So, Americans took the top four places in the Dauphine TT. The question is: Why do Americans do so well in TT’s and stage races? And why don’t they do as well in 1 day races? Do they lack the tactical sense Euro’s have from being in the sport their whole lives? Conversely, are Euro’s too tied into old world training methods to excel in a scientific discipline like TT’ing? Do Americans just have better equipment?
Or is it like ‘Briske said, “We’re just used to riding alone more.â€
Locally, who are the ‘Euro’s’ and who are the ‘Americans’? Axis – just ride their bikes and race, right? ML – a bunch of TT’ers with more wattage than race sense? If you’ll pardon me, I have to shove down some soggy pasta and panini, and I have to slap that ice cream out of Andy Shen’s hands.
It’s like the US trying to play soccer.
the aero equipment is too essential for victory even in a local event.
unfortunately we dont have a stage race set-up locally around here but here’s a thought.
Stage 1 – TT prospect park / or River Rd.
Stage 2 – The Bethel course / or Prospect pk.
Stage 3 – CPK
We can do it on one of those 3 day wkend deals and call it something crazy like "The battle of the Boroughs Stage race" or "3 Days de Hurtbox". You know we’d get a sick amount of teams into this and of course we’d have to have leader jersey’s and podium gals or else whats the point!
Someone please please lend kwk a full aero setup so we can see him flop in a TT.
Stage 1 – TT Prospect
Stage 2 – CpK
Stage 3 – Harriman
Seems to me the US has done pretty well the past 15 years in Cycling, not like soccer at all..
For what it’s worth, nobody races time trials in Continental Europe (the UK is a different story, and it shows in the TT riders they produce). As a European racer, you probably don’t deal with time trials until much later in your development. In the US, however, time trials are common and clubs often have running training series. A US racer will grow up racing TTs from early in their career..
I’m always shocked by the lack of logic from the anonymous posters here. K isn’t saying that full aero gear will make you win. He’s saying that w/o it the rider can’t win. Not the same thing.
Youve got to hold and give but do it at the right time
You can be slow or fast but you must get to the line
Cool idea Lee. Let me know where to register
The Four Days of New York.
Stage 1 Friday Night. FBF Criterium
Stage 2 Saturday. Central Park Circuit Race
Stage 3 Sunday. Harriman Road Race
Stage 4 Monday. River Road TT (Start under GWB, End at the top of the climb.)
Only the true hardmen (hardwomen?) would have the legs left to do a TT like that after racing Harriman the day before.
actually I’ve often wondered why there arent races on river road,
except that the park police are hostile to cyclists and would never give them permits.
it seems like a lot of americans come over to cycling from triathlons, not sure if this is as true in continental europe, my guess is it would also be true of australians. Also, we don’t really have a natural way for young people to get involved, not organized as a team sport from a young age. Basically what Z said.
The Columbia University Cycling team ran a race on River Road, as did Errol Toran. The key thing with putting on a bike race is that someone has to decide to do it, and ask for permission to use the roads.
ESGs has a 10 mile tt, a 70-85 mile road race usually on a hilly course, a 30-35 mile points race, and finally a 40 miles TTT (used to be 100K). Pretty hard.
TT’s sort of piss me off–i have nothing against the idea of a race against the clock being one part of a stage race, but personally, i wish they’d make you do it a la cannibal. you do everything else on the same bike, maybe switching out the wheels at most, and then for 2 or 3 races a year, suddenly bike racing becomes a test of your ability to sit all scrunched up on some crazy, tricked-out, uncontrollable rolling knife? ok, why not have a mountain bike stage, too? …bear in mind that this is coming from a guy who’s bitter that he couldn’t find something affordable for fitchburg.
lets see how the americans do in the tour TTs
Is it too obvious to say that it’s the Lance effect? A large part of his dominance was the TT, and the top four at the Dauphine TT were all former USPS lieutenants.
Someone like Cunego might have the same ability as Leipheimer, but he’s hailed as the next Pantani instead of the next Armstrong, so he concentrates on his climbing instead of his time trialing. And his team hasn’t won the Tour, so he doesn’t get the trickle-down benefit of equipment and wind tunnel testing and all that stuff that Discovery has from defending the yellow jersey for seven years. (In that regard look at the TT strength of non-American Discovery riders like Devolder and Hoste.)
Locally, guys like Xavier, Tiger, Auth, Wagener et al. have shown the effect that a deliberate focus on TTing can have on times. And the large number of Central Park TTs in the past couple of years probably led to better CRCA results in stage races, because everyone had a lot more practice.
