Christian Prudhomme reckons the WorldTour is too fast. At a meeting last week of the race organizers’ association (AIOCC), the director of the Tour de France said, “beyond the behavior of the athletes and the work of the organizers, it is absolutely necessary to reduce speed by appropriate measures: the riders are going too fast. The faster they go, the greater the risk and the more they endanger themselves and others,” Prudhomme reasoned.
Prudhomme also cited the increased risk for lead vehicle drivers and motorcycle riders in trying to outpace the modern WorldTour in situations like descents off mountain passes.
Setting aside the fact his comments give the impression that he is unfairly shifting responsibility onto riders and seemingly ignoring the fact he decides the route of his race that often includes dangerous descents to finish lines, does he have a valid point?
This article explores the various measures the UCI could implement to reduce racing speeds. However, last month, we examined four (fairly) easy safety fixes where arguably the focus should be directed.
Why speeds are increasing
There’s no doubting WorldTour racing is getting faster, and the stats show it. Per ProCyclingStats, overall men’s WorldTour average race speeds consistently cracked 40 km/h starting in 2014, and in the decade since have crept up to 42.3 km/h. (Those stats are for all WT races; the graph below compares a smaller subset.) Be it real or perceived, there’s seemingly been an increase in the frequency and severity of crashes alongside that increase in speeds. Correlation is no proof of causation, but it does stand to reason that higher speed means crashes result in more severe injuries.
Before considering how to make racing slower, we must first answer why it’s getting so fast. There are a host of explanations, but there’s an obvious culprit: Marginal gains!
Aerodynamics
Aerodynamic drag is the single biggest force working against a cyclist at racing speeds. Crucially, the power required to overcome aerodynamic drag increases with the cube of speed; so as a rider’s speed doubles, the power needed to maintain that speed increases eightfold.
Here’s an illustration of that: a reasonably aero road rider (.320 CdA) requires 125 watts to increase his speed from 40 to 45 km/h, but increasing it just another 5 km/h requires an additional 155 watts! (This is on top of the watts required to go 40 km/h). Even a small reduction in drag can result in a staggering performance improvement; reducing that same riders CdA to .280 drops the incremental wattage increases to 111 watts and 136 watts, respectively – an improvement that may go a long way to explaining the jump in speeds from even just 10 or 20 years ago.
Although it was slow to begin with, the modern peloton now exists amidst a true aero revolution, which has spurred a transformation in the frames, wheels, helmets, clothing, handlebars, and riding positions the world’s best are now racing on. The result: season after season, aero test after aero test, and equipment tweak after tweak, the same riders are going faster with the same power. But aerodynamics doesn’t get all the credit for increasing speeds.
Training and nutrition
Just as significant is the improvement in both training and nutrition. Until recently riders would bludgeon themselves into form with a combination of countless hours in the saddle fueled on minimal calories, blood bags, and sleeping tablets washed down with sparkling water to stave off the hunger. It worked because the teams of those days were more akin to pharmaceutical companies than sport teams. The concoctions mixed up by the doctors of the time kept meant the riders kept churning out the watts even with suboptimal training and nutrition.
Fast forward to today, thankfully the sport is cleaner and both training and nutrition is as close to optimal as the human race’s current understanding permits.
The training a modern rider does has little in common with the “I’m on my bike busting my ass six hours a day” training methods a certain Texan once advocated. Riders today take smaller offseason breaks and come back to training ready to build on the year just past instead of getting massively out of shape. Training is more structured; gone are the aimless hours in the saddle, replaced with a power prescription for every minute of every ride. That power prescription is tailored to the individual, their current form, and proximity to their next goal.
Riders are now much better fueled as well. Gone are the days of fruit cordial in water bottles and cream cheese croissants for races alongside what can only be described as starvation on training rides, replaced with advanced nutrition strategies targeting macro and micro nutrients and electrolytes, on and off the bike. Where riders once ate very little, they are now consuming 100+ grams of carbohydrates per hour on both race day and training rides.
Other marginal gains
There have been a host of other marginal gains also, including lower rolling resistance, better drivetrain efficiency, cooling, and so on, but long story short, the modern rider is better prepared and better equipped to go faster than 10-15 years ago. Add to that the increasing competitive and career pressures of having to perform/win/be at the front all the time in every race to keep your job and it’s hardly surprising we’ve seen speeds go up.
That gets us back to the question at hand: Knowing how the riders are faster, and assuming the UCI doesn’t introduce some “cheeseburgers only” rule and a maximum training hours per week regulations, how now do we make these better prepared and better equipped riders slower?
Assuming for a second that the performance brainiacs now employed by the WorldTour’s top teams don’t suddenly forget that aerodynamics is a thing, are there any interventions that could make racing slower and would that translate into safer racing?
Sure there are, and here are a few simple rule changes that would guarantee racing speeds drop from the giddy heights of the past few years. I’ve rated each on a scale of 1-10 according to both how feasible it would be to enact and their probability, or the likelihood of the UCI ever introducing them.
