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1/2 Ironman Astana Brad Kahlefeldt Cycling davide rebellin emma snowsill International Road Ironman ITU Javier Gomez Levi Leipheimer Marathon matt reed new york city marathon Olympic Olympics Paris Nice Running Slipstream Chipotle Swimming Tour de France Training triathlon Uncategorized vanessa fernandes
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March 21, 2008
Student of the Sport: Lactate Threshold
Great article from Inside Triathlon on lactate threshold training..... Although “lactate threshold” is one of the most common buzzwords surrounding training for triathlon, many athletes don’t realize its importance in improving performance. Understanding and knowing your lactate threshold can help you get the most bang for your training buck. THE BASICS The What Lactate: A chemical compound produced during processes of energy metabolism. Lactate threshold: The point during exercise at which the rate of lactate production exceeds the rate of lactate removal. The mechanism of removal in our bodies is our “buffering system.” The Why At rest or during aerobic exercise, our body shunts the precursors of lactate back into the energy cycle, using them for more energy. As we reach anaerobic exercise, our system’s capacity to do so is overcome, and those precursors start turning into lactate. Knowing that threshold at which your individual buffering system is overcome can help you to train at that threshold and become more efficient at turning lactate back into energy. This translates to higher quality training of your aerobic and anaerobic energy systems when you know concrete numbers for the boundaries of those systems. FINDING YOUR LACTATE THRESHOLD Read More
March 21, 2008
Slipstream vow to bring fresh breeze to Tour
by Julien Pretot
PARIS, March 21 (Reuters) - Newcomers Slipstream vowed to bring a fresh breeze to the Tour de France after being invited to cycling’s greatest stage race.
Slipstream, a ProContinental team, will hit the French roads with two other second-division teams that have already competed in the Tour and 17 ProTour teams.
However, team owner Doug Ellis was undaunted by the task awaiting his riders.
“There are a lot of experienced riders in the team, with two having worn the yellow jersey, David Millar and David Zabriskie,” Ellis told Reuters in a telephone interview.
“I think (Tour organisers) ASO saw there was experience in our team. They are also interested in getting access to the U.S. cycling audience, and we have so many U.S. riders in the team,” he added.
Led by Zabriskie, the only U.S. rider to have won at least one stage in all three big Tours (France, Italy and Spain), the team has 14 Americans on its 25-strong roster.
This gives ASO an opportunity to lure back the American audience three years after seven-times winner Lance Armstrong retired.
Ellis promised that his team, under the guidance of former professional rider and founder Jonathan Vaughters, would stand out during the Tour.
ANTI-DOPING STANCE
“We’re not only going for publicity. We are going for the yellow jersey, to take it and try to hold on to it,” Ellis said.
March 20, 2008
Slipstream a go, Astana a no for Tour - ASO announces 20 teams for 2008 Tour de France
Cycling News Flash… March 21, 2008 By Gregor Brown
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The Amaury Sport Organisation (ASO) has announced the 20 teams that will partake in the 2008 edition of the Tour de France, July 5 to 27. The organiser of the world’s largest cycling event confirmed its controversial decision to exclude the team of defending champion Alberto Contador, Astana, but has included USA’s promising new team, Slipstream Chipotle - H30.
Slipstream manager Jonathan Vaughters was happy to be back on the road to the Tour de France, after having last ridden the event in 2002. The team had planned its season around a possible bid for the Tour, but the invitation was not a given. “I’ve come to never expect anything in cycling: it’s funny, we were given an invite to the Tour but not for Gent-Wevelgem!”
Comprising the list of 20 teams are the 17 ProTour teams (minus Astana) and three Professional Continental teams, Agritubel (Fra), Slipstream Chipotle - H30 (USA) and Barloworld (GBr). The ProTour teams are Gerolsteiner and Team Milram (Ger), Quick Step and Silence-Lotto (Bel), Team CSC (Den), Caisse d’Epargne, Euskaltel-Euskadi and Saunier-Duval-Scott (Spa), High Road (USA), Bouygues Telecom, Crédit Agricole, Cofidis, Française des Jeux and AG2R La Mondiale (Fra), Lampre and Liquigas (Ita), Rabobank (Ned).
During a meeting between the International Cycling Union (UCI) and five national federations (including France) in January, the UCI stated that all 18 ProTour teams must be invited to the Tour de France. However, February 12, ASO said it had no intention on inviting Team Astana following its problems in last year’s event.
Slipstream’s invitation comes as a welcome sign and a follow-up to its participation in ASO’s Paris-Nice last week. The team, which was also invited to race in the Giro d’Italia, is headed by Jonathan Vaughters and boasts star riders such as Magnus Backstedt, David Millar and David Zabriskie. In addition, it has a strong anti-doping programme in place.
