Wiggins using VAM

gsk82

i think that knowing that all these journalists would be saying he can't climb someone at sky did a quick fag packet working he could use to prove he can.

his figure is probably high in the dauphine because they rode tempo all the way up, instead of pootling for 90% and accelerating for a few seconds at a time, as tends to happen in races

fredmac

ratsbeyfus wrote:

Interesting article on/by Wiggins here:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/blog/2012/jun/28/tour-de-france-2012-bradley-wigging

The numbers we have been working by this year on the road are not power output or speed, but VAM: Vertical Altitude Metres, or how quickly you gain height on a climb. That way it doesn't matter about power output, windspeed, the steepness of the climb or your speed: it's simply a matter of how fast you gain height vertically, as if you were in a lift, measured in metres per hour. The average VAM for a big climb on the Tour last year was 1,400m or 1,500m. When Alberto Contador attacked at Verbier in 2009 he was going at about 1,800m, which is similar to the figures Marco Pantani used to reach.

In the Dauphiné, on the Col du Joux-Plane on the penultimate day, we were climbing at about 1,700 VAM. There aren't many riders out there who can go that fast, and there weren't many able to stay with us on that stage. So that gives me confidence that physically I'm in the right place at the moment.

I don't know scientifically how valid it is to compare VAM figures from one rider to another on different days/courses, etc, but to me that comparison between Contador, Pantani and his own figures sounds like he's trying to tell the doping-doubters to shut it.

So Wiggins can climb at nearly 95% of the pace of Pantani who was juiced out his head.
Interesting

RichN95.

fredmac wrote:

So Wiggins can climb at nearly 95% of the pace of Pantani who was juiced out his head.
Interesting

5% is a big difference though. It translates to three minutes on that climb alone.
And Pantani was doing it solo as the fourth climb on stage 15 of the Tour, not as a team on the only real climb of a one week race.

fredmac

He was also a specialist climber, possibly the best of his generation.
Wiggins is not

RichN95.

fredmac wrote:

He was also a specialist climber, possibly the best of his generation.
Wiggins is not

Maybe, but it doesn't change the fact that 5% difference is really quite big.

In a different sport, Men's Athletics, in almost all events, 5% is the difference between not qualifying for the Olympics and being the World Record holder

fredmac

This is rubbish. First 2 events I looked at, 100 & 200 meters finals at Bejing the difference between first and last in the FINAL was 4 & 5 % respectively

dave_1

Wiggins prologue yesterday would have only had him in fourth place in the same stage in 2004. He would have been 7 seconds slower than Armstrong in 2004 and 9 seconds slower than Cancellera rather than 7 seconds behind fab yesterday. IMO Wiggins is clean and honest.

RichN95.

fredmac wrote:

This is rubbish. First 2 events I looked at, 100 & 200 meters finals at Bejing the difference between first and last in the FINAL was 4 & 5 % respectively

Let's do the maths:

Winning time in Beijing: 9.69
Olympics A qualifying time: 10.18

(9.69/10.18) x 100 = 95.19% - a difference of 4.81%. So 5% is the difference between winning gold in world record time and not qualifying.
Now of course, Bolt has dropped the WR since so 5% does just scrape in, but, as in almost all distances, the difference is around 5%.

5% in sport is a huge difference.

meagain

Dave_1 wrote:

Wiggins prologue yesterday would have only had him in fourth place in the same stage in 2004. He would have been 7 seconds slower than Armstrong in 2004 and 9 seconds slower than Cancellera rather than 7 seconds behind fab yesterday. IMO Wiggins is clean and honest.

That surely assumes "everything else equal" , which it never is! Or possibly "just not as good".

dave_1

meagain wrote:

Dave_1 wrote:

Wiggins prologue yesterday would have only had him in fourth place in the same stage in 2004. He would have been 7 seconds slower than Armstrong in 2004 and 9 seconds slower than Cancellera rather than 7 seconds behind fab yesterday. IMO Wiggins is clean and honest.

That surely assumes "everything else equal" , which it never is! Or possibly "just not as good".

they spend millions of Euros and trains thousands of miles on TT bikes, have engineers redesign frames just to get 1 or 2 seconds so was just curious as to why everyone was slower than 8 years ago

gsk82

Have the time gaps quoted above been flexed for the extra 300m they did yesterday?

fredmac

RichN95 wrote:

fredmac wrote:

This is rubbish. First 2 events I looked at, 100 & 200 meters finals at Bejing the difference between first and last in the FINAL was 4 & 5 % respectively

Let's do the maths:

Winning time in Beijing: 9.69
Olympics A qualifying time: 10.18

(9.69/10.18) x 100 = 95.19% - a difference of 4.81%. So 5% is the difference between winning gold in world record time and not qualifying.
Now of course, Bolt has dropped the WR since so 5% does just scrape in, but, as in almost all distances, the difference is around 5%.

5% in sport is a huge difference.

The difference in the 2008 100m final between the 8 fastest guys in the world was 3.4%, so maybe the differences are not as huge as you make out.
The slowest time at the games was 12.6s, 24% slower. Now that is huge.

Jez mon

Dave_1 wrote:

meagain wrote:

Dave_1 wrote:

Wiggins prologue yesterday would have only had him in fourth place in the same stage in 2004. He would have been 7 seconds slower than Armstrong in 2004 and 9 seconds slower than Cancellera rather than 7 seconds behind fab yesterday. IMO Wiggins is clean and honest.

That surely assumes "everything else equal" , which it never is! Or possibly "just not as good".

they spend millions of Euros and trains thousands of miles on TT bikes, have engineers redesign frames just to get 1 or 2 seconds so was just curious as to why everyone was slower than 8 years ago

How much have the UCI regulations changed in these 8 years?