I historically haven’t been a big fan of either of the Schlecks. Fragile cyclists that don’t really know how to ride their bikes. It seemed to be the new generation of the sport. All climbing power, but really no ability. But, I saw a video interview with him before his positive drug test and the guy seemed pretty humble and real. That was surprising. I’m not sure why, because as far as I know, I’ve never met him, so how would I know who he is and what he’s like.

Anyway, he isn’t going to be racing for a while until he sorts this thing all out. I pretty much doubt this poison defense is going to work because if it does, then everyone is going to use it. Why not? The problem is that there is a chance that it is actually the case. I don’t know what chance that actually is, but there is a chance. But, that is the problem nowadays. When doping now became the norm, then when you are popped, you don’t get the benefit of doubt anymore.

Just think of Scott Moninger drug problem. Here is a copy of his wiki page concerning his suspension –

He was suspended for one year due to contaminated supplements which contained the banned substance – 19-norandrosterone. These supplements were bought off the shelf of the local Boulder, Colorado supplement store. It was later proven by lab results from the same batch of supplements that the banned substance was not labeled on the product container.

Do you think anyone would believe that now? Not many. That is the one of the biggest obstacles all some riders are going to face when they have the issue.

I received an email from a guy from Santa Barbara today asking me what I thought about this article at Velonews.com. The article quotes Chris Horner’s take on Frank Schleck’s deal. He says something like he took over 60 bottles during the Tour from spectators and that anyone of them could have be “spiked” with something. And that the riders have no control of what goes into their mouths.

I’ve always liked Chris. Still do. I think he races aggressively and is very savvy. But, sorry Chris, but that is total bullshit. He says something about the top 5 riders being supported, but back where he is, they have to take whatever they can get. Wow. I watched pretty much every stage and I can’t think of one time that I saw Chris take a bottle from a spectator. Take the 10 hardest stages, that would be around 6 bottle per stage. Each team has two team cars, plus multiple feeders on the course. And Chris finished in the top 15. So, according to his statement, he was abandoned and had to take the “risk” of taking a bottle that someone had put drugs in. I’m assuming that he is implying that Frank had the same problem.

And addressing his food statement. I’d bet $100 dollars that the RadioShack team has a cook with them at the Tour. A lot of the teams have full cooking trucks that travel with the race and some of the trucks even have dinning rooms in them where the riders eat. Every rider eats the same food. So if one of them would be positive, then the whole team would be positive.

It seems to me that Chris is sort of making a case for Contador with his meat statement in the article. I remember talking to Chris at a ‘cross race in San Diego last fall and he said that he didn’t think that Alberto would be suspended. He said something about a whole soccer team in Mexico that was positive for clembuterol and then something about the UCI telling the riders doing the Tour of China that they shouldn’t eat the meat for fear of testing positive.

Chris is usually spot on concerning a lot of aspects of the sport, but his last few calls on topics relating to doping have been crazy off the mark. I’m not even sure why he commenting. He said that that he didn’t believe Lance cheated last month. He’s sort of made plausible excuses for Alberto and now he’s come out in full support of Frank. I know that he has been a team mate of all this guys, but to go on record publicly on some of this stuff seems naive and ill advised.

Anyway, it’s not like the Pro Tour teams haven’t thought of all this before. And it’s not like they don’t have a budget and the means to support their riders during stage races. If I was making around 2.6 million Euros racing bikes, I surely wouldn’t be taking bottles from complete strangers if I had the slightest worry that they were poisoned.

Maybe with Johan not being at the Tour, the support staff was in complete disarray and the RadioShack Team had no bottles in their cars, so their riders had to rely on the spectators to get fed? Or maybe the higher ups in their organization, dislike Frank enough, because he was going to Astana, that the “bad” bottle he got was actually from the team car? So many plausible explanations to where the diuretic came from. Like I said from the start, I was just starting to like Frank, it’s too bad.

Chris doing a little pre race stretching on the curb.

I know I’ve posted about how hot it is in Kansas right now, but it is about all that anyone thinks about here right now. I’m not obsessed about it, but I made a decision to try to figure out how to athletically deal with it. And I think I’ve sort of figured it out. At least for now.

I think the key is as much exposure as possible at sub-maximal effort levels. By sub-maximal I mean real easy training. I think that you get enough stress just from the heat exposure that you don’t need to add anything extra to that. Today was hardly 100 degrees when I rode at 6 pm. It makes a huge difference whether the sun is overhead or not. Most of my longer rides I’ve been leaving around noon or so to get the maximum exposure, but 3 days a week, we ride from my house after “normal” folks work, so I tend to wait until then. On the later rides, when it cools into the 90’s, I don’t mind doing a short maximal effort. We usually come in pretty hard for the last few miles, so it works out fine. Recently I’ve not had an issue with the tight diaphragm feeling I normally get when I’m gassed from heat.

Plus, I’ve been working out in the sun during the heat of the day moving concrete, on and off, for the past few days. Luckily Kansas is a pretty windy place always because if there was no wind movement, the job would be unbearable. As it is, I have only a couple hours, at most, before I have to rest and get something to drink.

Talk about drinking, I’m pretty sure you can’t drink enough liquid to stay hydrated when it’s 104 or more. Yesterday I drank around 5 large, thermal bottles of waters, drank a smoothie when I got home, plus a couple chunks of watermelon and I was 5 pounds lighter after 40 miles. And it wasn’t 100 much of the ride. On the hot days, I’m coming back 6-8 pounds light and I’m drinking at least 6 bottles in 60 miles. So, one bottle every half hour isn’t enough obviously. It’s a hassle to stop more (maybe I should take some bottles from the spectators?).

I’ve read you need somewhere are 20 hours in extreme heat to be completely acclimated. That makes sense, something like 2-3 hours for around 10 days seems about right to me. What I meant above about not being obsessed about trying to figure out the heat is just that I really want that arrow in my quiver when it occurs. I think to be a good, all around bike racer, you have to be able to over come all climate issues, whether it’s heat, cold, rain or snow. Extreme conditions are when the tough earn the label.

That is what blows me away about the Schlecks and others that have real weaknesses in their riding abilities. I can’t understand why they wouldn’t want to put in an effort to improve on those weaknesses. Especially if it means the difference between being a just a podium rider and the winner of Grand Tours. They seem to have the mentality that they’ll just try to climb better, work on their strengths, and hope that gets them by. That seems silly and lazy to me. It’s always easier working on something that you are good at than try to get better at something you suck at.

Anyway, I think I’m going to ride over to Lawrence at noon on my MTB bike. It’s a little longer and mostly on gravel, but there is some shade. I’m going to try to finish up the driveway before then, so I should be pretty good and tired by the time I’m riding. It’s just weight training, with heat I guess. Seems to drain you more though, not that I ever do any weight training.

Here are some photos from the last few days.