Why the Tour de France is exclusively for insane people 

I've been racing for 2 years now, and I used to think up until a couple of months I was the only one suffering too lol, once I started to think the others are suffering just as much as me my mind changed completely, that's when I started to take training and racing more seriously. But yeah it's just as how much pain you can endure, especially if your competition is stacked.

"If it hurts you, then you can make a difference." - E. Merckx

It never gets easier you just get faster is definitely true

It will never hurt any more than it does right now!

@@martinbogadomartinesi5135 Suffering changes moment to moment and day to day. I'm talking about the internal characteristics in terms of physical sensations and how you respond emotionally to it. You can't assume anyone is "suffering like you" more or less. You have to decide what you can endure and how your workload changes after training periods and then after getting wiped out in competition only to come back in stronger and have days when you don't feel any "suffering" at all or at least that you can remember. Only going through all of this do you understand such a sport and what top athletes endure. It's not insane in any sense at all.

While on adrenaline I don't really feel pain. I did 40km in the mountains with injured shoulder. When I finished riding and the adrenaline went away, it was terrible.

He rode it on cobbles... pretty important detail

If I keep reading further down this thread, I'm sure at some point I'll read a comment where Roglic actually died and resuscitated three days later.

thats called really good drugs

@@murphychris9811 so you do drugs, not sports

The tour is full of stories like that. It's hard to understand. Idon't know how they do it.

He then used those recently healed vertebrae (or not even fully healed yet) to compete in La Vuelta Espana. A race in which he was in contention of winning until yet another crash took him out. After all that, a normal human would be sad, frustrated, hurt, exhausted and probably be scared of riding again. Primož Roglič responded by winning every race he competed in in 2023.

@@lesflynn4455 PED's

@@funnytortoise thats the grindset you need on top of insane genetics

Drugs, a lot of Doping , just watch the sport history

I used to get the same feelings, and it was just a 5 min. walk away for me!

i used to commute cycling, work each way was 15 miles (24km), 30 miles (48km) total commute, in traffic in the city, and my weekend job was as a pedicab driver. I fuckin feel you brother. my son was a baby at the time, i HAD to go, no matter what, for his sake. i got frostbite on my fingertips riding in a blizzard at night. many a time i ran out of flat repair kits, and had to carry my bike and run the rest of the way. Then having to be energetic and chipper at work and put on a face, when maybe 30 minutes earlier I got tagged by a car and my pants are soaked in blood from road rash. Cudos to you man. cycling as your main commute is not easy, but never let it slip your mind that you are being healthy and strong, probably in better shape than most people you know, and still getting the bag. Keep goin, try to make it fun when it can be. Your bike is your trusty steed, and it loves you as much as you love it. I only make this comment so that you know there is at least one person out there who understands what getting on that bike every day really means in that situation.

Have you tried doping?

@@SofaKingShit wats the point? I only turn up to work earlier and get home with 1 ball

@@skwb1973is this sustainable just curious complete amateur here so maybe I’m overestimating it but 20k a day (assuming that’s there and back) is insane right?

It’s insane. They average about 15mph on really steep mountain roads, which is faster than most cyclists go on flat ground.

It’s insane. They average about 15mph on really steep mountain roads, which is faster than most cyclists go on flat ground.

Oh I forgot, another insanity is when these pro cyclists go down the mountain at truly insane speeds up to 60mph or 100kmh. You cannot follow them in a car. Absolutely crazy and awesome.

​@@stavrosk.2868are you kidding that's insanely fast. I'm french and didn't even know that. But I don't live in the mountains

Depends on the gradient obviously. Once it gets up above 7/8% they ain’t going 15 mph... maybe 15 kph.

​@@whannabiI think most people know it's fucking tall which is enough.

​@@whannabiat least broadly know how high Mount Everest is, is pretty much general knowledge in my opinion

​@@whannabiahh yes because us Americans don't use the metric system and have no object permanence, Mt Everest and its size simply does not exist! Only things in 'Merica are real! 😠

well going from south carolina to la means crossing the rocky mountains so I think it probably is still accurate

3:18 He said "throw in a couple of the biggest mountain ranges in Europe".

Amazing 🥰. Thanks for sharing 😊

Bullshit, no personnal phones at that time in France

​@@frv84but but but he use.. pigeon!!!!!

@@odjsjaks yep 😀 And pigeon fits perfectly here, in France people who believe anything they're told and who are fooled easily are called pigeons..

@@frv84 Poor pigeons.. Pardon for the french*

Huh, that’s super interesting! Do you have any more data about the post-bonk strength? Haven’t heard of it before

Huh that’s interesting, haven’t heard of or experienced an increase in performance the day after a bonk. For Anyone that hasn’t experienced it though, it’s absolutely crushing when It happens and takes a lot of discipline and practice to learn how to avoid it

Depletion prior to carb loading has been debunked.

