The 2012 ABSA cape Epic was apparently the toughest one yet. I competed in the women’s category and started my preparation well in advance. Our team MTNQhubeka used world-class equipment and we had no technical issues. My coach, Dr Carol Austin set my training schedule at a very competitive level of 20 to 24 hours a week for about 4 months building up to the event. I was well trained and tapered for the Epic. In terms of race preparation the team did everything possible to make sure that we were ready.
The race changed for women this year were there were UCI points allocated, and an increased price purse. This attracted a much more competitive field, and my hopes of getting a podium position materialised with a 3rd position in the category. We also got 39th in the General Classification, which would include all the men, women and mixed categories. Even though I have been in the best form of my life, it still felt as if there was so much more to do. This race just seemed so incredibly hard.
Most riders will attribute this years particularly tough Epic to the brutal weather elements. There was scorching heat, nearing 40 degrees Celsius, gale force winds, storming rain that also had temperatures plummeting and athletes treated with hypothermia. These conditions certainly attributed to a hard race in most opinions, but how can this scientifically compare to the hardest sports?
Most professional cyclists use a power meters to gauge efforts the most accurate of them being the SRM power meter. In many discussions with my coach, we debated whether this race is actually fit for women to compete in. The time and effort it takes for professional women is so much longer than for men. The question of what the effort is for women racing the Epic, lead me to a study done by Dirk Friel. He tried to illustrate the effort of racing the Tour of California to that of the Tour de France. For purposes of this exercise the comparisons of these two major tours were compared to my personal data from the Epic 2012.
Dirk Friel drew comparisons and contrasts with the 2010 Amgen Tour of California, which is roughly only one-third the length of the Tour de France. For purposes of the study he used the eight hardest consecutive stages of the Tour de France, being stages 2-9 of the 2009 Tour from Team Saxo Bank’s Chris Anker Sorenson’s. Sorenson’s race files can be seen here http://home.trainingpeaks.com/races/2009-tour-de-france-files.aspx. As for 2010 Tour of California data we looked at power files from Darren Lille of team Fly V Australia and Jakob Fuglsang of Team Saxo Bank which can be found here http://home.trainingpeaks.com/articles/cycling/2010-tour-of-california-team-saxo-bank-and-team-fly-v.aspx.
Comparing The Epic, The Tour of California and the Tour de France
To help determine the effort of women racing the Cape Epic the race data was compared to at five different categories:
1-The Hardest Stage as Measured by Most Kilojoules
2- The Total Kilojoules Measured for the Eight Consecutive Days
3- Duration (Hours) of Accumulated Winning Stage Times
4- Hardest Stage Measured by Training Stress Score (TSS) Value
5-Total Accumulated (Eight-Day) TSS Points
1. Kilojoules- The Hardest Stage
• Lill- 4844kj, Stage 6: Big Bear
• Fuglsang- 6364kj, Stage 6: Big Bear
• Sorenson- 5652kj, Stage 7: Barcelona to AndorreArcalis
•
Karien- 4169kj, Stage 5: Caledon to Oakvalley
Even though there is no clear winner within this category the Epic stage 5 absolutely measures up to the hardest stage of any Grand Tour
. Although this stage was not the hardest on paper, the rain created a challenging surface and the energy consumption compares well to the major tours. The reason why Fuglsang’s kilojoules were so high is because he was in the breakaway for nearly all of the stage so his intensity was much higher than Darren Lill’s who rode within the main peloton.
2. Total Accumulated KJ’s
• Lill- 28,221kj (3,527kj/day)
• Fuglsang – 29,061kj (3,632kj/day)
• Sorenson- 31,479kj (3,934kj/day)
• Karien- 25,377kj (3,172kj/day)
The highest energy expenditure is Tour de France at an 8-day total accumulated value of 31,479kj and an average of nearly 4,000kj a day. The Epic however includes one prologue of only 27km, and the final stage of only 63km. For this reason we can rather use 7 days for the Epic in this instance. Should one use this seven-day reason for the Epic, the daily energy expenditure is about 3,625kj per day. This compares well to the Tour de France energy expenditure.
