Cycling
What riding a Grand Tour does to a professional cyclist’s mind and body
Three weeks of non-stop riding, thousands of kilometres in the saddle, harsh weather and fluctuating temperatures, Grand Tours push pro cyclists to the limits, both physically and mentally.
The Vuelta a Españais the final Grand Tour of the summer, taking place over three weeks in 3,300km of Spanish countryside – with a slight detour in France.
Throughout the extreme 21 stages, the riders’ physical and mental limits will be tested to their extremities. Some will surpass them and result in withdrawals from the race, either through exhaustion, injury or illness.
For those who make it to the finish of Stage 21 in Madrid, this is just some of what their bodies and minds will have to deal with along the way.
A Grand Tour can take a toll on your body
© Denis Klero/Red Bull Content Pool
Noticeable changes in physical appearance
One of the most obvious effects will be the outward physical changes such a gruelling race will force on a rider. Thanks to their meticulously planned diets (WorldTour teams have dedicated nutritionists and chefs who prepare daily meals and portion sizes tailored to individual riders’ specific requirements) and carefully managed pre, during and post-stage fuelling strategies, weight loss (or gain) isn’t a major concern despite the thousands of calories burned and consumed on a daily basis.
Apart from tired faces, one of the most striking changes visible in riders is a much more obvious vascularity. As the race progresses, riders’ already well-developed vascular system will dilate further and make their veins even more prominent, aiding blood flow. Combined with their lean physique, this is why you’ll see riders’ legs looking more and more like this as a Grand Tour progresses:
Severe energy depletion and muscle breakdown
Riding for 4-5 hours and anywhere between 150-200km daily will result in serious calorie intake and expenditure. Doing it for 21 stages with just a couple of rest days thrown in means the body goes extremely deep into its reserves.
Nico Bruijnen is team doctor for WorldTour outfit Lotto Soudal. “The main difference between a Grand Tour and a one-day race is that during the three weeks of a GT, riders will use all their reserves of energy that they have, so it’s very important for us to replenish every day with everything they eat and drink.”
Stocking up on mid-stage snacks
© Ydwer van der Heide / Red Bull Content Pool
At such an elite level, the fuelling and recovery operation in place within WorldTour teams is planned to the minute, calorie and gram of food intake, but even with such high-level management of the situation the effect on the muscles of a rider can be extreme as the race progresses.
With the muscles, if you don’t fuel them enough you will lose muscle. That’s why protein is very important
The deeper into the race a rider gets, the more catabolic their metabolism gets. Put simply, their body burns more and more of their protein stores, or muscle, which is why protein intake is so important.
In the first week a rider may burn around five percent of their protein reserve, but by the last week of a Grand Tour a rider can be eating away at up to 20% of that store as their muscles struggle to keep up with the demands of simply digesting, storing and then supplying glycogen.
Intense physical fatigue
Breaks are few and far between
© Masha Berliner / Red Bull Content Pool
The massive physical exertions on the bike and the fact that a Grand Tour travels an entire country has a cumulative effect on riders too.
Aside from riding an average of 160km every day at this year’s Vuelta, many of the transfers from hotels to stage starts and from stage finishes to a new hotel every day means that stress hormones rise and sleep can become disrupted.
With all this preparation however, stress hormones are still a factor that can only be controlled to a certain degree, and while in the first week of a Grand Tour the riders’ physical condition is often close to its peak and fatigue levels are not yet at concerning levels, the intensity and nerves are in full flow as the race establishes its rhythm.
The fatigue setting in at the end of the stage
© Pavel Sukhorukov / Red Bull Content Pool
Cortisol levels rise and despite all those tailored sleeping arrangements, that can interfere with sleep patterns. Elevated levels can also provoke a premature onset of a catabolic state, making for an extremely fine balancing act.
Reduced endurance abilities
The effect of all this fatigue on physical performance has a few outcomes. Generally, riders can put out the same power for a whole Grand Tour, for example a 60-minute effort at 5.5 watts per kilo.
Cyclists vitals need to be monitored closely
© Denis Klero/Red Bull Content Pool
What changes is their perceived exertion, which becomes significantly higher. So a rider may need to pedal at a higher cadence to achieve the same result, and that can translate into being able to do that on two or three climbs in a day towards the end of a Grand Tour instead of four at the start. As one WorldTour team coach commented, “You see the power levels staying the same, it’s just the volume and duration of that riders can keep”.
Another direct result of this intense effort and fatigue is a suppressed heart rate. At the start of the Grand Tour, a rider’s maximum heart rate may be around 190 beats per minute (bpm), but by the end of the tour it could be around the 175bpm mark.
This drop in maximum heart rate has a knock-on effect on oxygen distribution and the ability to maintain those efforts for longer as the racing reaches its climax in the definitive final stages.
Immunity levels take a hit
Post-stage recovery
© Pavel Sukhorukov / Red Bull Content Pool
It’s not uncommon for riders to come undone by illness as the race progresses, given all the demands placed on their increasingly beleaguered bodies.
As the stages roll on, haemoglobin concentration in riders’ blood drops as their bodies struggle to deal with the relentless workload. A drop in lymphocyte count (a subtype of white blood cells and which include natural killer cells) is another common side effect of intense exercise. All of this combined leaves riders susceptible to illness.
Mental drain
That feeling when you finish the Grand Tour!
© Denis Klero/Red Bull Content Pool
Tiredness, disrupted sleep patterns, hours on the bike, hours off it during transfers between hotels and race starts and finishes, the general stress and physical rollercoaster that is a Grand Tour often leads to mental fatigue deeper into the race.
It’s not uncommon to see a higher number of crashes within the peloton as the race progresses, as concentration levels can drop off.
Riders are highly experienced with this and have incredible bike handling skills, but crashing is an occupational hazard. The physical effects of this can range from road rash, which apart from being incredibly painful and uncomfortable can also lead to infections, through to broken bones.
