Another rider has joined the ranks of those speaking out against doping in the wake of the Armstrong affair. FDJ-Bigmat’s Jérémy Roy posted an open letter on his website on November 5th, talking about the current state of cycling and of doping in the sport. Below is an English version of this letter, translated by myself. You can read the original French letter on his website here.
Following recent events in the world of cycling, reactions and admissions from certain riders, and different movements launched to save cycling and to respond to certain people, I want to express my thoughts today through this open letter.
Of course I won’t say that cycling is moving in the best of worlds, but we need to stop stigmatising it and accusing every cyclist. Yes, there are cheats, and there always will be (in sport and in life), but the noose is tightening little by little thanks to the work of the UCI, of WADA (and its national counterparts) and of the police.
Today everyone is talking about the Armstrong affair (which hasn’t yet finished shedding light on certain shadowy areas regarding the transfer of funds), tomorrow I hope that the Padova affair in Italy will come good and that the Puerto affair in Spain, which will reopen in January, will also reveal its secrets.
I discovered the USADA report just like all of you, and yes, I was shocked by this quasi-collective doping system. No, fortunately not all teams work like that. I’m not stonewalling or influenced by omerta, as has been suggested by some journalists who’ve reproached me for the fact that I discovered the story through the media like any man in the street. I turned professional at the end of 2003 and even though I mix with other riders for a quarter of the year (90 days of racing), that doesn’t mean that I know what’s done away from prying eyes. And even if I speak from time to time to other riders, do you think that the cheaters are going to boast of their chemical prowess? The latest confessions (which, in passing, have been revealed only thanks to the inquiry and thus under oath) attest to that; not even their wife or their family was aware (I think that you share more with your loved ones than with your cyclist colleagues or opponents). It’s too easy today to ask forgiveness, to cleanse the conscience. No, I don’t forgive them.
They have stolen (results, glory, income, contracts…). But on the other hand I would say to them nevertheless, “Thanks for having confessed”, if it can contribute to stopping the scourge by taking into account their methods and by trying to find a solution.
And speaking of solutions, it’s worth knowing that the UCI has indeed put in place some tools, though certainly not perfect, but which have the merit of existing. The Whereabouts system: a location system where a cyclist in the target group (World Tour teams, ProContinental teams applying for WildCards and certain riders chosen by a group of experts) must provide their activities and place of residence for every day with a one-hour time slot in which a control can be performed. (A control can also be performed outside of the hourly slot but will not be counted as a no-show if the rider is not present).
There’s the implementation of the biological passport, more accurately haematological for the time being, because the steroid aspect hasn’t yet been taken into account. This profiling of haematological values allows, in conjunction with a classic antidoping control, to target suspect riders, to suspend and to sanction a rider should the case arise, following a meeting of an expert commission. There have been some riders suspended by the passport but legal restrictions greatly limit the actions of the UCI.
Since June 2011 (unfortunately not retroactively), those convicted of violating the Anti-Doping Code cannot occupy a position as a manager, directeur sportif, coach, doctor or medical assistant, mechanic, driver or rider’s agent. This provision will allow us to gradually clean up the environment of cycling. I encourage teams to apply this sanction without delay.
As a suggestion, in addition to increasing the length of sanctions, I can only support antidoping research to improve the tests further and further. Too often the cheaters are a step ahead. The problem which presents itself on top of the cost of the research is the volume of the sample, which is far from infinite. It’s necessary to understand that a sample can’t be tested for all known substances, meaning a choice has to be made (and you can only find what you look for!). That’s how some riders pass a control one day, but not necessarily another.
Preservation of the B-sample for subsequent tests when research has progressed has been mentioned, but I don’t know when that will be. It still has a cost: storage, analysis, which test to apply?
The economic problem is therefore very much present in the fight against doping. Part of the “prize money” is already withdrawn, so what more can be done? As has been suggested by the President of Française des Jeux, Mr Blanchard Dignac (since 2009), an association of cycling team sponsors needs to be created to support the UCI in its fight against doping. In theory a year’s salary must be paid by an offender. I hope that these funds are intended for the fight against doping.
It would also be desirable for WADA to change its attitude regarding the “liberalised” use of corticosteroids. A work stoppage should be mandatory in the case of its use to avoid risking the health of the rider (due to the risk of falling cortisol levels). Only the member teams of the MPCC (Movement for Credible Cycling) apply a work stoppage internally in the case of an injection to treat an illness.
The personalised power profile (PPP), notably suggested by F. Grappe and which follows the example of the haematological profile, allows a rider to know their physical limits. This then poses the problem of the reliability of the measure, the consideration of fatigue and the recurrent stresses during a stage, the margin of error (it’s not forbidden to beat records…it’s actually the point of training).
Developing the biological passport with the activation of the steroid profile.
I also join Taylor Phinney in his stance against the painkillers that certain riders take during a race. When there is a problem which requires a painkiller I doubt that participating in competitive cycling will help the problem!
Holding a “States General” bringing together WADA and the UCI would also allow progress.
The creation of a commission independent of the UCI to organise controls seems like a necessity to restore faith in the UCI: we will no longer be able to criticise them for being both judge and jury.
