It's true, but do we have to say it?

French MTBer Jean-Christophe Peraud has claimed the road cycling title at his nation's champs, and reflects upon his advancing years:

I'll be 35 in 2012. Cycling is an endurance sport suitable for old athletes but I'll wait for one more year to determine myself about focusing on London or not.

Great, 35 is officially "old". Let's not tell Lance, eh?

Astana rumoured to fold b4 Le Tour.. and Armstrong confident abt starting his own team. Hmmm

I'm sure that the Astana team will find a stop-gap sponsor between now and July, should it need one, to ensure a start at Le Tour. It has to be a worthwhile investment, surely? With a team of stars, including Armstrong, how could you fail to get ROI out of it?

The rumours look like this:
On May third, the newspaper's website quoted Kazakhstan's cycling federation vice president Nikolai Proskurin as saying that even if the team takes part in the Giro as planned, it is likely to be the final Grand Tour in the history of the Astana project. The only way to save the current incarnation of the squad appears to be for one or more Kazakh backers to move in and commit to supporting it. Alternatively Johan Bruyneel, who owns the ProTour licence, will have to find funds to enable the team to continue.

Armstrong recently said this:
Lance Armstrong believes there is a "high" probability he will start a professional team of his own for the 2010 season. The American expects the announcement to come this July, after he races the Tour de France.

You can join any required dots.

Drug testers take blood, sweat and tears - Armstrong's behaviour 'unusual'?

Just what constitutes 'unusual' behaviour when 'surprised' by the blood, urine and hair-sample-taking team I don't know:

Lance Armstrong's behaviour during his 24th anti-doping control since returning to the sport may have landed the American in hot water with the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and French Anti-Doping Agency (AFLD). L'Equipe has reported that AFLD, which conducted the March 17 out-of-competition test, submitted a report to the International Cycling Union (UCI) and WADA on March 30. The report apparently details the abnormal behaviour observed before and during the surprise visit from the French agency.

Did he run away? Slam the door? Abuse them? Or is this L'Equipe beating things up? He is recovering from a broken collarbone, so maybe he was a bit tetchy... I would be. Later, Armstrong's rebuttal came and it was quite reasonable - someone turned up to take samples who simply didn't appear convincingly authorised to do so, so they checked on his credentials:

"I returned home that day after a long training ride to find a man chasing me as I rode up to the house. He stopped me and told me he was from the French laboratory and was here to test me. I had never heard of labs or governments doing drug testing and I had no idea who this guy was or whether he was telling the truth.

Despite all of that reasonableness, the "drug testing laboratory" in question was concerned about the 20 minute delay between turning up and actually getting the samples. Without wanting to get carried away about it, having a shower could have been a cover for time to take a masking drug, but then again it could just have been a shower. In any case 20 mins is not long enough to mask much, especially so when blood, urine and hair was taken. Surely he didn't get a hair transplant in 20mins?

Postscript: The UCI's Pat McQuaid wonders aloud what the AFLD is doing: "Normal proceedings between institutions such as national anti-doping agencies, the international federation and the World anti-doping agency (WADA) are normally done in a professional and confidential way until a decision or sanction has been taken," he continued. "In this case it was leaked to the press and I do find that disturbing."

LA pic from Adelaide via Twitter

Just sharing a pic from Lance in Adelaide (for the TDU):



Nice to see a fit Pat Jonker (past winner, retired from pro riding but still looking good). O'Grady looks like he has been working out - preparing for the Euro-season cobbles?

Training a 37 yo L. Armstrong

Not so different from a 34 year old one really:
With Armstrong being 37 years-old, will Carmichael be monitoring any new or different parameters this time around? "It is basically the same thing as with any athlete, the most objective marker is power," said Carmichael. "Right now, it is just trying to see if we can get power to keep going up which we anticipate to happen. We also want to see that he is getting more efficient so his kilojoules will keep going down for similar types of workouts. "Now he is starting to get more specific with his training moving out of the foundation phase and doing a little more specific work for the bike; a little more threshold work; a little more speed work. He goes to the Astana camp in December then we are planning a camp right after that where he will get behind the motor a little bit and up the volume from basically doing 24-25 hours a week up to 28-30 hours a week of training. That's a big jump on just energy expenditure so everything just has to start simplifying," said Carmichael, who once served as the US National Coaching Director.

So that's:

1. Measure power (ie engine output)
   
2. Watch it go up (and do something if it doesn't)
   
3. Move from foundation to specifics (ie start long and slow and build workouts on top)
   
4. Become more efficient (ie run as far and as fast but on less)
   

Simple, really.

Armstrong wants more power, less speed?

That's what I think I read: Armstrong is not necessarily looking for the position that will make the bike the fastest. "It has to be a perfect mix between position and power. If I am five percent slower due to the position, but have 25 percent more power, than that will be better."

Now he may be misquoted. He may be confused, or quoted out of context. Or he's being silly. Perhaps he meant that the 'fastest' position wasn't necessarily the most comfortable and sustainable, which is fine. Perhaps he meant that the most aerodynamic position wasn't necessarily the best overall, for whatever reason. But why the heck say that he'd compromise speed for 'more power'? Wouldn't less power and more speed be even better than the reverse? What use is the extra power if it doesn't increase his speed?

Please explain!

