"We introduced the control room during the Tour de
France," Heijboer stated. "A data analyst monitors all incoming
information: weather conditions, social media, climb times, and more. The race
coach mainly focuses on the TV, analyzing how our team and other squads are
racing, which allows him to relay insights to our race director."
"You could do that from the couch as well, but this
way, we centralized everything. During the Tour, it was really useful. We could
see whether teams were riding offensively or defensively," added Heijboer,
a member of Visma | Lease a Bike's sports management team.
Following an evaluation over the winter, the team has now
scaled back the system.
"After evaluating things over the winter, we concluded
that the added value of the control room during races is limited, so you won’t
be seeing much of it anymore. However, the concept remains, and the bus will
now be stationed at our High Performance Center in Den Bosch. There, we have
all the necessary technology and strong connections at our disposal."
Heijboer explained the initial reasoning behind the setup.
"With our Performance department, we concluded that
there is an overwhelming amount of available data. During the spring classics,
we realized that you actually see more from home on the couch than the race
coach does from the team car. By combining these insights, we came up with the
control room—supported by Visma and BetCity. The idea was to centralize all
publicly available information in one place, where both our data analyst and a
race coach would be present."
"This setup ensures that all relevant data is filtered
and sent to the race coach. That way, they don’t have to search for information
themselves and can fully focus on communicating with the riders. It’s a tool
that enhances our decision-making during races while also improving safety.
Race coaches normally juggle many tasks—they watch TV, check social media, and
make a lot of phone calls. We believe it’s far better for them to focus on
communication."
Despite external criticism, Heijboer dismissed concerns over
the system's impact on racing.
"We’re not turning it into a PlayStation. The riders
still have to make split-second decisions, and there is no direct connection
between the control room and the riders. We provide our insights to the race
coach, and it’s ultimately their responsibility to decide whether to pass that
information on to the riders or not."
He also emphasized that data does not replace instinct.
"In every sport, data is becoming increasingly
important, but in my opinion, it does not take away the intuition of the
cyclists."