Make them less aerodynamic
Yeah, you guessed it. Given the outsize importance of aerodynamics, being even just a little less efficient here can have a huge impact on how fast riders can push. A marginal aero loss could slow them down.
It could potentially be pretty simple. The UCI could regulate to prohibit the use of aero tubing, or deep-section rims. It could ban aero helmets, or, ban skinsuits in road races. Heck, let’s go back to the “golden era” and have a new UCI frame and wheel approval process that only permits round tubes of X mm diameter, 32-spoke, wheels with box-section rims, and loose jerseys. A ban on aero socks, and vented helmets could both complete the look and further increase the aero drag.
Like the idea or loathe it, such a step back in time would be effective in reducing speeds. Taking the same 40 to 45 to 50 km/h example from earlier: if CdA increases to .400, the additional power now required for each increase in speed shoots up to 155 and 192 watts. This oversimplifies aerodynamics and how racing works, but it demonstrates how much more difficult it would become for riders to maintain the higher speeds we’ve seen of late.
While slower might be safer, and less aero will be slower, there are two problems with enforcing any of the above.
The biggest hurdle is that cycling is a tiny industry and part of what makes the finances of sponsoring WorldTour teams actually feasible is that manufacturers can use the world’s best riders as billboards to promote and – hopefully – sell their latest and greatest products. How many times have we heard “This new bike is X watts faster than the old one” with a new bike release? Forcing manufacturers to make slower bikes (or kit for that matter) takes that marketability away; without it, suddenly that huge investment in sponsoring a WorldTour team makes a lot less sense, if any, which puts more pressure on team budgets.
The UCI’s commercialisation rule, although imperfect, helps manufacturers enormously in this department by mandating that pro riders can only race with the same equipment as available to you and I. Any move to make that gear slower automatically kills any performance marketing for brands and their products. Placing a ceiling on performance and also openly stating, “these bikes must be made slower,” could quickly become a major viability issue for the World our. It’s part of the reason we found a standardised equipment WorldTour wouldn’t work when we looked into what would happen if all pros raced the same bike.
That said, it’s not beyond the realm of possibility that the UCI could roll back the frame design rules it relaxed in 2021, which increased tube depth-to-width ratios to 8:1 from the older 3:1 standard. A return to the 3:1 ratio, just as manufacturers are now rolling out updated versions of their aero bikes redesigned under the recently relaxed rules, could see all hell break loose between the industry and the UCI.
Furthermore, such intervention might just unleash a whole new arms race where the richest teams and biggest manufacturers throw new cash at an old problem in a bid to find ways to maximise performance under the new “go slow rules.” The UCI has been here before, banning skinsuits in downhill mountain bike racing, and as one Escape Collective member so succinctly summed it up on Discord recently, “Now we have downhillers wearing the tightest baggies they can.”
All told, while this could be the most effective intervention, the UCI is aware of how much the sport depends on the industry and thus it’s unlikely we see any major interventions.
Feasibility: 5
Probability: 5
Go small on gearing
Although the new high-carb nutrition plans likely has some impact on the increase in average speeds in the WorldTour, I for one am not going to even entertain the idea we go back to the ludicrously unhealthy nutrition practicesof yesteryear. As such, next on my list to make the riders slower is smaller chainrings.
This idea I could actually see happening. Sure, we’ve only recently and finally done away with junior gear restrictions in UCI events, but feasibly a new cap could be introduced for all racing. If intervening to make riders less aero could kill race bike sales and thus jeopardise teams very existence, it’s far less consequential to just artificially cap how fast the riders can pedal by imposing a cap on gearing in road races. Chainrings are the most logical focus here.
Altering cassette sizes could face the same industry hurdles as forcing them to produce un-aero bikes, given how the major players have painted themselves into corners on cassette options. But all the major component brands offer a variety of chainring sizes from small to humongous. The UCI could mandate a maximum 53-tooth chainring and effectively lower the terminal velocity riders can hit on descents without the huge 60+ tooth chainrings that are increasingly common. And, given the chainring is a consumable item, the industry need not worry customers will stop buying them.
Overall, I’d rank this one as both highly feasible and highly probable of coming to pass, given the UCI will likely want to be seen to do something and because capping chainring sizes is much easier than meaningful safety interventions that could be required of race organisers and other parties (including the UCI).
Feasibility: 8
Probability: 10
Mandate wider tyres
At the risk of stating the obvious, tyres are the one part of our bikes touching the ground, and so do they offer an opportunity for holding riders back?
While making tyres slower by increasing rolling resistance or making them less aero (potentially both) will meet the same aforementioned objections that making our bikes and kit less aero would, theoretically there could be a way to square the performance problem to fit the consumer circle if the UCI set a minimum 35 mm tyre width for road racing.
That width is most likely because 1) it would fit many modern race bikes (with others following suit) and 2) any larger and the tyre might infringe on the UCI’s existing maximum wheel and tyre diameter regulation. Crucially for this discussion, these wider tyres would likely prove slowe- rolling and less aero than their 28 or 30 mm equivalents. As such, the UCI could reduce pro speeds, admittedly only marginally, without hampering the marketability of the manufacturers’ products: the pros are slower because they use the wider tyre … not because the tyres are slower, or so the thinking goes.
