Larvatus Prodeo

Lance Armstrong is a hell of a cyclist. But the anticipation surrounding his ride in the Tour Down Under in Adelaide is just bizarre. He’s not here to win. He’s here for a glorified training ride.

Lance Armstrong is a rider who was (and may still be) perfectly suited to the Tour de France. He excels in two disciplines. He was exceptional at long time trials, an individual race against the clock, and mountain climbing – particularly the extremely long but not ultra-steep climbs of the Tour. The overall winner of the Tour de France must be amongst the best in both of these disciplines. Armstrong trained exclusively for the Tour, practising the climbs and the time trial courses again and again until he knew them perfectly. And he had a team featuring many of the best riders in the field, who rode not for their own glory but purely to support Armstrong.

In other races – indeed, in flatter stages on the Tour – Armstrong just rode with the bunch; his particular gifts didn’t help him when the road was flat and he’s riding with other cyclists. Indeed, for many one-day races, he acted as water bottle-fetcher – domestique – for his teammates. Throughout the period where he won the Tour, the only other races of note that he won were the Dauphine Libere – a traditional Tour warm-up featuring a mountainous course, and the Tour de Georgia – the closest thing he had to a home race, one featuring a couple of challenging climbs, and one in which he might be expected to put in a particular effort.
Continue reading ‘The most-publicized training ride in history’