But I’m with mikem on the torture of riding a TT bike. I’d be happy if all the stage race TTs were turned into hill climb prologues.
TTT Championships – live from (Eindhoven?) This wkend Cycling.tv
Gerolsteiner won last year – Levi was on fire!
Love the name (4 Days of New York) – playing off the "Dunkirk" name. Your idea sounds good but I would throw out the FBF Crit and swap it for the newly paved Prosp.pk!
Floyd’s course put a bitter taste in my pallet after the TT with its 35+ winds ,sand traps (totally ridiculous!), intermitten puddles, and busted up tarmac.
I sorta like riding the TT position. I think it stems from just being on something different other than the same ol’ set-up day in and out. When I started riding my road rig after the TT i found myself wanting to take a spacer out of the stem riser just because I felt to high up.
The ex-postie TT result @ Dauphine definitely didnt go un-noticed. Never done an uphill chrono.
Thanks Lee3, that was my fantasy NYC cycling weekend. The reason I chose FBF is because I wanted just a tiny smidgen of reality. No way we could race in PP on friday night. I was thinking that the anchor has to be Bear Mountain Sunday, then it wouldn’t be too hard to get the club to schedule a park race the Saturday morning before, and maybe Charlie can run a Friday night FBF the night before that. The buzz-kill is the River Road TT. I don’t think that’s do-able, but there ARE other TT venues that might work. Gotta dream big, right?
even if i had a P3 with the full get up, i would get my ass kicked in a tt of almost any distance longer than 1 k.
i got dropped in one lap of the TTT two years ago. It made me wonder how I can even finish a road race.
I have a nicer P3 than Zabriskie and can average 16mph for 8hrs with hairy legs. Top that.
Fat t-g, sounds like you’re talking Race Across America…
Brit Perspective.
Uk cycling is focused on TT. Every weekend morning you see riders TT’ing along main roads at 6am.
In South London you could probably choose from 2 each day each weekend from February till September. 10 mile, 25, Sporting (not flat), 50 , 100 and 12hr/24hr.
Believe me depending on where you live TT is probably your only choice. In recent years maybe one or two rider have been killed each year by traffic and there is a push to move the courses to smaller, quieter country roads instaed of dragstrips.
The competition for many isn’t about winning the TT it’s all about improving your own personal best.
Must admit that is a great aspect of the sport – you don’t neccesarily lose to anyone else.
I eventually decided to risk bunch racing and got hooked almost vowing never to TT again, well almost.
So riders such as Boardman, Obree, Wiggins, Miller, Yates et all come from that quaint British Racing mentality. I have had the honour of being steamrollered by an 18 year old Boardman and a 40 something Yates in the past.
And I bet they all enjoyed the obligatory tea and huge slice of cake for about $1 after all their race events.
Now if someone could introduce that to American racing!!!
well put Steve!
no matter how good you think you are there are a ton of people who can kick you ass.
I’m with MH–more uphill TTs. There’s a Tuesday night TT up here in the Hudson Valley out of New Paltz. Low participation compared to NYC, but relatively car free courses that rotate between flat, rolling, and uphill. It’s free, not USCF or club affiliated and is about 50/50 men and women. People ride a wide variety of aero and non-aero equipment.
Hopefully the TT and the dearly missed TTT will make a return to Central Pk. i too really look to beat my own personal time, yet with the switching of venues this yr. that wasnt possible. Last year I used a standard road frame with my road helmet compounded with an air-sucking position. This year I improved my time with a.) Better fitness and b.) a dedicated TT rig and helmet. and a little Zoltan wisdom. The equipment definitely helped alot. Pschologically ya just feel fast. Based on my Floyd results (28.49), I’m guessing I could shave atleast 2.5 – 3.0 minutes off of my Cpk. effort. of 05′ (30.54)
Aaron, where are those races listed?
Disagree with mikem’s first post about time-trialing’s distance from all other disciplines. Hilly road race is not comparable to Tuesday Floyd race either. Good sprinter will approach a circuit race differently than a roleur. The sub-disciplines of cycling are some of the things that keep it interesting.
Unfortunately, the web page is very out of date and wrong, but it will tell you how to get there. Jon Furminger is still the contact.
http://hvvc.org/Club%20TT%20Info.html
If you look at last year’s times you can see good links to the course maps and profiles.