Finally, having the police and Customs reviewing general intelligence should continue to help us in the struggle (the fight against doping, trafficking, suspicious monetary transfers (corruption)…). A number of cases have been uncovered through them.
Despite the storms we’ve weathered and the blows we’ve received, I believe and I still want to believe in the sport that I love. I’ve accepted that I’m not as strong as the others but that doesn’t prevent me from achieving good results with my resources and winning races. Admittedly I’ll certainly never win the Tour de France or the World Championships with my abilities but I always hope that it’s in me, the hope of improving, of giving the best of myself and of never having regrets because I’ve put in everything to get there. I’ve made so many sacrifices, as has my family when I’m away 180 days a year, that I don’t want to give up now. It would be a (another) failure in the face of cheaters.
I’ve wanted to write this open letter for some time, but I haven’t wanted to be seen as a whiner, or to receive the usual criticisms (he has no results because he doesn’t know how to train, he’s too big, he’s stonewalling, he’s being idealistic…).
For those who want to continue bad-mouthing cycling, just keep walking…me, I still want to believe in it. For nearly 10 years I’ve been among the pros and for nearly 10 years I’ve heard at the start-of-year briefings, “Boys, don’t lose hope, things change, the cheaters will be caught sooner or later, things are heading in the right direction.” My improvement and the rise of young riders are certainly not due to coincidence. Since the implementation of geolocation and the passport, the room for movement is decreasing.
Finally, a little soapboxing to finish, because I’ve had enough of seeing certain media only talking about cycling in relation to doping scandals. I’m sorry, dear journalists and spectators, that the flat stages at the start of the Tour bore you (and you make it very clear)…yes, there are stages for the sprinters and there always will be; where is the harm in saving a little with three weeks of racing in mind? You need to stop playing CyclingManager!
For those who are frightened by the average speeds of the peloton (and who also complain when the peloton dawdles a little – yes, often they’re the same people), have they ever ridden competitively? What about in a group? Aspiration effect and relay, does that sound familiar? You can’t compare races or eras, as so many factors can influence a performance (weather, wind, condition of the road, profiles of preceding stages…). We are professional cyclists, our job is to be the fastest on a bike and we train every day for that, so don’t compare your Sunday ride or your local hill climb with a professional race.
I’m not the only one to think this. Lots of riders suffer in silence from this insidious disease which eats away from within and is considered as the “system”. Some no longer even dare to say that they’re cyclists, all because of the transgressions of certain riders. And I maintain that the majority of the peloton rides fairly.
I could elaborate further on certain ideas and tackle other subjects that are equally important for the future of cycling (sustainable development, the modernisation of cycling, the format of races…) but I’m afraid I’d lose you along the way (if I haven’t already).
Thank you for reading and thank you for your support. Cycling needs you too.
Sunday, 18 November 2012
Tuesday, 30 October 2012
Cleaning House
My mum always loved old musical films. So I guess it was no surprise that I immediately thought of the house-cleaning duet from Calamity Jane when I heard that the UCI was establishing an external commission to investigate the UCI in the wake of the Armstrong affair. They’re actually finally doing it. The UCI is cleaning house.
It’s been bruited around for a while, though never more so than now, that the UCI were in Armstrong’s pocket when it came to his literally unbelievable career, and more than one ex-rider has pointed the finger at the UCI when it came to laying blame for cycling’s doping culture. With USADA shining the world’s biggest spotlight into every corner of Lance Armstrong and US Postal, the pressure has been growing for a while now for the UCI to take the same steps and sweep out their own dusty corners too. Unfortunately, with the UCI the highest body in cycling, there was no-one to ensure that they actually would, but it seems they’ve been listening to the voices on the street at last.
It’s a gesture of good faith, certainly, but let’s hope it becomes more than just a gesture. As part of the investigation the UCI has also halted the controversial lawsuit against Irish journalist and ex-rider Paul Kimmage. This gives no guarantee that they won’t relaunch it again either after the conclusion of the commission’s investigation or even before then, but it’s a start, and a much-needed one. Even with all the whisking and mopping that USADA have been doing over in the US, cycling could never start over and be ‘clean’ with such a dark cloud hanging over the sport’s governing body. Scrubbing all the cyclists’ pasts raw would make little difference if the administration wasn’t equally squeaky.
Thankfully, despite all the denials and professions of non-culpability over recent months, the UCI seems to have recognised this fact as well, and they’re taking steps. What we have to wait and see now is whether they’re serious about those steps. Will the UCI give the external commission carte blanche to dig as deep as they need for as long as they need to in order to polish up every single dirty ‘winder’? Will the ‘appropriate terms of reference’ to be negotiated with the committee omit all the key concerns such as alleged cover-ups in the Armstrong era and the culpability of ex-UCI president Hein Verbrugghe and his successor, Pat McQuaid? And will the UCI give due credit to and implement any or all of the recommendations made by the committee at the end of their investigation?
Let us hope that the instigation of the investigation means they will. Maybe, with a completely exposed and absolved past and a clear vision for a clean future, we will finally get to see cycling as the ‘shiny castle’ of which Doris Day and Allyn McLerie sang all those years ago.
