from Allen Lim, PhD

It began today. Well actually, it began a long time ago when these guys first got addicted to cycling and started down a very long road to the Tour. But that road got a little shorter today here in La Molina Spain smack in the middle of the Pyrenees on Day one of our final training camp before the Tour de France.

Stage 4 of the Nature Valley Grand Prix brought the riders to downtown Minneapolis for a tight and technical, flat and fast criterium. The L-shaped course featured 6 90-degree corners with a few extra bends and a narrow bus access road to make sure everyone was paying attention. For the ISCorp team, Matthew Busche and Steve Scholzen finished in the main pack while Roessingh got popped off the field with one lap to go. We'll take a look at their stats and graphs and then compare those to Johnny Clarke, a rider for the Toyota United Professional Cycling Team.

Stage 3 of the Nature Valley Grand Prix featured a 4.5 mile time trial. The course was flat and smooth and finished with a nice steep climb to the finish. The riders' data for this race is strikingly similar in shape, clearly showing each place on the course where the riders had to slow for a corner or a turnaround and the point in the end of the course where the terrain started climbing upward.

The first thing to note about the riders' data files was that each rider rolled out of the start house at a pace that was much higher than what they could maintain for the duration of the race. After about a minute, their effort settled into a manageable pace. Jordan reported: "...when I first started to roll, I didn't believe my PowerTap because the numbers were so high, and it seemed so easy. Of course, after the first minute the effort started to set in, and I held a pretty steady pace from there."

With a full field of riders reamaining in the second stage of the Nature Valley Grand Priz and nice weather with low winds and relatively flat terrain, the Cannon Falls road race was a giant motor pacing session for the boys sitting in the field. They drafted along at an average speed of 27 mpg - not bad for a 60+ mile road race. As no riders where able to get away from the field, the race didn't get difficult until the final finishing circuits in the city of Cannon Falls.

The data file from Stage 2 brings up two interesting things to note. First, the importance of recovering quickly during a race. Second, the difference in power requirements for two riders with different riding styles riding relatively close to each other in the peloton.

Many bike riders who ride in large packs have been told to stay near the front. Riding near the front (but not AT the front) of the group is easier because the pace is smoother.  Riders near the back often have to close gaps if a rider in front of them fall off the pace.  They also suffer the "slinky effect" going through corners where they are required to decelerate into a corner and quickly accelerate out of the corner to keep up with the group. For this stage's analysis, we'll compare the power of one of the ISCorp riders who was able to stay near the front of the race to another rider who started further back in the field.  We'll see what difference a rider's position in the field makes on the power requirements to stay with the field.