2014 Pro-cycling season thread

I never think performance is proof, and I'm open to the idea that performances will inevitably progress, but for a lot of people beating or even getting close to the times of the past , especially Armstrong's, is like a signed confession. Ah well, it's a shitty world

There's an interesting chapter in Dr Hutch's book about the genetics of cyclists - it makes it pretty clear that whilst todays top cyclists are relatively predisposed genetically to being good at cycling, even they might only have10 out of a possible 23 polymorphisms necessary for excelling at endurance sports, and even then that's pretty rare. Even if Froome only had one more of these polymorphisms than his peers then he would be head and shoulders above them.

I'm not necessarily saying he does (and I'm not saying he isn't going right up to the line with whatever is currently allowed drugs-wise), I'm just saying that the role genetics play is huge (much much MUCH larger than training, equipment or even doping) if he really is the physical freak everyone says he is, it's not a totally ridiculous conclusion that he might have one or two more polymorphisms than Armstrong (or whoever).

Traditionally cycling has had access to quite a narrow, white, European gene pool. With a widening base of interest in cycling, the chances of people genetically predisposed to being good at it taking it up instead of say, running (or even nothing) are much greater. Exciting, and also a little bit terrifying.

Geneticist!

See also the TED talk by David Epstein

http://www.ted.com/talks/david_epstein_are_athletes_really_getting_faster_better_stronger

Still, technology isn't the only thing pushing athletes forward. While indeed we haven't evolved into a new species in a century, the gene pool within competitive sports most certainly has changed. In the early half of the 20th century, physical education instructors and coaches had the idea that the average body type was the best for all athletic endeavors: medium height, medium weight, no matter the sport. And this showed in athletes' bodies. In the 1920s, the average elite high-jumper and average elite shot-putter were the same exact size. But as that idea started to fade away, as sports scientists and coaches realized that rather than the average body type, you want highly specialized bodies that fit into certain athletic niches, a form of artificial selection took place, a self-sorting for bodies that fit certain sports, and athletes' bodies became more different from one another. Today, rather than the same size as the average elite high jumper, the average elite shot-putter is two and a half inches taller and 130 pounds heavier. And this happened throughout the sports world.

In fact, if you plot on a height versus mass graph one data point for each of two dozen sports in the first half of the 20th century, it looks like this. There's some dispersal, but it's kind of grouped around that average body type. Then that idea started to go away, and at the same time, digital technology -- first radio, then television and the Internet -- gave millions, or in some cases billions, of people a ticket to consume elite sports performance. The financial incentives and fame and glory afforded elite athletes skyrocketed, and it tipped toward the tiny upper echelon of performance. It accelerated the artificial selection for specialized bodies. And if you plot a data point for these same two dozen sports today, it looks like this. The athletes' bodies have gotten much more different from one another. And because this chart looks like the charts that show the expanding universe, with the galaxies flying away from one another, the scientists who discovered it call it "The Big Bang of Body Types."

In sports where height is prized, like basketball, the tall athletes got taller. In 1983, the National Basketball Association signed a groundbreaking agreement making players partners in the league, entitled to shares of ticket revenues and television contracts. Suddenly, anybody who could be an NBA player wanted to be, and teams started scouring the globe for the bodies that could help them win championships. Almost overnight, the proportion of men in the NBA who are at least seven feet tall doubled to 10 percent. Today, one in 10 men in the NBA is at least seven feet tall, but a seven-foot-tall man is incredibly rare in the general population -- so rare that if you know an American man between the ages of 20 and 40 who is at least seven feet tall, there's a 17 percent chance he's in the NBA right now. (Laughter) That is, find six honest seven footers, one is in the NBA right now. And that's not the only way that NBA players' bodies are unique. This is Leonardo da Vinci's "Vitruvian Man," the ideal proportions, with arm span equal to height. My arm span is exactly equal to my height. Yours is probably very nearly so. But not the average NBA player. The average NBA player is a shade under 6'7", with arms that are seven feet long. Not only are NBA players ridiculously tall, they are ludicrously long. Had Leonardo wanted to draw the Vitruvian NBA Player, he would have needed a rectangle and an ellipse, not a circle and a square.

So in sports where large size is prized, the large athletes have gotten larger. Conversely, in sports where diminutive stature is an advantage, the small athletes got smaller. The average elite female gymnast shrunk from 5'3" to 4'9" on average over the last 30 years, all the better for their power-to-weight ratio and for spinning in the air. And while the large got larger and the small got smaller, the weird got weirder. The average length of the forearm of a water polo player in relation to their total arm got longer, all the better for a forceful throwing whip. And as the large got larger, small got smaller, and the weird weirder. In swimming, the ideal body type is a long torso and short legs. It's like the long hull of a canoe for speed over the water. And the opposite is advantageous in running. You want long legs and a short torso. And this shows in athletes' bodies today. Here you see Michael Phelps, the greatest swimmer in history, standing next to Hicham El Guerrouj, the world record holder in the mile. These men are seven inches different in height, but because of the body types advantaged in their sports, they wear the same length pants. Seven inches difference in height, these men have the same length legs.