It’s been bruited around for a while, though never more so than now, that the UCI were in Armstrong’s pocket when it came to his literally unbelievable career, and more than one ex-rider has pointed the finger at the UCI when it came to laying blame for cycling’s doping culture. With USADA shining the world’s biggest spotlight into every corner of Lance Armstrong and US Postal, the pressure has been growing for a while now for the UCI to take the same steps and sweep out their own dusty corners too. Unfortunately, with the UCI the highest body in cycling, there was no-one to ensure that they actually would, but it seems they’ve been listening to the voices on the street at last.
It’s a gesture of good faith, certainly, but let’s hope it becomes more than just a gesture. As part of the investigation the UCI has also halted the controversial lawsuit against Irish journalist and ex-rider Paul Kimmage. This gives no guarantee that they won’t relaunch it again either after the conclusion of the commission’s investigation or even before then, but it’s a start, and a much-needed one. Even with all the whisking and mopping that USADA have been doing over in the US, cycling could never start over and be ‘clean’ with such a dark cloud hanging over the sport’s governing body. Scrubbing all the cyclists’ pasts raw would make little difference if the administration wasn’t equally squeaky.
Thankfully, despite all the denials and professions of non-culpability over recent months, the UCI seems to have recognised this fact as well, and they’re taking steps. What we have to wait and see now is whether they’re serious about those steps. Will the UCI give the external commission carte blanche to dig as deep as they need for as long as they need to in order to polish up every single dirty ‘winder’? Will the ‘appropriate terms of reference’ to be negotiated with the committee omit all the key concerns such as alleged cover-ups in the Armstrong era and the culpability of ex-UCI president Hein Verbrugghe and his successor, Pat McQuaid? And will the UCI give due credit to and implement any or all of the recommendations made by the committee at the end of their investigation?
Let us hope that the instigation of the investigation means they will. Maybe, with a completely exposed and absolved past and a clear vision for a clean future, we will finally get to see cycling as the ‘shiny castle’ of which Doris Day and Allyn McLerie sang all those years ago.
Saturday, 20 October 2012
Not All Sunshine and Rainbow Stripes - An Interview with Alex Morgan
By September of Year 12, most 18-year-olds are focussing on exams, university applications and celebrating the end of high school. But Mitcham teenager Alex Morgan had other things on his mind. The 18-year-old cyclist had been selected as part of the Australian team for the UCI Road World Championships in Limburg, Holland, where he would be challenging for the rainbow jersey of the best time triallist in the world under the age of 19.
For someone who has been racing competitively for only four years, Alex acquitted himself well, finishing in a time of 35:47.35, just one second off third place. Just three months earlier Alex had done a similarly close ride, coming in second at the U19 Australian National Road Championships Time Trial by just 3.6 seconds. Though disappointed, Alex feels that these near misses have been amongst the best things that have happened to him in his cycling career. “From them I have learnt many things both physically and mentally,” he says. “They have especially made me hungrier to win than ever.”
But it wasn’t destined to be an easy year, as Alex was hampered by sickness in the latter half of the season. “It was hard both physically and mentally but I was very happy with how I dealt with it and I learnt many things for the years ahead,” he says. It was a setback nonetheless, especially in the lead-up to the Junior Track World Championships in New Zealand during August, where the Australian men’s team would be defending their world title in the team pursuit. With good training times behind them, Alex and his teammates Jack Cummings, Evan Hull, Miles Scotson and Tirian McManus were confident they would retain their rainbow jerseys.
“The belief that we would win was certainly there so I had to really focus hard on not becoming over-confident and complacent because the hard work still needed to be done,” Alex says. But the team were in for a shock after the qualifying round. “We really got a scare when we barely made the final,” Alex recalls. “I believe it was the best thing that could have happened for the team as it made us hungrier to win than ever.”
That hunger would serve Alex well in days to come, as the individual pursuit was held three days later. With his preparation for the IP also disrupted by sickness, he was ‘quite happy’ with his result, coming in third behind Switzerland’s Tom Bohli and New Zealand’s Dylan Kennett to take the bronze medal. “It would have been nice to have gone better in the IP but I rode as well as I could on the day,” he reflects.
“Overall it was a very successful season. Domestically I was very happy with how I rode on both the track and road,” Alex says. “It would have been nice to have gone faster in the Junior World TT and IP.” But he’s certainly not dismissing the effort that he and his team put into their races. “To come home a successful defending Team Pursuit Junior World Champion was pretty special. A 1st, 3rd and 4th in the world still isn’t too bad.”
So, where to next for the young road time triallist and track rider? Alex says that school is still a priority. “I’m currently completing Year 12 over two years so I’m doing two subjects per year, this year the first of the two. It’s not too hard to combine cycling and school as long as you are organised and disciplined,” he explains. “It was definitely hard going away for two months and coming back just before exams but my school, Vermont Secondary College, are fantastic and have got me right back on track.”
But he has big dreams for his cycling career too, focussing on the track and the road time trial in the near future and following the likes of Cameron Meyer and Luke Durbridge into full-time road racing later on. “My goals are to go to the [Glasgow 2014] Commonwealth Games and [Rio 2016] Olympics on the track in the Team Pursuit, and IP if it’s brought back. So the next four years I want to focus on the track and the road time trial, then after the Olympics move onto the road full-time. That’s the ideal plan at the moment,” Alex says. “We’ll see how it goes!”
