Innehållsförteckning för September 9, 2021 från Cycling Weekly

£4,000 for a groupset is an eye-watering amount of money. And that price tag hanging off the new Dura-Ace means I’ve had to scrub it straight off my Christmas list. I will survive, so don’t feel bad for me. The same price-related outcry happens every time a new range-topping groupset is released. It’s often quickly followed by a big drop in price once initial demand has been met. Although supply-chain issues mean that price drop is unlikely to happen with this release, there is a very good reason why we can all get excited about a groupset that few of us will be riding any time soon. The reason is the trickle-down tech for which Shimano is well known. Take a look at a current 105 chainset – it’s basically…

Remco abandons Benelux ​Remco Evenepoel was forced to abandon the 2021 Benelux Tour with stomach issues last week. Despite being unable to eat anything before, he struggled through the second-stage time trial and was able to recover enough to take to the start of stage three. “I was able to hold on for the first three to four kilometres,” Evenepoel said of the 11.1km time trial, “but after that my legs ran empty because I had not absorbed enough energy.” Van der Poel extends Alpecin contract Mathieu van der Poel will continue racing with Alpecin-Fenix for four more seasons. The Dutch sensation has ridden with the second-tier ProTeam outfit for the past decade and has enjoyed repeated success across the three disciplines of cyclo-cross, road racing and mountain biking. “I’m…

With its list price of £4,000-plus, is the latest Dura-Ace R9200 out of reach of the ordinary bike racer? Dura-Ace has always been a pro-first product, according to Mike Anderson, PR manager of Shimano’s UK distributor Madison, but the huge price hike in the last 10 years is down to changing technologies. However, he says, even at its highest price to date Madison still expects to sell every last Dura-Ace groupset. But with increasingly sophisticated electronics featuring in almost every household gadget, why is Di2 so expensive? “The interesting thing is that electronic shifting is cheaper to produce because microchips can be cheaply produced – but it costs an absolute ton to develop,” says Anderson. “Like with the iPhone it’s the development that costs a lot of money not the…

Remember that time you aced your turbo session fuelled by anger at your boss who unfairly blamed you for an error of their own making? Or maybe you were infuriated after a call with a utility company that took an hour and got you precisely nowhere. Such short-lived fits of rage can fill our bodies with adrenaline, cortisol and energy that assist us in hitting wattages and speeds we never thought possible. Perhaps we should get angry more often. Can anger really be a productive force in your cycling? Could it help you make a breakaway that sticks or get up the hill you usually dread? Maybe, but the trouble is, anger has a downside. It is a complex emotion that tends to crowd out rational thoughts and impede our…

August was meant to be a huge month of racing for me, with the Tour of Witheridge Moor followed by the Tour Series with my Skoda DSI Academy team, but positive Covid-19 tests among my family members meant I was forced to self-isolate at home. It was disappointing to miss out, but in the grand scheme of things it’s a minor setback – I’d already achieved far more this year than I could have imagined. A very nice consolation came at the end of August when the kind folk at Ribble got in touch to offer me a new Endurance SL bike for the rest of the year, complete with a complimentary fitting session to select the perfect size and geometry. So on 20 August I took the long train…

Igot an email from a reader recently. It asked why I don’t write more about the ageing process, and how best a bike rider can cope with it. It added, rather unkindly I felt, that I ought to know something about it because, “There are riders representing GB internationally who are younger than the Dr. Hutch column, never mind younger than you.” My reply was simple. I told her that I didn’t write about the process of getting older because it would be like me writing about menstruation. It’s not something I do, it’s not something I’m planning to start doing, I have no expertise in the area and frankly I think people would find me writing about it to be weird and possibly offensive. People might say this is…

Mark Cavendish has set his sights on returning to the sprinting dominance of his youth after his “fairytale” return to the fastmen’s highest echelon during the 2021 Tour de France. The Manxman returned to British roads this week at the Tour of Britain just a month and a half after he completed the French Tour, where he won four stages. Speaking to the press ahead of the race he said: “At the beginning of the year I was adamant this would be my last year – what I’ve gained from this year is that I don’t believe I’ll stay at this level, I believe I will get even better. “I said at the beginning of the year I wasn’t looking for a fairytale but I’ve had a fairytale. It would…

