised if their heart rate gets to 20bpm in deep sleep.

Re: Tour de France riders are inhaling carbon monoxide in 'super altitude' recipe

#12

Post by RIMR »

MBCook wrote: post #6

This sounds very stupidly dangerous. I’m amazed this is legal, and that people would do it in the first place. I get wanting to win at all costs but this is nuts.

I just watched Tour de Pharmacy, which I thought was parody, but now I'm not so sure.

Re: Tour de France riders are inhaling carbon monoxide in 'super altitude' recipe

#13

Post by davidw »

weinzierl wrote: post #2

This article is shadow paywalled. It looks as if you could read it but suddenly throws a "Want to keep reading? Pay!" in your face.

Cycling journalism doesn't pay well and has suffered in recent years. Escape Collective is a group trying to 'go their own way' to provide high quality reporting on their own terms.

So it makes sense for them to paywall it; it's not meant for a broader audience, but people who want a lot of high quality bike news.

https://escapecollective.com/about-us/

Re: Tour de France riders are inhaling carbon monoxide in 'super altitude' recipe

#15

Post by davidw »

I got a light case of CO poisoning from using a grill outdoors in a space that I guess wasn't really well ventilated. Threw up in the middle of the night (wasn't the food, everyone else was fine and so was I the very next day). I didn't feel any faster after that and it was kind of a miserable experience.

I don't think I would mess around with that stuff.

Re: Tour de France riders are inhaling carbon monoxide in 'super altitude' recipe

#16

Post by Aperocky »

> That’s what happened in January 2023 when two riders on Uno-X Mobility had to be taken to hospital after a go-karting session for team bonding left them with carbon monoxide poisoning.

Surely it was the go-karting and the team-bonding...

Re: Tour de France riders are inhaling carbon monoxide in 'super altitude' recipe

#17

Post by LargeWu »

its_ethan wrote: post #9
MBCook wrote: post #6

This sounds very stupidly dangerous. I’m amazed this is legal, and that people would do it in the first place. I get wanting to win at all costs but this is nuts.

I don't know what it is about cycling that seems to concentrate some of the most insane physiological manipulation (not sure if that's the right phrase tbh). Other sports like baseball/tennis/etc seem to have some issues with like general steroids. But the level that cyclists go to always seems to exceed them by orders of magnitude. I don't know how true it is, but I've heard that some cyclists had/have to set alarms…

I think because there's less "skill" required, in the sense of hand-eye coordination, than ball sports. The predominant factor seems to be how hard and how long you can push yourself. Once you reach the human body's natural physical limits, chemical advantage seems like the only way to break through those.

Re: Tour de France riders are inhaling carbon monoxide in 'super altitude' recipe

#18

Post by Aperocky »

davidw wrote: post #15

I got a light case of CO poisoning from using a grill outdoors in a space that I guess wasn't really well ventilated. Threw up in the middle of the night (wasn't the food, everyone else was fine and so was I the very next day). I didn't feel any faster after that and it was kind of a miserable experience. I don't think I would mess around with that stuff.

Apparently if you had slightly less CO but more often you might become a faster cyclist!

Re: Tour de France riders are inhaling carbon monoxide in 'super altitude' recipe

#19

Post by matsemann »

its_ethan wrote: post #9
MBCook wrote: post #6

This sounds very stupidly dangerous. I’m amazed this is legal, and that people would do it in the first place. I get wanting to win at all costs but this is nuts.

I don't know what it is about cycling that seems to concentrate some of the most insane physiological manipulation (not sure if that's the right phrase tbh). Other sports like baseball/tennis/etc seem to have some issues with like general steroids. But the level that cyclists go to always seems to exceed them by orders of magnitude. I don't know how true it is, but I've heard that some cyclists had/have to set alarms…

The wake up and walk around the hotel was mainly an EPO thing, where your blood got so thick you otherwise could die.

Re: Tour de France riders are inhaling carbon monoxide in 'super altitude' recipe

#20

Post by its_ethan »

Swizec wrote: post #11
its_ethan wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know what it is about cycling that seems to concentrate some of the most insane physiological manipulation (not sure if that's the right phrase tbh). Other sports like baseball/tennis/etc seem to have some issues with like general steroids. But the level that cyclists go to always seems to exceed them by orders of magnitude. I don't know how true it is, but I've heard that some cyclists had/have to set alarms…

> I don't know how true it is, but I've heard that some cyclists had/have to set alarms throughout the night so they wake up to do jumping jacks to get their heart rates back up above the "artificial" 15bpm that their training + cocktail of drugs has caused. Even as a casual runner (top 20% in a marathon, def not competitive), I have had to silence low heart rate alarms on my apple watch because my heart rate regular…

Definitely some amount of it is natural, I'm even less competitive with running than you, but seeing my resting heart rate go down as you ramp up distances is a satisfying thing when you realize the hard work is paying off in a "tangible" way :)

I did a little more googling after the above comment, and it seems like another factor that (in theory) plays into the issue for the anecdote is that their blood can get thicker from doping. So it's a recipe of very low heart rate + extra viscous blood to pump that = danger.

Regardless, it's some pretty interesting/freaky stuff!

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