There’s also an active, up-to-date yahoo group you can join:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/npz_tntt/?yguid=173552284
Lee, my CP best time is 81 seconds slower than my Floyd time. Most people went slower in CP than Floyd. I don’t think you can assume a 28-28:30 CP time from your Floyd time.
Well the thing is, I feel like I have CPK much more dialed in as far as my line, and my ease off moments and such and with that, last year, I managed a 30:54 with inadequate equipment and a busted position. @ FBF, I knew nothing about the conditions, it was my 1st time there and I had proper equipment + better fitness and position. Though we may not get the opportunity to test our theories, I’m pretty confidant I could kick the crap out of 30:00. By how much – who knows. I can only reflect on my performance. You have a point though about comparing the courses with times. The wind speed was different for each of my laps @ FBF and I’m sure if given a more stable platform I could maybe get a better gauge of what could be done on that course. Winds cant be controlled I understand and its great to have new parcours to challenge us, however, I think for an ITT one must make the course conditions as nuetral as possible so that true efforts can be gauged. FBF was the total opposite of this. Great for crits, maybe not for ITT’s!
local stuff aside, who thinks D. Millar will take the prologue?
While not exactly the same and I understand the motivation could be tough but if you are really interested in your CP TT time just go out at 6am during the week and blast it TT bike and all the trimmings. Even subtract 20 sec for good measure. Then you will know.
30:54 and now 28-28 1/2? 6am any morning you should be able to hammer away.
I’ll give it a shot sometime after Housatonic.
While a rider’s size, weight, and aero position all play a factor, a rider my size (6′ 160 lbs) needs to average around 320W with a TT setup to hit 28 minutes for 2 laps of CP and about 340W to break 27 minutes. Lee – I didn’t do the Floyd TT so I’m not sure how the times compare, but if you got power numbers you should be able to solve for your CP time as we are abut the same size. Aaron, a great hilly TT in the area is the Silvermine TT in the fall. It takes place at Harriman and is a great combination of fast TT riding and climbing. It was very lightly contested last year – I finished 2nd and I rode it cannibal. I love the dream of a NYC stage race, let’s make it happen.
Ben, you’re neglecting the fact that CP is a fun and technical course. Smarts will get you 30-60 seconds in CP. Lee, I should amend my previous statement. If you had a good ride at Floyd, then it should be faster than your CP time. If you had a bad time coping with the wind, then it’s a different story. Why do you think your position is more aero this year?
What you’re all neglecting to mention is that you’re are talking about girly time trials where no one is allowed to SMASH!
Um, I smashed Mihael and the $50 bet you made with him.
orcutt, i’m not saying that the act of tt’ing is so totally different than other road disciplines–i definitely agree that the various kinds of riding keep things interesting. all i said was that they should make us do it on road bikes. it’s the stupid equipment that i’m bitching about.
…by the way, the saddle in that picture appears to have actually ENTERED mr. zabriskie
Mike, the equipment is fun, and it’s cool to go that much faster than you can on a road bike. It doesn’t necessarily have to be so expensive. Sherry won on a bike that was mostly put together from ebay’d parts. He borrowed my helmet, I borrowed his wheel…
Excellent,
who would have guessed that an article on Time Trialing would inspire such inteligent conversation- go figure?
Andy, I totally agree, CP does take skill to squeeze time out of it. I dropped almost a minute over a very short period of time just getting used to riding the course on a TT bike. Who’s riding Fitchburg?
mikem, you want to look for a TT bike on eBay or roadbikereview in January, not a month before Fitchburg. Same thing with cyclocross bikes — closer it is to the season, the more expensive they are. Ken H. and I both bought cheap used Lemonds, which were one-offs made for the TIAA-CREF and Webcor teams a few years back — I think Justin England was the previous owner of Ken’s. (There, I managed to put myself in the same sentence with Ken and Justin England, I feel faster already.) You’re welcome to borrow my bike for the Fitchburg TT if you want — I should be done by noon, and you guys don’t go off until 2.
OK mikem, but I maintain that being able to ride hard through raging cross-winds with your elbows touching is one of those disciplines, like climbing, descending or crit racing.
Another good TT trick for those not committed to purchasing and storing another bike is to spring for real TT bars, shifters and brake levers, attach all the cables and you can swap the bars in about 15 minutes total. You’ll get much of the benefit of a dedicated bike with that swap for not too much cash or hassle.