That said, the UCI rule makers are outnumbered tenfold by brainiacs on staff with teams and manufacturers. Give these engineers a problem and watch them find a solution. That performance gap between the new wider and old narrower tyres could close quicker than we expect. Furthermore, in regulating out the 28 and 30 mm options preferred by many road riders, the UCI could be indirectly mandating the performance available to the paying customer if manufacturers cast aside these sizes like they did with tubulars not so long ago, refocusing on what their big teams require.
There’s also the question of whether wider tyres might actually have the opposite effect and be less safe. Sure, they may offer more grip and comfort and that’s why many love them, but could it be argued such grip actively encourages faster descending in the WorldTour, one of the concerns Prudhomme raised in his quotes.
Overall, mandating wider tyres isn’t all that difficult; many frame and tyre manufacturers already offer frames with sufficient clearance and road-specific tyres in 35 mm widths. Furthermore, the UCI did quietly insist pro teams adhere to ISO tyre and rim sizing combinations earlier this year. That forced teams racing on rims with 25 mm inner rim widths to increase their tyre sizes from 28 mm to 30 mm.
Feasibility: 8
Probability: 7
Force them to stay low
Let’s not even waste our time on the power meter ban discussion; it won’t slow riders down in races, and they’d still have access to them in training, so it won’t even affect their preparation. But could the UCI ban altitude training? One of the major training interventions in recent times and now utilised by most teams, it is highly effective but also very costly both financially for the teams and psychologically for the riders and staff who have to spend large chunks of the year away from home is distant locations.
Theoretically, yes, an altitude training ban could work, but such a ban could lead to a further tilt of the playing field if some riders feel they’re forced to up sticks and move family homes to high-altitude locations for year-round access to the thinner air that elicits such haematological performance gains. (As a note, some riders already live at elevation, but the opportunity to do altitude camps means full-time residency at high altitude is not essential.)
Feasibility: 3
Probability: 3
Boost fan engagement
I’ve saved the best (IMO) for last. There is one intervention the UCI could introduce that would make bikes less aerodynamic and heavier, reducing speeds while making the sport more engaging to watch – potentially making it even more appealing to industry sponsors without impacting the performance gains they can advertise and sell to us mere mortals: mandatory on-board cameras!
Take two cameras. Shape them like bricks, about as aerodynamic as a fridge freezer, and mandate every rider must have said cameras mounted to both the front and rear of their bikes during all races. Stipulate the camera must be on top of the handlebars, so that it’s not altering the aero flow onto the frame and thus influencing what manufacturers are designing for us, and wrapped around the seat post at the back. The cameras also don’t count against the 6.8 kg minimum bike weight.
These drag-inducing anchors, disguised as cameras, would go a long way to negating the aero gains of the past decade. As a rough guide, a burrito-sized and shaped handlebar bag – as used by many riders outside racing – could add up to 20 watts of additional drag, and so two intentionally un-aero cameras could add 30+ watts of drag, maybe more at racing speeds. Theoretically, you could simply watch the speeds drop.
But it’s not the speeds we’d be watching. If the UCI mandated all cameras are paired to and continually broadcasting power meter data, speed, cadence, GPS location and maybe even sound, think of the extra engagement the sport could offer for fans. Heck, pair race radios to the camera and broadcast all radio comms. Sure the teams wouldn’t like it, but fans would and ultimately it’s fan engagement that draws the sponsors.
There’s no reason any of this couldn’t happen, but will it? No! The UCI are unlikely to force such a move and the ASO has so far been hapless at making any such data useful. Its attempts with power data are feckless, not to mention the farce of its race radio broadcasting, where teams have a veto over which comms are broadcast and as such we end up with 3 weeks of “Guys, remember to eat and drink” messages.
Feasibility: 8
Probability: 3
You may be wondering where’s the bullet point exploring the option to increase the UCI minimum weight limit for bikes. Well, it’s not coming because weight has such a small impact on speed on anything bar steep climbs where speed is already low that it simply won’t make races slower, and to the extent it would, it would be immaterial for safety considerations.
Of course, Prudhomme’s comments attempts at passing the buck and this whole discussion are a distraction from what actually needs to happen. Despite existing rules and regulations in place, cycling continues to see dangerous course designs and inadequate safety measures. Downhill finishes (as seen in the TdF that Prudhomme organises), poor barriers, and inconsistent application of concussion protocols contribute to avoidable crashes and injuries as highlighted in our look last month into how safety could be improved. The UCI’s slow response is frustrating, especially when compared to other sports’ safety improvements where there’s a clear prioritisation for human life over the spectacle of the sport, something it feels cycling hasn’t quite understood the importance of yet.
Cycling must adopt a similar mindset and updated safety protocols before the powers that be can start turning the spot light back on the riders and their actions. Until the UCI takes these necessary steps, a forced reduction in speed alone will never be enough. Yes, slower speeds could complement such moves, but until then Prudhomme’s comments are shifting the onus at best and distracting at worst.
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