For someone who has been racing competitively for only four years, Alex acquitted himself well, finishing in a time of 35:47.35, just one second off third place. Just three months earlier Alex had done a similarly close ride, coming in second at the U19 Australian National Road Championships Time Trial by just 3.6 seconds. Though disappointed, Alex feels that these near misses have been amongst the best things that have happened to him in his cycling career. “From them I have learnt many things both physically and mentally,” he says. “They have especially made me hungrier to win than ever.”
But it wasn’t destined to be an easy year, as Alex was hampered by sickness in the latter half of the season. “It was hard both physically and mentally but I was very happy with how I dealt with it and I learnt many things for the years ahead,” he says. It was a setback nonetheless, especially in the lead-up to the Junior Track World Championships in New Zealand during August, where the Australian men’s team would be defending their world title in the team pursuit. With good training times behind them, Alex and his teammates Jack Cummings, Evan Hull, Miles Scotson and Tirian McManus were confident they would retain their rainbow jerseys.
“The belief that we would win was certainly there so I had to really focus hard on not becoming over-confident and complacent because the hard work still needed to be done,” Alex says. But the team were in for a shock after the qualifying round. “We really got a scare when we barely made the final,” Alex recalls. “I believe it was the best thing that could have happened for the team as it made us hungrier to win than ever.”
That hunger would serve Alex well in days to come, as the individual pursuit was held three days later. With his preparation for the IP also disrupted by sickness, he was ‘quite happy’ with his result, coming in third behind Switzerland’s Tom Bohli and New Zealand’s Dylan Kennett to take the bronze medal. “It would have been nice to have gone better in the IP but I rode as well as I could on the day,” he reflects.
“Overall it was a very successful season. Domestically I was very happy with how I rode on both the track and road,” Alex says. “It would have been nice to have gone faster in the Junior World TT and IP.” But he’s certainly not dismissing the effort that he and his team put into their races. “To come home a successful defending Team Pursuit Junior World Champion was pretty special. A 1st, 3rd and 4th in the world still isn’t too bad.”
So, where to next for the young road time triallist and track rider? Alex says that school is still a priority. “I’m currently completing Year 12 over two years so I’m doing two subjects per year, this year the first of the two. It’s not too hard to combine cycling and school as long as you are organised and disciplined,” he explains. “It was definitely hard going away for two months and coming back just before exams but my school, Vermont Secondary College, are fantastic and have got me right back on track.”
But he has big dreams for his cycling career too, focussing on the track and the road time trial in the near future and following the likes of Cameron Meyer and Luke Durbridge into full-time road racing later on. “My goals are to go to the [Glasgow 2014] Commonwealth Games and [Rio 2016] Olympics on the track in the Team Pursuit, and IP if it’s brought back. So the next four years I want to focus on the track and the road time trial, then after the Olympics move onto the road full-time. That’s the ideal plan at the moment,” Alex says. “We’ll see how it goes!”
Tuesday, 16 October 2012
What Is There To Say?
It’s the news that cycling has been waiting for. The next step in the Armstrong case that has kept not just cycling but the whole world on the edge of their seats, waiting to see how the chips will fall. Every day seems to bring another admission, another revelation, something else to make you stop and weep at just where all this is going. It’s like riding the rollercoaster of Bad News that you can’t step off, your heart in your throat every time you hit another loop-the-loop.
And it feels like something ought to be said, but, really, what is there to say? The evidence is out there. USADA’s decision has been made. It’s hard to argue with the proof. Hard to dispute the verdict. Hard to believe the truth. Hard to know what to think. It’s a black day in the history of cycling. What is there to say?
Yet the circus still goes on, name after name crumbling like a wall of bricks without mortar. Vande Velde, Zabriskie, Danielson. Leipheimer, Vaughters. Hincapie. Bruyneel. Will no one escape the purges?
And now there’s news of one of our own. Matt White has now been touched, now been tainted. Our Australian ‘purity’ on the doping front has crumbled into dust, our belief and faith in our cyclists shaken, the trust gone.
It’s disheartening to see another great of the sport laid low, like the pillars of Stonehenge falling to the earth. Those who are well-acquainted with cycling are well-acquainted with its chequered past, too, and it says a lot that so many can still love it knowing full well the scandals in its history. But we can still be saddened that this is the situation in cycling. Disappointed that cycling has been reduced to salacious headlines in the tabloids. Angry that cycling has changed from how well you ride to how well you dope.
But it can’t go on like this. If we look hard enough we will always find another doping scandal, another ‘drug cheat’ to be vilified and torn down from his pedestal. Such is the history of cycling. At some point we need to draw a line and declare an amnesty. Someone has to suggest that from now on we let the dead past bury its dead and focus on the future of cycling. It’s been suggested before. Someone has to say that we need to forgive, though not forget, the old culture of cycling that allowed, nay, condoned, such widespread doping as the Armstrong case, and instead construct a new future in which doping is rejected from the level of the fans right up to the UCI, and that embraces those spectacular feats of plain old guts and endurance that make this sport great.