Andy, last season I used my Serotta frame and actually went out and purchased the complete aero front end as Accardi suggested. The problem with the Serotta was that the head tube was so tall that I could never get my back horizontal enough without compromising the seat-tube length and I wasnt interested in cutting the frame. Serotta’s a custom frame builder so when I was measured, tucking into a TT profile was never on the table and so this frame geometry just didnt justify $ for the new duties. Currently setting up the Serotta for winter and Battenkill.
Ben, you really make the argument to crossover into the wattage world! I’m still HRM based. Mo and I were talking about that new system that installs into the BB which would allow for any crank assembly. I’m weary of new tech. so I’m keeping my eye on it to hear about reviews (cant remember the name though – get back to ya on this)
I’m still in research on my West Side Greenway TT. i not having any luck on finding out what the finishing look of the Greenway will be so that the planning can get going. I did notice during fleetweek that 1 lane on the hwy was utilized for rec. traffic (encouraging). The Stage Race idea seems alot more doable since the events will be held in park areas –
I’ll look into this also.
TT Announcement: Friday 6/16/06, 7am. South Entrance Rd and 9W to the top of Bear Mountain. Free. Self-timed. Hard enough to get you in the mood for Housatonic. Easy enough that you’ll have time to recover.
Lee: You’re referring to the Ergomo Pro. Jury’s still out on it, relative to SRM abd Powertap. You’ll also need to use a square taper or ISIS bottom bracket, as they don’t support the Shimano, FSA and soon-to-be Campy hollow axle outboard BB’s.
Lee, wait a couple of weeks. We’re going to get an iBike to test. If it works well it’ll be a real competitor to Powertap and SRM.
I saw a pic of you on the Serotta. I thought you looked pretty aero then.
Here’s my two cents (worth 1.5, in real dollars). American training is mostly numbers based right now: AT, wattage, HR, BS, etc. What’s missing is practical training, i.e. jumping away, making a break, bridging. It would make a lot of sense for teams to train together, but play race simulation games together like having breakaway intervals or have guys go off the fornt and have teammates chase, etc. That way guys get confidence in race type situations, and know what they can/can’t do to win races. I would be available to lead these training sessions for a fee, of course. How does $500 sound?
Cool….cant wait to hear the results on the Ergomo! I hear it gives out temperature and slope grade info. Not sure though.
Yea Andy, I got the Serotta tweaked almost right but the only shortfall was after a while my knee’s would get irritated from extending the post to compensate for the extra hieght I had at the front end due to the frames head. Probably should’ve tried an adj-stem before committing to a TT frame. Any excuse to keep up with the Jones’s!
Good god, Lee, extending your seatpost to compensate for a tall headtube? Go see Mike and get fit! Especially now that you have that flash new bike.
what the schmaltz says is partly true. but we don’t need another coaching service to provide us the opportunity to practice these skills (though one would no doubt thrive here, if the monthly fee were high enough). we already have a ridiculous number of chances to work on this stuff–club races, the spring series, floyd bennet, branchbrook, kissena, etc., etc.
Working on these skills in a race is just silly, because you are at the mercy of what the race presents you. You might miss the break or need to chase, etc. If you have structured workouts, you can develop these skills. You don’t need a coach, just make up you own race situations.
Hahahaha….yea 05′ was a complete throwaway season for me. I did many crazy/stupid things while with Skyline. Went back to my first coach this yr.(zt) Finally back on track. He rides with ya and tweaks on the road. Mike’s performance speaks for itself though. I may walk into UPS a couple weeks before Owasco for the Sherry set-up on the T-MO rig.
So Schmalz, by your math that race tactics session should only cost $375 in real dollars?
So Schmalz, by your math that race tactics session should only cost $375 in real dollars?
Wait till the night before the race to try out your new TT set-up for Owasco. That way the fit will be "Fresh"
anonymous, I’m with ya a little bit on gettin that fresh feeling. After floyds I removed the 1/2" armrest riser pieces and I have yet to roll it out. I should have a slight negative back slope. Cant wait to fire it up!
WAAAAAAAATTTTTTTS…………Back to reality……………… Tom Auth banging out 5 consecutive laps in the 13’s this AM. I think 27 min requires a little more than 340w.
I banged out some 25min laps on my Pimp P3. I can do that for HOURS. Suckaz.
Actually, I think 340 watts on a TT bike rode with intention will get you pretty close to 27:30. 27 flat will take some doing though.
A road bike ups those requirements….355 for a 14 minute lap. YMMV