3. Winner’s Accumulated Stage Times
The women’s winning time for the Epic was 38hrs and 34 mins. The winners included defending champion Sally Bigham and former world champion Esther Suss. The 2010 Amgen Tour of California’s winner, Michael Rogers, completed the race in 33hrs and 8 minutes, as compared to 33hrs and 3 minutes for the accumulated finish times for stages 2-9 for the 2009 Tour de France winner Alberto Contador.
The women in the Epic raced for much longer than men do in most major tours. The Epic men’s winning time of 31hrs 46mins is more on par to the major tours, but there is a dramatic difference between men and women’s racing.
4. Hardest Stage Measured by Training Stress Score (TSS) Value
• Lill- 361TSS, Stage 6: Big Bear Lake
• Fuglsang- 431TSS, Stage 6: Big Bear Lake
• Sorensen- 391TSS, Stage 7: Barcelone - Andorre Arcalis
•
Karien- 433TSS, Stage 5: Caledon to Oakvalley
The Epic TSS score of 433 is higher than any major tour. To illustrate this workload, Fuglsang recorded 431TSS points since he was in the long breakaway group. In contrast Sorensen measured 391TSS points within stage 7 of the ’09 Tour de France. Fuglsang would have had a lower value if he hadn’t been off the front for so long. It seems as if the hardest days in the grand tours measure around 400TSS points.
TSS is a very valuable metric to track since it takes into account the intensity of the race as compared to the individuals own functional threshold power value. Besides an intensity factor being accounted for, the TSS value also takes into account the duration of the race. This has much more meaning than kilojoules since kilojoules do not account for the relative intensity of a race. What might be a threshold pace for one rider may be a lower tempo type zone for another, yet if the two riders weigh the same, and recorded exactly the same watts, the KJ’s would also be the same.
5. Total Accumulated (Eight-Day) TSS Points
• Lill- 2254 TSS total
• Fuglsang- 2192 TSS
• Chris Anker Sorenson- 2152 TSS
•
Karien- 2642 TSS
The total accumulated TSS for the Epic is higher than both the Tour de France and Tour of California.
On all accounts it was similar or more demanding for women to race the Epic than it was for men racing major tours. Perhaps a Tour de France style-training program is the way to go for women racing the Epic. This is a man’s world!
Hi Karien
ReplyDeleteThis is a great article, I just think that you have used Kj instead of Kcal.
As a 75kg Male I burn over 1500Kcal per day just sitting at my desk that equates to 6000kj per day (it is roughly 4kj per Kcal)
I have burnt over 6000Kcal on stages of the Epic in 2008
Here is some research from Prof Jeukendrup:
Researchers in Holland performed the first measurements of energy consumption during the Tour de France. The cyclists in their research group consumed 24.7 megajoules/day (5,900 cal/day) with a highest average value for a single day being 32.4 megajoules (7,750 kcal). That sounds like a lot and it is, but to give you something a little more tangible about how much food that really is, I will steal an example from Rabobank’s team physiologist Asker Jeukendrup. Professor Jeukendrup likes to relate the quantity of food to cheeseburgers, a quantity most non-vegetarians understand. Professor Jeukendrup relates that on average a cyclist has to consume 19 cheeseburgers a day during the Tour. This is definitely a large amount of food and is complicated more so by the fact that the cyclists are on their bikes racing for a good portion of the day when it is harder to eat. So if it is broken down further, a typical pattern is the following. When the cyclists wake up they consume 4 cheeseburgers for breakfast. On the bike throughout the stage they eat another 5 cheeseburgers. After they race they immediately have to choke down 2 more cheeseburgers. Then comes dinner where they eat an incredible 6 cheeseburgers. But this is not even the end yet, before going to bed another 2 more cheeseburgers are consumed. Such is the life of a tour cyclist as related by cheeseburgers. Could you imagine eating that much, do you think it is even possible to eat more? I will actually build a case here that these athletes are eating as much as physiologically possible and by not being able to eat any more, they are limiting how fast they can go.
You are quite right! Thanks for the read
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