Depletion prior to carb loading has been debunked.

@@XX-is7ps nothing gets ‘debunked’ in professional cycling, there r too many confounding factors in the race environment to enable proper research I’m quoting paolo Bettini in an interview when he retired 20yrs ago speaking of how Mapei riders prepared for Milan san remo and other one day races like the world champs I’ve just done another research trawl from this thread, first on this subject in about 10yrs for me, and there just isn’t good data…u wud never get consent from pro riders for muscle biopsies in these circumstances Carb depletion is only one of many performance enhancing techniques used by pros in ‘secret squirrel clubs’ If u can quote the research u make reference to please do, I’d be very happy to critique it (I’m an emergency medicine dr and also have a physiology degree and raced to a high amateur standard)

Apologies for the personal question, but what caused you to need a knee replacement?

@zachchristiansen In middle school and high school I used to run 100 miles a week, and would also go alpine skiing all winter and whitewater canoeing all summer. Ran through a few too many injuries, and now I have osteoarthritis in most of my load-bearing joints.

​@@user-uo8kl7bo7n Damn, that's too bad. I hope you're able to manage the arthritis.

Abusing your body, then? Moderation is the key...@@user-uo8kl7bo7n

I think with running that's insanely difficult to differentiate. My girlfriend is an ultra trail runner and she dragged me a bit into the sport. I did long distance sports before, a bit with cycling but especially swimming (hour events). And oh boy, barely anything fucks me up the same way like a whole day of running through forests and mountains... Anyway, I made a similar mistake, trying to push through an injury there I should have taken a longer break, resulting eventually in a running/cycling break for 1,5 years now in total. But it's apparently nothing really serious and I'll slowly(!) start again in November. I am sorry about your knee and I hope you'll be able to find somehow a solution for yourself.

the media attention is just something world class athletes have to learn to deal with yea it sucks but that's the butter to their proverbial bread exposure and wide media coverage can get u sponsors and deals to keep doing what u do

Cycle racing IS a 'circus act'. A hundred or so blokes in clown costume, doing a mass balancing act all over the road. What a circus!

@@tooleyheadbang4239 "funny colored clothes, now laugh"

@@tooleyheadbang4239 I'd take that as a compliment, people who work at circuses are incredibly skilled

I've never heard a single instance of a circus performer testing positive...@@fran2911

The old saying is "It doesn't get any easier, you just get faster". Not all training has to be painful tho. Once I started the polarized approach of training, I ride way more, rest accordingly and got way faster.

@@martinbogadomartinesi5135Zone 2 or Zone 4! Zone 3 is the Devil!!

I don't cycle but i run. My 5k pb is 21:32, which is way slower than the 13-14 min range pro runners generally take. Still, my average HR on that was 177, and i had to hit 180 HR from km 2 and hold on to that pain barrier. i'm not that fast, but my all out efforts definately require me to put myself trough pain.

​@@tomascanevaro4292I've read so many comments where people say 190 is a high heartrate im now starting to get worried a bit. My heartrate reaches 205 easily on tough runs, my max is 215. 195bpm is still a relatively easy run and

@@larsisgoodyeah you’re watch is probably fucked if 195bpm is an easy run for you

I'm a former College XC athlete, and you can tell who has been a serious runner before, because they just don't put music in on race day. I used to take off my watch because I didn't want to know my splits. It was me, my teammates, everyone else, and the mile markers.

elite footballers are trained to fake pain 🤣

hahaha, outstanding comment.

Elite athletes destroy their bodies and minds to push the limits.

“These guys endure pain at a level higher than most other pro athletes even imagine” …. For three weeks straight. No other sport has this level of prolonged suffering.

And that isn’t even taking into account the safety risks of participation, In the first 4 stages of this years tour, 4 riders have already suffered broken bones and abandoned the race. You’re risking your physical well-being and safety. In the history of the Tour de France, riders have died both from crashing on a descent and from collapsing on an ascent. The last death was many years ago in 1995 when a rider hit a concrete barrier. Rider safety has increased since then but there is still an ever present risk of death because they are physically unprecedented aside from their helmet and can hit speeds greater than 70mph on descents.

@@mauryeetss3561 Unfortunately Gino Mader (26 years old) died in a crash in the Tour de Suisse earlier this year......

Most people get out and ride 25 miles and are like eh. Then 50 to 100 then the have that look. They crack. Then when people see they pros do the tour and it 100 miles plus daily plus multi miles up bike in the mountains. Sprints mid and end for points king of the mountain points. It’s great stuff. I love big hills . Where I live it’s maybe a 20 min climb at 14 mph. So a hour or two climbing is wild and humbling.