Let’s make this cycling’s turning point. Let’s make this the time when things could go back to the way they were or they could change for the better, and we gave them a push in the right direction. At risk of sounding like a motivational speaker on a sugar high, fans are an important part of cycling, and they do play a part in the pro cycling scene. All the sponsorship, advertising, marketing and money that gets thrown around at races like the Tour de France is aimed at the fans – fans who are sick of the riders they worshipped in July being kicked to the kerb by December. Fans who can use that advertising and marketing to push for a cleaner, safer sport, more entertaining in its purity and its natural ability to surprise.
So, what is there to say? Well, let’s start by echoing the words of Lance Armstrong and saying, “Enough is enough.”
And it feels like something ought to be said, but, really, what is there to say? The evidence is out there. USADA’s decision has been made. It’s hard to argue with the proof. Hard to dispute the verdict. Hard to believe the truth. Hard to know what to think. It’s a black day in the history of cycling. What is there to say?
Yet the circus still goes on, name after name crumbling like a wall of bricks without mortar. Vande Velde, Zabriskie, Danielson. Leipheimer, Vaughters. Hincapie. Bruyneel. Will no one escape the purges?
And now there’s news of one of our own. Matt White has now been touched, now been tainted. Our Australian ‘purity’ on the doping front has crumbled into dust, our belief and faith in our cyclists shaken, the trust gone.
It’s disheartening to see another great of the sport laid low, like the pillars of Stonehenge falling to the earth. Those who are well-acquainted with cycling are well-acquainted with its chequered past, too, and it says a lot that so many can still love it knowing full well the scandals in its history. But we can still be saddened that this is the situation in cycling. Disappointed that cycling has been reduced to salacious headlines in the tabloids. Angry that cycling has changed from how well you ride to how well you dope.
But it can’t go on like this. If we look hard enough we will always find another doping scandal, another ‘drug cheat’ to be vilified and torn down from his pedestal. Such is the history of cycling. At some point we need to draw a line and declare an amnesty. Someone has to suggest that from now on we let the dead past bury its dead and focus on the future of cycling. It’s been suggested before. Someone has to say that we need to forgive, though not forget, the old culture of cycling that allowed, nay, condoned, such widespread doping as the Armstrong case, and instead construct a new future in which doping is rejected from the level of the fans right up to the UCI, and that embraces those spectacular feats of plain old guts and endurance that make this sport great.
Let’s make this cycling’s turning point. Let’s make this the time when things could go back to the way they were or they could change for the better, and we gave them a push in the right direction. At risk of sounding like a motivational speaker on a sugar high, fans are an important part of cycling, and they do play a part in the pro cycling scene. All the sponsorship, advertising, marketing and money that gets thrown around at races like the Tour de France is aimed at the fans – fans who are sick of the riders they worshipped in July being kicked to the kerb by December. Fans who can use that advertising and marketing to push for a cleaner, safer sport, more entertaining in its purity and its natural ability to surprise.
So, what is there to say? Well, let’s start by echoing the words of Lance Armstrong and saying, “Enough is enough.”
Thursday, 11 October 2012
Tuesday, 9 October 2012
Tours With Orica-GreenEDGE
It’s 9:00am on a nippy autumn Sunday in the town of Chateauneuf-en-Thymerais. Most of France is asleep. Not here. Not this Sunday. It may be cold and grey, but Chateauneuf is a town coming to life.
Paris-Tours is today.
The team buses line the road into town, a colourful array against the cloudy sky. It’s chaos on the street, fans crowding the buses for glimpses of their heroes. Orica-GreenEDGE is one of the 25 sets of cars and buses among the throng, the Australian team almost anomalous amongst all the European entrants. The fans love them nonetheless. Baden Cooke and Jens Keukeleire are stopped and asked for photos and autographs as they mount their bikes to sign on. Another French fan is waiting for the riders as they return to the team bus. No, she’s not a fan of GreenEDGE, she just likes ‘all good riders’. She gets a signature from Julian Dean and takes her search elsewhere..
The GreenEDGE support staff are standing and chatting outside the team bus as they wait for the day to get started. DS Lionel Marie will be following the race in the first team car with the mechanics. The other team car will be heading for the feed zone. I climb into the second car with two of the soigneurs, Joachim and Thomas, where I have a ‘back-seat pass’ for the day. The race hasn’t started yet, but it’s 10:00am and time for us to leave.
Someone’s iPod is plugged into the stereo, Madonna playing over the speakers as the car heads out of Chateauneuf-en-Thymerais towards the feed zone, and then Tours. Joachim and Thomas are chatting as we head out of town and into the countryside about the end of the season, plans and life at home – normal topics of conversation between co-workers. They share a joke about the gendarmes we pass at the entrance to every road that crosses the race route. “The ones at the end of the race have to stand there all day,” Joachim laughs.
A wrong turn with the GPS puts us temporarily off track, but Joachim and Thomas are quick to notice and turn the car around. “We always fuck everything up,” Joachim comments.
“Not always,” Thomas corrects him.
“But most of the time,” Joachim notes sagely. We do another lap of the roundabout and re-join the convoy of team cars heading for the feed zone. The drivers are all joshing one another, waving or flipping the finger with a grin on their face. There’s an exclusive sort of fraternity among the support staff that transcends the team boundaries. Nothing is sacred to these guys, and the humour and language is irreverent, almost crude, but it’s tempered by a mutual understanding and respect between those in a very hectic, demanding line of work.
