"As a domestique you can always be important to a leader, but rarely as pronounced as in a team time trial" - Victor Campenaerts out to prove his worth in Visma
Cycling
The team time trial has become something of a dying art in professional cycling over recent years. This afternoon at Paris-Nice though, the peloton does battle in a TTT and for Team Visma | Lease a Bike's Victor Campenaerts, there is a real opportunity to prove himself as a key domestique in his new team.
With Jonas Vingegaard, Edoardo Affini, Matteo Jorgenson, Per Strand Hagenes, Bart Lemmen and Axel Zingle in the team in addition to Campenaerts, Team Visma | Lease start the day as one of the favourites to take the win. Campenaerts in particular has an important role, looking after team leader Vingegaard. "I get the most blessed place. Or rather the most feared..., haha. I am small and aerodynamic on the bike myself, but nobody is as aerodynamic as Jonas," the Belgian explains to Het Nieuwsblad. "So behind him you do catch some wind. But someone has to do it, of course, and for me the disadvantage seems to be limited after all."
As mentioned though, having re-joined Visma from Lotto over the recent off-season, this TTT gives Campenaerts an early season chance to really prove his worth. "As a domestique you can always be important to a leader, but rarely as pronounced as in a team time trial. Uphill, the leader must be good enough. In a team time trial, one rider can never limit the damage alone if the rest is not up to par," he concludes. "I am definitely more nervous for a team time trial than for an individual time trial. I have also never ridden a team time trial with an ex-Tour winner in the team, in a stage race that we clearly want to win. But my form is good and during altitude training I have also often trained on the time trial bike."
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- I don’t know how generalised it is but in every race in every country I’ve participated in you either need to show a club licence (which you only get by having a medical around every 2-3 years) or by having a doctors’ aptitude certificate. Can’t ask for much more. Don’t forget, 15000 people (of which quite some are well into the latter part of life), that’s a small town where people will have medical issues every day even without cycling hard. In one country I lived in you even have to do a full ECG and power test regularly to ride competitively after 50.Mistermaumau05-04-2025
- Before or after their kids get married to each other ;-)Mistermaumau05-04-2025
- Ok guys, both of you, this is far too complex to debate as a whole as there are dozens of variables and none of the conditions have been rigidly defined, what’s more, everyone is looking at things from a different angle and for a different purpose so let’s go back to the real basics first to see if we can agree on some starting principles. If you throw a golf ball or ping pong ball (assuming same size here) at the same speed in the same direction, which is going to land further? Ditto if you launch them with the same power? If two identical riders of 70 and 80kg (lets assume the extra 10kg is just bones and drinks and lunch) on identical bikes ride side by side at speed X with zero wind (or alternatively a really strong head wind) and both stop pedalling at the same time, which is going to roll further or come to a stop sooner? The wind force does inevitably come into play but I want to keep an open mind as to the effect it has in situ in practice because it obviously isn’t the only criteria and with acem82’s example it’s highly likely that wind is more minor but that wouldn’t be true for every real-life situation. Regarding cobbles, that’s an extremely complex motion to analyse, you can call it bouncing or hopping or climbing or what you like but in reality it’s indescribable and only high precision analysis can tell you exactly how much of each effect is contributing for each rider at each speed and every tire pressure/behaviour, you will NEVER manage to say that one criteria alone governs the whole efficiency equation.Mistermaumau05-04-2025
- Medical test should be mandatory before participationabstractengineer05-04-2025
- You are completely wrongvappaxbipmv05-04-2025
- Tadej has a little more chance. It will be an exciting race and the most important thing is that no one gets hurt.
maria2024202405-04-2025 - Whatever happens tomorrow... it'll be a hell of a raceslappers6605-04-2025
- Exactly Tadej, the cancer of modern society. Full of good-for-nothing people who gain visibility and importance on social media mocking, humiliating (and worse things) to earn money. But it's the follower's fault, no followers, no "influencers".maria2024202405-04-2025
- Great commentCaralladas05-04-2025
- i’m such a sucker for those group-hug, happy ending moments between competitors, largely because it’s so WASN’T that way in my younger, stronger days. (on that note, i have this hope that somewhere down the road, maybe fifteen or twenty years, a middle aged wout and mathieu will go for a pleasure ride together in flanders, and reminisce about the days when they were the young, strong monsters that stalked the cobbles.)OCexile05-04-2025