Stay with Cyclingnews for follow-ups on this story in our next news edition.
March 20, 2008
University probably helped T-mobile dope
Cyclists in the now defunct Team T-Mobile "probably" took doping products under the supervision of Freiburg university doctors, according to an independent report published on Thursday.
And the 23-page interim report, published by the commissioned inquiry into the doping scandal at Freiburg's University Medical Clinic, has also named two more doctors involved in the scandal.
The report sheds light on the doping practices of Team T-Mobile — who changed their name from Team Telekom in ...
March 19, 2008
Some Olympic events could be at risk given Beijing pollution issue
From the IOC… 17 March 2008
With the health of athletes who participate in the Olympic Games being of the utmost importance to the International Olympic Committee (IOC), the IOC’s Medical Commission has been appraising the air quality in the Chinese capital.
Over the past weeks, an analysis has been made of a set of data – including temperature, wind, humidity and SO2, NO2, CO, Ozone and PM10 readings – which were taken by the Beijing Environment Protection Bureau from 8 to 29 August 2007 and given to the IOC. The data have been evaluated on the basis of the WHO 2005 interim target standards. The findings indicate that, at Games time one year out, the health of athletes was largely not impaired. This finding is upheld by the fact that no health issues related to air quality were reported to the IOC by any of the team physicians who looked after athletes competing during the August 2007 test events. Nor were any such problems reported at the IAAF Junior World Championships that were held in August 2006. Moreover, measures are continuously being taken by the Chinese authorities which can be expected to improve the air quality further when compared with 2006 and 2007.
For outdoor endurance events that include minimum one hour continuous physical efforts at high level – urban road cycling, mountain bike, marathon, marathon swimming, triathlon and road walk - the IOC Medical Commission’s findings indicated that there may be some risk. The IOC will, therefore, be working together with the relevant International Federations in order to put in place procedures which will allow a “plan B” to be activated for such events if necessary. The procedure will include daily monitoring of air quality and weather conditions at the venue, a reporting process from the Beijing Environment Protection Bureau to the IOC and relevant sports Federation, and a joint IOC-sports Federation decision to postpone the event if necessary.
March 18, 2008
Cancellara wins Tirreno-Adriatico overall
CSC's Fabian Cancellara held on to win the 43rd edition of the Tirreno-Adriatico following Tuesday's seventh and final stage. Italian Francesco Chicchi of Liquigas won the 176km run around San Benedetto del Tronto. But the 26-year-old Swiss, the current double world time-trial champion, kept hold of the leader's blue jersey and set himself up as one of the hot favorites for Saturday's Milan-San Remo.
March 17, 2008
Training and Pacing
More on Pacing by Joe Friel
Since my post last month on negative splits in steady state events such as time trials and triathlons there have been a lot of questions about how the principles described there apply to courses with hills and wind. There have been several scientific studies done on this matter. Here is a brief summary of several of these studies. I’ll let you draw your own conclusions.
* Using a mathematical model Swain found that when compared with a constant effort there was a significant time savings in a cycling time trial by slightly increasing power on the uphills and into headwinds and decreasing it slightly on downhills and with tailwinds. (Swain. 1997. A model for optimizing cycling performance by varying power on hills and in wind. Med Sci Sports Exercise 29:1104-1108.)
March 16, 2008
Rebellin wins Paris-Nice
Davide Rebellin (Gerolsteiner) survived a flurry of attacks to win the 66th edition of Paris-Nice on Sunday after Luis-León Sanchez (Caisse d’Epargne) took the slimmest of victories in the final stage around Nice. The stage, which featured three cat. 1 climbs, was trimmed by 6.5km to 115km due to a landslide on the descent of the cat. 1 La Turbie. A small detour took the peloton to the final climb up Col d’Eze.
March 16, 2008
Paris-Nice riders protest Van Impe test
Riders in the Paris-Nice stage race protested Sunday against a doping test control for Belgian colleague Kevin Van Impe, who was asked for a urine sample just as he was grieving at a crematorium following the death of his new-born son. The protest delayed the start of the final stage of the race as Van Impe's compatriot Philippe Gilbert, a member of the international riders association CPA, took to the rostrum to say that while the riders were not against doping tests they wanted more respect shown. read more
March 15, 2008
Rebellin seizes lead at Paris-Nice
Davide Rebellin (Gerolsteiner) seized the lead in Paris-Nice on Saturday as Sylvain Chavanel (Cofidis) outfought a seven-man breakaway in the final kilometer to win the sixth stage. The 206km stage was another tough one, the longest of the race. It featured seven rated climbs, including the decisive cat. 2 Col du Tanneron with 20km to go. read more
