Lance's Weight - The Big Difference

davidbod

There has been a lot of talk here on the forum about Lance and whether his come back after cancer could possibly be realistic without the aid of dope. The Lance bashers point to his so called lack of ability before cancer compared to his incredible performances now over the last 6 tours. The Lance supporters point to his change in riding style, nutrition, weight, discipline for year round training, acquiring the best equipment, best team, better endurance and power as he got into his late 20s early 30s, etc.

With this such a hot topic I thought I would do some research to quantify just what his weight loss alone would do. His weight before cancer has been published at 175 lbs and from what I can gather on the net his weight during his tour wins has been around 156-158 lbs. I found a great paper on the power required to climb hills and started to do some calculations. What I wanted to quantify was the difference in power required to climb a hill based on 2 riders of different weight.

The mass is for rider+bike+equipment all up. For Lance pre-cancer this would be 175lb + his bike and equipment which would probably be around 18.5 lbs. This is equivalent to 88 kg. For Lance post cancer we can go with 157 lbs + around 17.5 lbs for the rest or 79 kg.

The difference in power required to climb the same grade at the same speed for these 2 weight differences is about 11.4%. At the elite pro level in cycling that is an absolutely huge number and could more than explain Lance's transformation to the 6 time tour winner and dominator. When you combine this with all the rest of the changes since his cancer recovery its clear that he doesn't need dope to do what he has achieved.

As a side note Miguel Indurain like Lance had a hard time finishing tours on his first few attempts as well. Yes in their early tour years Miguel was a domestique and Lance stricly was in it for stage victories, but I do not believe Miguel could have won a tour prior to his own weight loss. Prior to his first of 5 successive wins, Indurain lost 28lbs. Doing the calculations on a rider losing that much weight, Indurain was climbing with 16.5% less power requirement.

Here is the link to the very interesting articel on climbing:
http://www.sportsci.org/jour/9804/dps.html

HellonWheels

[QUOTE=davidbod]There has been a lot of talk here on the forum about Lance and whether his come back after cancer could possibly be realistic without the aid of dope. The Lance bashers point to his so called lack of ability before cancer compared to his incredible performances now over the last 6 tours. >>>>

Bob Roll points out in his TdF guide that Lance lost 20 lbs due to cancer, that of course made him LIGHTER. He also said Lance was tested by the Cooper Aerobics Ctr of Dallas and found to havew the largest lung cap of any athlete they ever tested. In some ways the guy REALLY IS superhuman. And today he made history as well!

__________________
"He who conquers himself is the mightiest warrior"--Confucius

gntlmn

Adding to all of this is the fact that a lower mass cools easier. In other words, if you generate the same power but climb faster because you weigh less, you will cool easier. The lower body mass will relinquish its heat easier. This is no small advantage, especially when the outside temperature goes up.

And I was not referring to convection. I was referring to a rider's body as a heat sink. The lower the mass of a heat sink (ie, the lower the rider's weight), the quicker he will cool. But convection comes into play too because when you lose weight, the you ride faster at the same power output. Therefore the air rushes against you faster as you push against the wind. The cooling effect increases.

I read quite a while ago about how they did a test on the cycling great Eddy Merckx to see just how dramatic this cooling effect is. They tested him indoors on a trainer with no wind and room temperature. After an hour of riding at typical power outputs required for the Tour, he could go no more and almost collapsed. I don't remember the exact details on this, but if I cannot find the article, perhaps Eddy would care to elaborate on this experiment. I'm sure he remembers this one.