HANNAH DINES The Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games was momentous for Britain and not just because of our massive medal haul. It was first time in history that road paracycling has been televised. Here’s some race action you may have missed. “The cameras suddenly switched” The top four favourites in the men’s tandem time trial had a bike change in the first lap. Adam Duggleby (pilot) and Steve Bate (stoker) leaned so hard they hit a pedal. Two medal opportunities and half of Adam’s skinsuit came off on the tarmac. Then, in a stunning show of why you should have a road specialist athlete on your team, Ben Watson (C3) took both time trial and road race wins, his best previous result having been fourth at World Championship level. Sophie Unwin,…

The first Shimano Dura-Ace Di2 groupset was launched in 2009. It would be convenient to be able to say it created a ‘buzz’ or ‘sent shockwaves’ through cycling but in fact Mavic had experimented with electronic shifting through much of the previous decade with its Zap and Mektronic systems and had achieved considerable success with Chris Boardman, who won two Tour de France prologues with it. The Mavic components were incredibly ambitious – Mektronic was even wireless – but, a bit like the Apollo space program, they were a little too advanced for the available technology of the time and were costly and unreliable. By 2009 the Apple iPhone had already been around for two years and the world should have been ready for Shimano’s electronic shifting system but memories…

The word ‘anger’ covers all manner of emotions. If we want to overcome it, we need to be more specific in understanding what we are really feeling and where the threat is coming from. Instead of thinking ‘I’m angry’, interrogate which of these underlying feelings may be playing a part, and why: ‘I’m angry because I feel…’ Let down Humiliated Bitter Aggressive Frustrated Critical Betrayed Resentful Disrespected Ridiculed Undermined Violated Scared Jealous Provoked Hostile Impatient Superior Sceptical Dismissive…

We wanted this to be an educational process for Maddi, to empower her with the knowledge and skills to choose the right size bike. Manufacturers’ size guides are just that – guides. They don’t necessarily take into account an individual’s leg length, arm length, flexibility, etc. Too many riders assume they are a certain frame size based solely on their height, whereas it’s always worth trying it out on the sizing jig first. Maddi’s height puts her in the bracket between medium and large frame sizes. She was used to riding her dad’s bike, a large frame with a relatively upright position, so we didn’t want to put her on a medium if it was going to feel completely alien. The compromise was a medium frame with a longer stem,…

While the obsession with aerodynamic equipment and clothing is a relatively recent phenomenon, the knowledge that air resistance is the biggest thing a cyclist has to overcome is not. In this issue A C Davison compares the speed of a tandem with the speed of a single. Two riders, twice as fast, right? Clearly not, but the reasons for the difference in speed is an interesting subject, and Davison covers some interesting topics. “Why should the tandem be any faster at all? It has practically an equal weight per rider, the rolling resistance will be doubled and there is twice the amount of driving gear. The answer is there is not double the air resistance and this, especially at greater speeds is the greater part of the total.” He even…

The four-day Ceratizit Challenge Challenge by La Vuelta women’s race ended on Sunday with Annemiek Van Vleuten (Movistar) the victor. Swiss pair Marlen Reusser (Ale-BTC-Ljubljana) and Elise Chabbey (Canyon-SRAM) completed the podium. Van Vleuten had established her GC lead by winning the two middle stages in emphatic fashion: a 20-second win in stage two’s 7.3km uphill time trial to Cabeza de Manzaneda followed by a 40km solo victory on the from stage two lumpy stage three to Pereiro de Aguiar. On the final day Van Vleuten’s Movistar team-mate Leah Thomas came close to winning after escaping a break late on, only to be caught with 300m to go – Liv Racing’s Lotte Kopecky won the day with Brit Anna Henderson (Jumbo-Visma) third and Van Vleuten taking the overall. Abi Smith…

