Etape du Tour

Wingedheels
Wingedheels Posts: 3
edited June 2010 in Pro race
Does anyone know how they calculate the speed of the broom wagon in the Etape. Is it a per centage of the lead rider? If you are not in the front pen it seems to be much tougher - or is that not true.

Comments

  • Kléber
    Kléber Posts: 6,842
    It seems sad that so many get attracted to this one ride but end up spending the day looking over their shoulder.

    Anyway, wrong section, see http://www.bikeradar.com/road/forums/vi ... hp?f=40007
  • Wingedheels
    Wingedheels Posts: 3
    In training for an event it helps to know what average speed you need to get up to.
  • Rodrego Hernandez
    Rodrego Hernandez Posts: 1,436
    Wingedheels wrote:
    In training for an event it helps to know what average speed you need to get up to.

    Does it? Surely you just go as hard as possible for the duration of the event. Why go with the bare minimum standard, just go for the best time you can do or take up cycle touring.
  • The roadislife
    The roadislife Posts: 5
    Rodrego Hernandez wrote:
    Wingedheels wrote:
    In training for an event it helps to know what average speed you need to get up to.

    Does it? Surely you just go as hard as possible for the duration of the event. Why go with the bare minimum standard, just go for the best time you can do or take up cycle touring.

    Wingedheels has got a point. It goes without saying that you work as hard as you can within and beyond your physical and mental capacity. However, if on the Etape the broom wagon operates on the basis of the first guy across the line, the riders in Pen 9 for example, are going to have to work a lot harder than the riders, say in Pen 3 who probably have a 15 minute head start. I don't think the question was about performance, I think it was a question simply about the technical timing of the broom.
  • The roadislife
    The roadislife Posts: 5
    Kléber wrote:
    It seems sad that so many get attracted to this one ride but end up spending the day looking over their shoulder.

    Anyway, wrong section, see http://www.bikeradar.com/road/forums/vi ... hp?f=40007

    Not sure where you get the basis for that over the shoulder comment. I'm doing my fourth Etape this July and as far as I could work out everyone just wants to finish, and finish in their best possible time. When you're on the Ventoux with one hour behind you and another hour to go in 30+ degrees of heat, the only thought in your head is to keep the pedals turning, and not about what anyone else may or may not be doing. If you've avoided the Broom that is at least one mental pressure you can discard.
  • Monty Dog
    Monty Dog Posts: 20,614
    Apart from posting this in the wrong board - L'Etape stuff should be under sportives...

    Anyway, if you start calculating your speed based on the broomwagon, how are you going to account for punctures, mechanicals and the like? To be brutally honest, if you're worried about the broomwagon, should you be doing it all?
    Make mine an Italian, with Campagnolo on the side..
  • Rodrego Hernandez
    Rodrego Hernandez Posts: 1,436
    Fair comment. The broom wagon timer starts at 7am, the start of the event. Those at the back just have to PLF.
  • richa
    richa Posts: 1,632
    The wagon starts to roll at 7h40. Worth thinking about but not worrying about. Do your best, if it gets you, then get fitter/faster and have another go next year. Good luck.
    Rich
  • Rodrego Hernandez
    Rodrego Hernandez Posts: 1,436
    It starts after the last rider but its clock starts on the first.

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