We reach the edge of the houses around Chateauneuf and enter the French countryside, where the hunting season has already begun. We pass a few hunters walking the fields with their rifles, some waving as the race cars pass. There are a few cycling fans and locals out for an early morning walk or ride, but otherwise the landscape is devoid of life, just us and the road. We stop in one of the many small, nameless towns between Chateauneuf-en-Thymerais and the feed zone for a few minutes. “Something interesting happen?” Joachim asks as he climbs back into the car.
“Nothing,” Thomas replies. It’s a good word to describe what fills most of the day – driving, waiting…nothing.
The fields and woods, so very European in their greenery, seem never-ending. Joachim pushes the speed limit around every corner of the winding French roads as cannily as the riders take the corners of the narrow streets in the towns. As we drive, we constantly drop in and out of the groups of team cars, vans and trucks that fill the roads between Chateauneuf and the feedzone, and we start to look for a petrol station to fill up along the way. By now it’s almost lunchtime, so we pull into the nearest Macca’s for something to eat while we can. Joachim uses the iPad on our table at Macca’s to show Thomas the trailers for some Australian movies and TV shows, commenting on how crazy all the characters in Underbelly are. We’re back on the road soon after. We slip through the road blocks to find the race route yet again, the gendarmes always waving us through.
Passing through the small town of Santenay, we head into the feed zone and pull over on the side of the road. The riders are maybe half an hour behind us. Thomas opens the Eski and begins preparing the musettes for the riders, hanging them off the side of the car. The little knot at the top of the musette strap, he tells me, is to stop the strap sliding through the rider’s hand when he grabs it from the soigneur. As he fills the musettes with various small foods wrapped in tin foil, he talks a little about what it’s like being a soigneur. The majority of them are ex-riders, just like the team managers and sports directors. Most soigneurs leave after a few years, though; it’s not the easy, glamorous work it might seem. It’s a job, like any other. There’s a lot of time spent away from home, and a lot of long hours on the road driving from the start to the finish of a race. Paris-Tours is 183 kilometres. It takes us nearly five hours.
With the musettes ready, there’s not much to do until the peloton arrives. Thomas plays a game on his phone while Joachim tries to set up the race radio in the car and figure out how far away the race is. The breakaway of 11 is still preceding the peloton, and Orica-GreenEDGE’s Michael Hepburn is in it. “Can you imagine if he wins it?” Joachim asks.
“It will be perfect,” Thomas replies. There’s a moment of silence in the car as they think about a GreenEGDE win. Though to an outsider they might seem totally disinterested in the race for most of the day, they still want the team victory. Then the moment is gone and it’s back to business. The riders are on their way and there’s work to be done.
Joachim pulls an Orica-GreenEDGE vest out of his backpack, while Thomas dons a cap, unable to find the other vests in the car boot. They organise how many musettes each of them will carry. Joachim will hand Michael his bag as the breakaway rides past. They take up positions on the right-hand side of the road – Joachim lower down with the most musettes and Thomas a hundred metres further up to catch any riders that Joachim misses.
We can see the breakaway at the bottom of the hill. Michael spots Joachim and tries to veer right, but there’s another rider in the way. The other rider ducks as Joachim hands Michael a musette over the rider’s back. The peloton appears shortly after, and it’s hard to make out individual riders in the mass. The riders know to look for the soigneurs, and Baden Cooke heads right towards Joachim, holding out his hand. The baton relay doesn’t come off, though, and Baden manages to grab a bag from Thomas instead. Joachim hands a musette to Fumiyuki Beppu, and then the peloton is gone, with no sign of the other GreenEDGE riders. We wait until the race convoy passes, jump in the car and continue on.
It’s another 90 kilometres to Tours. Thomas takes over the driving while Joachim naps in the passenger seat. Foo Fighters are playing over the stereo just a little too loudly. As far as the eye can see is nothing but farmland and woods and little hamlets in between. We can’t see Tours until we reach the city’s outskirts. We still haven’t gone past a petrol station, and Thomas is adamant that we need to fill up before we head to the race finish. Joachim types in the finish co-ordinates as we leave the petrol station, but really the neon signs saying ‘Paris-Tours’ guide us into the city centre.
It’s 2:30pm by the time we join the GreenEDGE bus in Tours where the third team car is waiting for us. The soigneurs and team physio, Manuel, unpack up everything from the cars and pile all the bags of the riders going to the airport in the second car. Other teams’ support staff drop by to say hello. Until the riders get here, we’re playing the waiting game again.
There’s a small flurry of excitement as the under-23 race finishes. All the GreenEDGE soigneurs wander over to the fence to have a look too. They start swapping stories of their own careers as riders, laughing as they point out where in the stragglers they’d have finished. Most of the time it might be just a job to them, full of organising, driving and waiting, but the sparkle of cycling is still there for all of them, especially at moments like this. As the race convoy rolls past we return to the team cars. Back to waiting.