Just to keep things in perspective

Take a chance on Lance? This comeback world tour for cancer is not all beer and roses y'know (in fact in may not involve beer or roses at all): Dr Michael Ashenden, whose analysis of Armstrong's urine samples from the 1999 Tour de France allegedly revealed that the cyclist used the blood-boosting drug EPO during the race, said too many people in Australia had been "dazzled" by Armstrong's "star power". "It surprises me that the Tour is willing to embrace such a controversial figure," Ashenden said.

Live on the web: Armstrong's blood profile

Just what we all wanted to see, Web2.0 at its very best: Lance Armstrong's blood tests on the web. Catlin said that the actual program is still taking shape. "[Lance] has agreed to a couple of a few very fundamental points. One is his data, like T/E ratio and all that kind of stuff that a doping control is allowed to do will be on the web, so you can see it. 'Ah, your T/E ration changed today, what happened?' Like to see if he is taking EPO – all the actors to make it a very public campaign."

What about this enhancement to the website itself - some sliding controls that change the blood values, with respectively new maximum values for Wattage and VO2 max as you dial up the changes. And how about a new estimated time up L'Alpe d'Huez at those values... just so we can assess for ourselves what difference it makes to have higher haematocrit, for example.

McQuaid on Armstrong's 'cleanliness'

Pat McQuaid may wish to revise his words, or not, if they are correctly reported: "He'll probably never shut up the no-gooders but it might give him the opportunity to prove he can do it clean."

To me that suggests that Lance hasn't yet proved "he can do it clean". I'll say no more!

Lance returns: do we care?

Well it will kick up some dust, sure. Lance Armstrong's comeback is in the grand US tradition of retiring at the top yet seeking another "final" blaze of glory. Indeed it can't be easy to step out of the limelight and start a "normal" life, if cancer-survivor LA's life could ever be called normal. So a comeback - a well-planned, targeted one at that - could give LA another shot at proving whatever it is he's trying to prove. His innocence, perhaps?

He says he's clean and I take him at his word. He says it's for cancer-fighting publicity, but there must be something in it for him as well. Assuming he does come back, whatever the reasons, does he link with the cleaned-up residue that is Astana, banned from Le Tour 2008? Or does he seek a pure, clean break with the past? I hope the latter - but suspect he'll fall in with the "trusted" old Bruyneel team, irrespective. I'd like to be proven wrong on that.

Lastly, if he does join Astana and they get a berth at Le Tour (no guarantees there but probable), will he be top dog? One assumes so, but will it be the case if Contador has an edge in week 3? Contador's still young, so I suspect he'll roll over easily, but it won't necessarily be easy for him, either.

As runners, cyclists make good cyclists

But triathletes fare better. Well Armstrong was a triathlete many moons ago, and it shows. As a cyclist and not a runner I can quite honestly say that I was "fast enough", but only over about 400m max. After that it became a slog, a real slog.

Anyway, from CN: Seven times Tour de France champion and cancer survivor Lance Armstrong finished the 112th Boston Marathon in 2:50:58, placing 488th out of more than 25,000 Monday. Kenyan Robert Cheruiyot won the men's race in 2:07:46, missing the course record he set by just 32 seconds. He became the fourth man to win Boston four times, joining American great Bill Rogers.

Riders who also run

I'm not sure why, but plenty of riders are turning to running, especially after retirement from pro cycling. Is it a fear of incipient osteoporosis? The lure of a new challenge? Less time-consuming? Or is running just easier? (I doubt the latter.) Anyway, here are some more... starting with Rabo's Michael Boogerd:Meanwhile, he is still staying athletically involved. He plans to run the Rotterdam marathon on April 13, as preparation for the RopaRun, a three day event from Paris to Rotterdam which raises money for charity. "It is for a good cause, and now that I have stopped racing I still need do something to keep my condition on a good level," Boogerd said. "I now try to run an hour each day. It does me good. Later this year, I want to run the New York marathon." His training partner is Leontien Zijlaard-van Moorsel, who ran the New York marathon in 2007. "I asked him and Michael was enthusiastic," she said. "After my cycling career, I found running to be a new sport where I feel good. I think that running will also be good for Michael."

And Armstrong, of course: Lance Armstrong will continue his post-retirement marathon career by competing in the Boston Marathon on April 21, the race organisers announced Thursday. Armstrong qualified after finishing the New York City Marathon in 2007, bettering his previous year's effort with a finishing time of two hours 46 minutes and 43 seconds. The seven time Tour de France champion was well under the Boston Marathon's qualifying time for his 35-to-39 age group of three hours 15 minutes.

Cyclists make good runners? Maybe

Personally I have always enjoyed a little cross-training and liked the fact that all you needed was a pair of shoes... and some light running gear. And a safe pathway with good lighting. And even ground to avoid tripping. And somewhere to put your keys whilst you go for that long run. And plenty of accessible water stops. OK, I tend to complicate things, but Lance Armstrong probably had someone hold his keys for him as he ran the NY marathon, eh? He finished 698th among 39,085 runners taking part. His time topped that of former cyclist Laurent Jalabert; the Frenchman ran the 2005 event in a time of 2:55'39". However, other former cyclists have gone faster in other marathon events; German Rolf Aldag ran 2:42'57" in Hamburg this April and Spaniard Abraham Olano went 2:39' in the San Sebastián marathon last November.