You also have to consider injury pain. Background, there are enough crashes that a team of doctors are in cars for every mile of the race. Falling off your bike, at race speed (25-34 mph) on a flat stretch of road will result in broken bones (scapulars, collar bones, wrists, tib-fib fractures in the legs), overexertion/overuse tendonitis in the knees; really painful sports injuries (injuries, not "discomfort" mind you.. Aleve does not calm down cycling injuries). Saddle sores can also arise (although teams and riders try to avoid that through padding in shorts and scientifically measured "bike fit" and saddle). Crashes when going down a mountain (45 to 55 mph on tires 23 to 25 millimeters wide) can result in multiple compound fractures, concussions or death (a rider died in June during a race in Switzerland). Then there is the scrapping of the skin and bruising that comes with "hitting the deck" and sliding on the asphalt at speed which is called "road rash." Road rash disrupts the rider's ability to access the best tool for recovery: SLEEP. Pro cyclists, like pro hockey players, more often than not try to compete with these injuries, because cycling is a team sport (although it looks like an individual psychosis) and they feel deep commitment and obligation to being a good teammate. They are the toughest men and women athletes in the world.

... you are* just going* faster. Still a great quote, up to the point where you age, the pain stays, but you stop going faster and have to give up competing. Don't miss the pain, dont miss competition but I do miss the times when going slow was easy😉.

Yeah it's the pain cave in climbing too

The rider coming last is usually celebrated in France, and known as the « red lantern », because just finish the Tour de France is an achievement and is recognized as such.

@@minilub3572 I would love to be able to finish dead last (maybe I shouldn't say 'dead') in the Tour du France. The last guy is a helluva bike rider!

@@williamcovey9703 the catch is there is a cut-off time calculated from when the 1st rider finished, so anyone after the cut-off time did not finish the stage/day. The last person who finished within the cut-off time gets the award

They have the ability to experience pain without suffering, which is the resistance to the pain. By experiencing pain with a purpouse and an inquisitive mind the resistance aspect drops dramatically and the experience of pain becomes less problematic.

We could all strive to be more like them 🤷‍♂️ they are only human after all

I love how they can keep cycling while covered with their own shit.

and drugs

@@EricDMMiller bruh

Yet, when you are older you lose the "explosive" muscle strength to attack. This is why riders like Pogacar, and Vinogaar and others are having success in the peloton are younger (early to mid 20s). We are witnessing a true revolution in cycling by this new generation of riders.

One of the gutsiest pulls I've ever seen in pro cycling. Up there with will Cadel Evans finishing second with the broken collarbone.

Do Vent Top even more fun

@@robertdiez3091 added to the list! Zwift just added all the Tour de France climbs so I plan on doing all of them….. if my legs allow me 😂

@@jakethesnake9340 last I checked the zwift avg time 1:45 just make sure to get a rythem at the base of the climb. The middle section is the hard once you hit Hotel turn on the climb just keep the power down until the line. It will be a long slow climb really you got to be mentally ready for it.

@@robertdiez3091 thanks for the tips! Once I get into my rhythm I feel good around a certain watts and HR. Climbed 1200 ft up Mount Ventoux on accident and felt good. I want to do Mt. Washington in my home state of NH next year so I am preparing on the virtual climbs

​@@jakethesnake9340I'm in the same boat. I got addicted to climbing in Zwift and now I'm registered for Mt Washington this year (why do I do this to myself?). Earlier this year I finally got AdZ under an hour after many tries. I probably could have done it much sooner, but I never used to take recovery needs seriously. My advice would be to wait a bit longer between your PR attempts and give yourself at least a few days of recovery beforehand. As a side note, there are no climbs in Zwift that come even close to the challenge of Mt Washington. If you want to properly prepare for that, you might want to look into getting a smart trainer that can simulate a GPX route. I ended up building a custom bike to handle that gradient. Depending on your fitness, regular road bikes probably just won't have the gearing for it (unless you're fine with mashing at 40 RPM for over an hour).

It would seem that "the best individual rider" was beaten by 1:38 minutes in today's time trial. You know, an individuel race. The guy who beat him by 2:38 minutes? Jonas Vingegaard. You still want to chalk that up to being protected by teammates?

Today beaten by 6 mins ish!! Go Jonas

Ya anything around 1k-2k meters of climbing or less are generally considered sprinters staged

this is the only comment that matters. I was so nervous 😅

@@studentofthegame Another Dane here in my ears; defacto flawless pronunciation.

@@studentofthegame I have to agree with my countrymen on this one. Your pronunciation was damned near spot on. Better than I'd ever expect from someone who isn't Scandinavian.

@@studentofthegamei say the same thing, great pronounciation.

I do sports, I'm not in your field, but emotions and stress 100% determine how fast and accurately I can provide solutions

My apologies for how I said Pogi's name