It’s 3:30pm, just as Joachim predicted, when the riders finally sprint past us with 400 metres to go. There’s a GreenEDGE rider in the first 10 riders, and we assume it’s Michael Hepburn and the rest of the breakaway, since we haven’t heard anything of the race since the feed zone. Joachim heads to the finish line to meet the riders while the rest of us wait at the team bus. The riders roll in one by one, leaning their bikes again the team truck for the soigneurs to pack away while the riders go and shower on the team bus. We eventually hear that it was Jens Keukeleire, not Michael Hepburn, who was up the front in the sprint and managed to take 9th place. Lionel Marie certainly seems happy with it, smiling and talking to each one of the riders. Everything is almost packed and the riders and staff are preparing to leave. Some are bound for the airport, others have another long drive ahead of them to get home.
It’s been the end to a very long season.
Paris-Tours is today.
The team buses line the road into town, a colourful array against the cloudy sky. It’s chaos on the street, fans crowding the buses for glimpses of their heroes. Orica-GreenEDGE is one of the 25 sets of cars and buses among the throng, the Australian team almost anomalous amongst all the European entrants. The fans love them nonetheless. Baden Cooke and Jens Keukeleire are stopped and asked for photos and autographs as they mount their bikes to sign on. Another French fan is waiting for the riders as they return to the team bus. No, she’s not a fan of GreenEDGE, she just likes ‘all good riders’. She gets a signature from Julian Dean and takes her search elsewhere..
The GreenEDGE support staff are standing and chatting outside the team bus as they wait for the day to get started. DS Lionel Marie will be following the race in the first team car with the mechanics. The other team car will be heading for the feed zone. I climb into the second car with two of the soigneurs, Joachim and Thomas, where I have a ‘back-seat pass’ for the day. The race hasn’t started yet, but it’s 10:00am and time for us to leave.
Someone’s iPod is plugged into the stereo, Madonna playing over the speakers as the car heads out of Chateauneuf-en-Thymerais towards the feed zone, and then Tours. Joachim and Thomas are chatting as we head out of town and into the countryside about the end of the season, plans and life at home – normal topics of conversation between co-workers. They share a joke about the gendarmes we pass at the entrance to every road that crosses the race route. “The ones at the end of the race have to stand there all day,” Joachim laughs.
A wrong turn with the GPS puts us temporarily off track, but Joachim and Thomas are quick to notice and turn the car around. “We always fuck everything up,” Joachim comments.
“Not always,” Thomas corrects him.
“But most of the time,” Joachim notes sagely. We do another lap of the roundabout and re-join the convoy of team cars heading for the feed zone. The drivers are all joshing one another, waving or flipping the finger with a grin on their face. There’s an exclusive sort of fraternity among the support staff that transcends the team boundaries. Nothing is sacred to these guys, and the humour and language is irreverent, almost crude, but it’s tempered by a mutual understanding and respect between those in a very hectic, demanding line of work.
We reach the edge of the houses around Chateauneuf and enter the French countryside, where the hunting season has already begun. We pass a few hunters walking the fields with their rifles, some waving as the race cars pass. There are a few cycling fans and locals out for an early morning walk or ride, but otherwise the landscape is devoid of life, just us and the road. We stop in one of the many small, nameless towns between Chateauneuf-en-Thymerais and the feed zone for a few minutes. “Something interesting happen?” Joachim asks as he climbs back into the car.
“Nothing,” Thomas replies. It’s a good word to describe what fills most of the day – driving, waiting…nothing.
The fields and woods, so very European in their greenery, seem never-ending. Joachim pushes the speed limit around every corner of the winding French roads as cannily as the riders take the corners of the narrow streets in the towns. As we drive, we constantly drop in and out of the groups of team cars, vans and trucks that fill the roads between Chateauneuf and the feedzone, and we start to look for a petrol station to fill up along the way. By now it’s almost lunchtime, so we pull into the nearest Macca’s for something to eat while we can. Joachim uses the iPad on our table at Macca’s to show Thomas the trailers for some Australian movies and TV shows, commenting on how crazy all the characters in Underbelly are. We’re back on the road soon after. We slip through the road blocks to find the race route yet again, the gendarmes always waving us through.
Passing through the small town of Santenay, we head into the feed zone and pull over on the side of the road. The riders are maybe half an hour behind us. Thomas opens the Eski and begins preparing the musettes for the riders, hanging them off the side of the car. The little knot at the top of the musette strap, he tells me, is to stop the strap sliding through the rider’s hand when he grabs it from the soigneur. As he fills the musettes with various small foods wrapped in tin foil, he talks a little about what it’s like being a soigneur. The majority of them are ex-riders, just like the team managers and sports directors. Most soigneurs leave after a few years, though; it’s not the easy, glamorous work it might seem. It’s a job, like any other. There’s a lot of time spent away from home, and a lot of long hours on the road driving from the start to the finish of a race. Paris-Tours is 183 kilometres. It takes us nearly five hours.
With the musettes ready, there’s not much to do until the peloton arrives. Thomas plays a game on his phone while Joachim tries to set up the race radio in the car and figure out how far away the race is. The breakaway of 11 is still preceding the peloton, and Orica-GreenEDGE’s Michael Hepburn is in it. “Can you imagine if he wins it?” Joachim asks.
“It will be perfect,” Thomas replies. There’s a moment of silence in the car as they think about a GreenEGDE win. Though to an outsider they might seem totally disinterested in the race for most of the day, they still want the team victory. Then the moment is gone and it’s back to business. The riders are on their way and there’s work to be done.
