Why can't someone like Robbie McEwen climb?

RHR38

Hmm.. Makes me wonder how well all climbers could climb during TdF if they marked Robbie and tried to overtake him in every sprint? I think they would be like MJ and beat it

Roadie_scum

Hmmm... not really. He would likely be 'loaded with' slow twitch muscles as would almost all the riders in the protour. He might have slightly fewer than the true climbers, but he is an endurance rider through and through. I'm sure there would be club level sprinters who could beat him in a flying 200.

serpico7

Excellent point. He has to finish the mountain stages within a time limit after the *best* time of the best climbers in the world.

doctorSpoc

5'8" 150 would be pretty heavy for a climber. at that height if he was about 125...130, then maybe... but even then, what's to say his sustainable power would be enough to make him competative? the long climbs (30 - 40min) in the tour are about sustainable power have nothing at all to do with max power and stustainable power as compared to your weight and Robbie is all about AnCap (30sec - 5min power) and NMP (10-20s power) and is relatively heavy as climbers go.

what about Robbie would make you think that he has particularly high stainable power for his weight? i wouldn't suspect that at all... because a rider can do great watts over 10 seconds to 5mins doesn't mean they can do great watts over 20-30+ mins. those are normally two completely different beasts (Bettini does both of those fairly well, but he's not at the very top tier in either of those two areas... but doing both good (i.e. not great) servers him very well.

italiano

If il piccolo Bettini could be scaled up by 5 to 7% while keeping his other innate and trainable qualities he'd be a world beater via drastically improved time trialing.

I have a hunch he does not want to bulk up. I have a hunch that all experienced top tier professionals know their inborn physical weakness’ and strengths. By and large, they fall into three broad categories - sprinters, climbers, all-rounders. At some point in their careers, with some help from top-level coaching, they deliberately decide to stick with a set of nature-provided tools. It's a more rational way to cash on some glory during rather short professional careers.

Robbie knows he's a born sprinter. He keeps his body weight/muscle mass at the level where he knows it could be used to his natural advantage - mad accelerations. If he lost 7kg, he knows he'd be no doubt a much better climber but he would lose his natural anaerobic fibers too. He prefers not to because he knows he'd never be as good as those born to fly.

Robbie *does not want* to be a great climber. Il piccolo Bettini *does not want* to be a great tter..As smart, experienced professionals, they only want to *improve* where they lag behind without jeopardizing god-given, dough-earning tools of trade.

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thunder

yep, they specialise and carve out a niche.

Mcewen strikes me as very similar to Oscar Freire. If MCewen went harder on the medical program, and changed his training, I think he would be a good classics rider like Freire. NOT over cobbles though, more the circuits that OF excells on. See: Allan Davis.

Roadie_scum

First up:

1. Be able to finish 250-300km race or multi-day tour, sometimes with climbs and crosswinds.

2. Win sprint

Not all about Anaerobic Capacity and NMP.

Second: Anaerobic Capacity starts to be a pretty small part of the puzzle at 5 minutes.

Mr McEwen may have slightly higher NMP and AWC than his (climbing specialist) peers, but the reason he can do what he does and my mates who do <12s flying 200's on outdoor 330m tracks and win club crits can't is that he has a substantially higher VO2max and FTP.

Oh yeah, and he loves to win, is aggressive, and an unforgiving personality. He has the angries. That helps sometimes.

doctorSpoc

i thought it would be pretty obvious i'm speaking in RELATIVE terms... of course Robbie has incredible aerobic abilities.

but, 1st up... unfortunately for Robbie h'e not climbing and TTing against you and and your mates, he's climbing against the likes of the Contadors and Solers of this world ant TTing against guys like Cancellara and Evans and compared to those guys he's crap! and even if he slimed down, the best he could hope for is to be mediocre at climbing against HIS peers. that's why he sticks to what he was born to do and why climbing specialist stick to what they can do... on the highest level your genetics dictate how you race.

second up... if the in hills in a race are long and in any way decisive Robbie doesn't have a snowballs chance in hell of being competative RELATIVE to HIS peers.. in crosswinds (on flats) he does have a snowballs chance in hell if he hides well...


third up... Robbie might have slightly higher than average AnCap and NMP than his peers... but this is what is decisive for him... this is what makes him successful at what he does.. he has ok aerobic abilities (relative again) that allows him to be in the game.. but this is not what makes Robbie, Robbie... i'll say it again in RELATIVE terms Robbie is all about AnCap and NMP... anyone that cometes at that level has to have good aerobic abilies, but his aerobic abilities are in no way shape or form exceptional when compared to HIS peers.

john979

This is a big if and while it is possible to increase muscle mass, increasing cardiovascular capability to match would not be possible.

doctorSpoc

oops.. missed one... a person with good AnCap can make AnCap a big part of the puzzle over 5min... i have pretty run of the mill FTP but i can hold my own and kick ass over 5min... actually up to 10min i can use superior AnCap to pretty much hold my own... basically it tops up my lacking FTP over intervals of those lengths... this is why you see sprinters going toe to toe with the traditional TTers in prologues.

italiano

I'm not sure, John, how my unlikely hypothetical about Bettini could be taken out of context and misunderstood after so much explanation that followed.

Paolo and Robbie are highly specialized and are good at what they were destined to do. Neither will benefit from trying to change to much their natural phisique.Neither did. IOW, Robbie did not strive to become a climber and Paolo did not waste his time becomeing a chrono expert.

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Frigo's Luggage

I doubt any club rider could take McEwen in a flying 200 m. Maybe a very small handful of Cat 1 track guys. Nobody else. Pros are so much better than the rest of us that it is not even a fair comparison.

He is not loaded with fast twitch muscles like Carl Lewis or other track and field sprinters. But this guy has a ton of fast twitch muscles and trains them to be even faster. He is not training to climb. Hell, he chooses to live in Belgium...not the Alps or Italy.

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Roadie_scum

I was waiting for someone to bite on that... I've seen them do it. QED.

Crankyfeet

+1. Wasn't McEwen a track sprinter prior to concentrating on road racing? He is not a slow twitch muscle fibre guy. You don't need a heap of slow twitch fibres to stay with the pro peloton on a flat stage IMO. You do need to be a good athlete/cyclist of course.

He's not anywhere near AT during the first 97% of the race. Even he admits he is a fast twitch guy and has always been a sprinter all through his life.

If there were a heap of guys out there who could beat him in a 200m track sprint, then most of them would beat him in a flat road race, with the help of a team and a 190 member peloton, and a modicum of endurance training IMHO.

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