Now in some cases, the search for bodies that could push athletic performance forward ended up introducing into the competitive world populations of people that weren't previously competing at all, like Kenyan distance runners. We think of Kenyans as being great marathoners. Kenyans think of the Kalenjin tribe as being great marathoners. The Kalenjin make up just 12 percent of the Kenyan population but the vast majority of elite runners. And they happen, on average, to have a certain unique physiology: legs that are very long and very thin at their extremity, and this is because they have their ancestry at very low latitude in a very hot and dry climate, and an evolutionary adaptation to that is limbs that are very long and very thin at the extremity for cooling purposes. It's the same reason that a radiator has long coils, to increase surface area compared to volume to let heat out, and because the leg is like a pendulum, the longer and thinner it is at the extremity, the more energy-efficient it is to swing. To put Kalenjin running success in perspective, consider that 17 American men in history have run faster than two hours and 10 minutes in the marathon. That's a four-minute-and-58-second-per-mile pace. Thirty-two Kalenjin men did that last October. (Laughter) That's from a source population the size of metropolitan Atlanta.

Good read

It's a long time since I rowed competitively but my understanding is that the GB rowing team has an outreach programme that scours schools that have no facilities or exposure to rowing for potential future athletes. From what I understand, the first level of selection is essentially physiological... you can teach the anyone to row but you can't improve someone beyond their raw physiological potential.

I think lots of sports now do that. Anecdotally I know diving scours schools and young gymnasts for potential and UK skeleton does something similar from some other sport.

The French bobsleigh programme used to mop up loads of "never quite made it" rugby players with some success, too.

Worked well enough for China and the Iron Curtain countries, so good enough for Team GB.

*Awaits Brailsford's call

Um

^^^ Yes, you reminded me that 7 or 8 years ago my uni did a rowing training camp in Germany and the Chinese senior squad were there too. At the time I knew a few of the GB U23 hopefuls and was at least on nodding terms with several of the senior GB squad guys but I remember being absolutely blown away by the Chinese. All of them (men and women alike) were enormous and almost exact carbon copies of one another. Tall and lean and far more homogenous than any other squad I'd met before. I remember wondering about how they were selected and at what age they were earmarked for development.

Interesting, I wonder what criteria you look for in a cyclist. I mean it's not like some sports (basketball, rowing etc.) where extremes of size offer an obvious advantage.

Good read

Watch his TED talk, it's great.

Interesting, I wonder what criteria you look for in a cyclist. I mean it's not like some sports (basketball, rowing etc.) where extremes of size offer an obvious advantage.

School sports spotters, coaches suggesting kids try out for higher level comps, scouting at state level races, then onto AIS for proper testing.

Some of our Olympic team cyclists were doing well in other sports where the ability to pump a shitload of O2 around is important - running, mtbing, tri and if those athletes didn't quite get on with the sport they were in or were injured or something and couldn't continue they'd possibly be encouraged to have a crack at road cycling.

Isn't Rebecca Romero form the GB rowing programme, for example?

I bet for cycling they measure VO2 max, body fat and they have another special tool that measures how bony your arse is.

Yep

Traditionally cycling has had access to quite a narrow, white, European gene pool. With a widening base of interest in cycling, the chances of people genetically predisposed to being good at it taking it up instead of say, running (or even nothing) are much greater. Exciting, and also a little bit terrifying.

Good point.

MTN Kubeka have tested thousands of street kids looking for the few with the pedal action and vo2 max potential. It's working for them.

Wasn't Alex Dowsett picked out at secondary school, masked up and put on a wattbike? I mean before he even cycled competitively? GB just have been doing this for a while.

Robbie was ex-BMX, Cadel ex-MTB, Nettie was found at school and trained for sprinting before moving to enduro track then road. Bobridge was a bit weird coming from a national champ dad who stopped him racing until later on so he wouldn't get burned out. Anna Meares followed her older sister into the sport. Um, Shane Perkins was a basketballer before going onto BMX then road maybe then probably picked up by VIS or AIS for track.

I think if they VO2 tested me I'd get sent to some sort of specialist for unfitness

^^ Yeah but their all Aussies so no-hope.

I think if they VO2 tested me I'd get sent to some sort of specialist for unfitness

All this talk of Apple moving into fitness monitoring and it's the unfitness monitoring that's the real market. :-)

^^ Yeah but their all Aussies so no-hope.

their

Go sit in the corner and have a think about what you've done.

He just realised he was communicating with an Australian, and he's an adaptable chap.

We won the war - my English is fine.

"their" was a Freudian, xenophobic slip.

#UKIP

#fckukip