Joachim pulls an Orica-GreenEDGE vest out of his backpack, while Thomas dons a cap, unable to find the other vests in the car boot. They organise how many musettes each of them will carry. Joachim will hand Michael his bag as the breakaway rides past. They take up positions on the right-hand side of the road – Joachim lower down with the most musettes and Thomas a hundred metres further up to catch any riders that Joachim misses.
We can see the breakaway at the bottom of the hill. Michael spots Joachim and tries to veer right, but there’s another rider in the way. The other rider ducks as Joachim hands Michael a musette over the rider’s back. The peloton appears shortly after, and it’s hard to make out individual riders in the mass. The riders know to look for the soigneurs, and Baden Cooke heads right towards Joachim, holding out his hand. The baton relay doesn’t come off, though, and Baden manages to grab a bag from Thomas instead. Joachim hands a musette to Fumiyuki Beppu, and then the peloton is gone, with no sign of the other GreenEDGE riders. We wait until the race convoy passes, jump in the car and continue on.
It’s another 90 kilometres to Tours. Thomas takes over the driving while Joachim naps in the passenger seat. Foo Fighters are playing over the stereo just a little too loudly. As far as the eye can see is nothing but farmland and woods and little hamlets in between. We can’t see Tours until we reach the city’s outskirts. We still haven’t gone past a petrol station, and Thomas is adamant that we need to fill up before we head to the race finish. Joachim types in the finish co-ordinates as we leave the petrol station, but really the neon signs saying ‘Paris-Tours’ guide us into the city centre.
It’s 2:30pm by the time we join the GreenEDGE bus in Tours where the third team car is waiting for us. The soigneurs and team physio, Manuel, unpack up everything from the cars and pile all the bags of the riders going to the airport in the second car. Other teams’ support staff drop by to say hello. Until the riders get here, we’re playing the waiting game again.
There’s a small flurry of excitement as the under-23 race finishes. All the GreenEDGE soigneurs wander over to the fence to have a look too. They start swapping stories of their own careers as riders, laughing as they point out where in the stragglers they’d have finished. Most of the time it might be just a job to them, full of organising, driving and waiting, but the sparkle of cycling is still there for all of them, especially at moments like this. As the race convoy rolls past we return to the team cars. Back to waiting.
It’s 3:30pm, just as Joachim predicted, when the riders finally sprint past us with 400 metres to go. There’s a GreenEDGE rider in the first 10 riders, and we assume it’s Michael Hepburn and the rest of the breakaway, since we haven’t heard anything of the race since the feed zone. Joachim heads to the finish line to meet the riders while the rest of us wait at the team bus. The riders roll in one by one, leaning their bikes again the team truck for the soigneurs to pack away while the riders go and shower on the team bus. We eventually hear that it was Jens Keukeleire, not Michael Hepburn, who was up the front in the sprint and managed to take 9th place. Lionel Marie certainly seems happy with it, smiling and talking to each one of the riders. Everything is almost packed and the riders and staff are preparing to leave. Some are bound for the airport, others have another long drive ahead of them to get home.
It’s been the end to a very long season.
Sunday, 30 September 2012
Circuit Franco-Belge, Stage 4
 |
| Jurgen Roelandts (Lotto Belisol) |
The preparations being made for the race’s arrival in Tournai were every bit as elaborate as for a Grand Tour, and fans certainly didn’t seem to notice any difference, team buses from all the World Tour teams squeezing through Tournai’s narrow backstreets. Race jerseys from every team and country were available to eager spectators, BMC fans able to buy direct from the source thanks to the team van parked alongside the race route. Belgian French and Flemish commentary mingled with police sirens and cheering of fans to provide the classic auditory backdrop to a European race.
The day’s breakaway held a slim lead over the peloton as they approached the finish line to begin the first of seven laps around Tournai, but the lead had been reduced to barely a hundred metres by the end of the first lap. This didn’t suit the breakaway riders, clearly hoping for an underdog victory, and the septet kicked again in the third lap, building up a massive lead of more than 3’30” over the peloton again. They were reeled in with plenty of time to spare, and a second breakaway of around nine riders had no more success in escaping the hungering peloton.
The whole race was together and the atmosphere at the finish very, very tense as the big screen counted down the final few kilometres of the stage. Various teams were jostling for position and it was still any man’s race as they reached the final 1000 metres of the race. An unexpected crash carved a hole in the middle of the peloton and left the watching audience in Tournai gasping, unsure who was down and who was still pelting for the finish.
It became evident a moment later as a black-and-red streak and a blue-white-and-red-striped streak raced across the finish line, French national champion Nacer Bouhanni (FDJ-Bigmat) just edging out BMC’s Adam Blythe to take the final stage win. The riders involved in the day’s late crash rolled slowly over the line a few minutes later tailed by British national champion Ian Stannard. Lotto Belisol team leader Jurgen Roelandts managed to hang onto his race lead and yellow jersey, as well as taking home the green points jersey. Topsport Vlaanderen Mercator’s Stijn Neirynck took out the mountains classification, while crowd favourite Guillaume Van Keirsbulck donned the best young rider’s white jersey and Lithuanian national champion Gediminas Bagdonas claimed the honours in combativity.
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