Dan Martin won the Junior Tour of Wales in 2004 before moving to Marseille to further his career. Now, after 14 years as a pro and 22 wins – including stages at all three Grand Tours and two Monuments – he is retiring at the end of the season. CW asked him if he had any advice for 2021 Junior Tour of Wales winner Tyler Hannay, who is following in Martin’s footsteps and moving to France to race. “It’s hard but it’s worth it. It’s a very, very tough life decision,” Martin said. “The first year I was out there was one of the hardest moments. But that drive and focus got me to where I am today. You learn a level of commitment. “One of the reasons I’m stopping…

VERN PITT This week I’ve been at the Tour of Britain. It’s the first race I’ve been able to go to myself since the Track World Championships in February 2020, where us journos eagerly covered Michael Mørkøv testing positive for Covid-19, quarantining and then being given the all clear and winning the Madison. Myself and the other journalists there wondered if this so-called coronavirus would really affect the world of cycling. Returning to races reminds me of what’s so great about it. The accessibility of the riders, the community feeling to the whole circus, and the thrill of this larger than life technicolour (yes I’m looking at your special edition jerseys Ribble-Weldtite) swarm on the plain old roads we ride on every day. “It’s that passion in the air you…

Three miles into a recent ride I fell victim to a freak accident. Riding through the Hertfordshire countryside I suffered a sudden collapse of my rear wheel which threw me off my bike. I landed on the tarmac on my head. Luckily two riders, Chris Lacey and John, who had just ridden the opposite way saw the whole thing. I had lost consciousness but they stayed with me, made me as comfortable as they could and phoned for an ambulance. They even managed to get a message to my long-suffering wife, to explain what had happened. That cannot have been an easy call to make! About an hour after their call, not one but three ambulances arrived. Chris and John stayed with me until they could transfer my care to…

The PBP Randonneur is organised by the Audax Club Parisien (ACP) and strict entry requirements must be met in order to participate. “Audax UK was originally set up in the 1970s by a small group of enthusiasts specifically to run qualifying events so British riders could enter PBP without having to travel to the Continent,” says Rob McIvor, Audax UK communications director. “The principal requirement is that in the year of PBP itself you must have ridden a 200km, 300km, 400km and 600km qualifying event by a certain time,” McIvor continues. “In the UK we kick off our 200s in January, by March the 300s appear, then the 400s, and by May the 600s. Most people will get their 600km qualifying ride in the bag by the middle of June.”…

What can we expect from 2022? Will there be a 105 Di2? Will mechanical shifting start with Tiagra? “Currently I don’t believe there will be a 105 Di2. But I would be really surprised if Shimano aren’t looking into it heavily,” says Mike Anderson, PR manager of Shimano’s UK distributor Madison. He explains that historically the Ultegra and Dura-Ace electronic groupsets are produced in a different facility from the rest of the road groupsets, meaning a significantly larger production would be expected from a factory not equipped for it. “All the Di2 is produced in high-tech clean rooms because you don’t want contamination of any of the electrical components, microchips etc. so that has always been the barrier,” says Anderson. There’s also profit margins to consider, as Anderson explains: “[Shimano]…

Female riders discuss the aggression they have been subjected to from guys on bikes Jen: “When they are being really slow in front of you but doing little spin-ups every time you try to get past.” Karen: “I’ll not forget the guy in a cross race who aggressively yelled at me to get out of his way on a narrow section. Not one of the pro female athletes I’ve raced have ever been anything but polite when they need to overtake. Charlotte: “Guys either sitting on your wheel deliberately and not pulling through or trying to ride you off their wheels when in a group.” Rachael: “Trying to compete at the traffic lights when they notice your gender.” Ruth: “When I overtake guys and they accelerate and won’t let me…

Finsbury Park road race Date: Sun 26 September Part of the Eastern Road Race league, preference will be given to members. There is also 20% of spots reserved for female riders and equal prize money for men’s and women’s winners. Closing date: Mon 13 September Team Kirkley Cycles Hill-Climb Date: Sun 10 October We’re told you should expect eight to 15 minutes of unrelenting pain on this brand new course just south of Edmundbyers. Closing date: Tues 28 September Harrogate Nova CC 10 Date: Sat 25 September A straightforward run up and down the A168. Adam Duggleby and Brit Tate set the course records here in September last year with rides of 19.31 and 23.15 respectively. Closing date: Tues 19 September…