by Max Leonard
Another driver of innovation might be that the Giro and the Vuelta organisers are aware of their races’ inferiority to the Tour in the public imagination – which might logically lead them, in a bid for notoriety, to inject thrills and spills and to add difficulties for difficulty’s sake. It could be argued that as in other areas of life (as, for example, violence in movies) in cycling there is a relentless logic of escalation: that once we have seen the steep slopes of the Zoncolan a few times, it will no longer sate our desire for tough racing and we need ever more extreme challenges to get the same fix. However, both men reject the idea that there is this kind of ‘arms race’. ‘Is there a need to be more extreme?’ echoed Mauro. ‘It’s actually not there. The reality is that over 21 days you already have a hard race, so you don’t need to be extreme. What you need to be is well balanced, and to give the fans and the riders a chance to challenge themselves every day in the stage.’
I’m not sure I totally buy this. I don’t mean to imply that any race organisers make irresponsible decisions and purposefully create dangerous conditions, but, just as different riders have different tolerances for careering down hills or charging up them, so each race has a character and an appetite of its own, shaped by factors like topography, the national audience, the riders and, of course, the organisers themselves. Some races do push further than others when it comes to lining up extreme climbs and tests of physical and mental endurance. It’s simply a fact.
It seemed inevitable in these discussions that the ideas of extreme terrain or extreme racing got mixed up with questions of risk and safety. The things were difficult to unpick. I asked Michele, too, about the risks of racing in the mountains and about pushing the envelope, and he, like Mauro, demurred: ‘Sometimes the problem when we speak about innovation is that climbs are too steep or too narrow, and you cannot do them because it’s too much. Even if fans want to see something crazy, if it’s too much, it’s too much.’ He continued: ‘We the organisers never need to create a dangerous race – we are the first who need to protect our stars. But we need to create a race full of opportunities for riders,’ he said. ‘I prefer to speak about opportunity in the race.’fn3
This seems more insightful to me. As Michele implied, a risk is a danger but also an opportunity – an opportunity to apply judgement, talent and experience to influence a situation. We all take risks, in the sense of making calculated and informed decisions about the possible bad outcomes of an action, all the time, and bike racers take more risks than most. It’s part of the job. Sometimes that’s just a risk in a racing sense: make a move and if it fails you’ve lost the race. Other times, there are undoubtedly more serious consequences. But would anyone want it any other way? The general standard of fitness among riders, from maglia rosa to the humblest gregario, is probably higher than ever; frames are stiffer, wheels are quicker, brakes are better. To keep doing the same things would make races sterile – stale for spectators and riders alike. The course must provoke good racing and give enough opportunities for the best riders to differentiate themselves and make their talent and initiative count. New challenges must always be found. The question is, will the chosen challenges tempt sprinters, rouleurs, or climbers, like Joe? And where will the line between desirable opportunity and unacceptable danger be drawn?
In truth, these lines are moving all the time. Racing is always changing. To take one example from the past few years, here’s a pet theory concerning ‘marginal gains’. When Team Sky arrived in the peloton in 2009 they shook things up with their unwavering focus on optimising every area of a rider’s life to make them quicker. Sky delved into nutrition and the cutting edge of sports science (not to mention mattresses, motorhomes and so on) more deeply than anyone before. But, subsequently, many other teams applied themselves in these areas and the gaps Sky opened up narrowed again. The general standard of training and scientific application has arguably never been higher, and the athletes are closer to maximising their physical and genetic talents than ever. Because everyone is closer to their limits it is increasingly rare that any Grand Tour contender has the sheer superiority to ride away from the others with, say, 40 kilometres to go on a high mountain stage. Gaps are smaller, attacks happen later. I’m not wearing rose-tinted spectacles and pretending that daring, long-range, Tour-winning heroics used to happen often, but they seem increasingly unthinkable. (An alternative version of this narrative holds that this is because the huge differences in performance occasioned in the past by doping are also being slowly erased, and let’s hope this is also true.)
Either way, the unintended consequence seems to be that in the past few years we’re seeing more and more racing downhill. Descending is not so much a matter of fitness. There is a larger psychological component and it cannot be trained in the same way, and so those who are real masters are increasingly exploiting this competitive advantage to win time. Vincenzo Nibali, a super descender, springs to mind, as does Romain Bardet, who twice in recent years has descended to a stunning stage victory. One was on the deviously tricky Col d’Allos in the 2015 Critérium du Dauphiné on the way to a solo win at Pra Loup. The second and most apposite was in the Alps during the 2016 Tour de France, when he attacked over the top of the Montée de Bisane climb and hared down a greasy descent to the finish. It was Stage 19, not all that far from Paris; Bardet was fifth on GC, less than five minutes behind the yellow jersey, and so he could not be allowed to gain too much time. Witness Chris Froome and Nibali chasing, and both at one point slipping and sliding on a corner. If the playing field of the climbs continues to be levelled, this will only start happening more. When the limits of the possible are reached in one sphere, it is natural that we start exploring them in another.
I also talked to Michele about sadism. Or, at least, I tried. Whether or not there was an element of sadism in sending riders up terrible mountain challenges – and in spectators delighting in watching them suffer – seemed to me a valid line of questioning. Surely there was something just a little bit cruel in the way fans sometimes glory in the hardships? Not for Michele. He refused to be drawn. For him, the delight was in watching them overcome these near-impossible obstacles: ‘His challenge is your challenge and you just want to support him. Fans push riders because they want to help him,’ he said. ‘It’s sharing the passion, sharing the fatigue, you know. It’s everything but sadistic.’
He went on to describe the unique atmosphere in the high mountains on the day of the race: the eating, the drinking, the party. Those colourful, screaming, passionate masses that have become indelibly associated with the spectacle of racing up high; thousands of people lining the road all day in anticipation of an event that, even in the mountains – where speeds are low and the race strung out, and where a good vantage point affords a view of kilometres of road – will last a few minutes at most. The Zoncolan was the best venue for this in his opinion, but the Finestre was also good for fans. ‘What do you call it when there are cowboys in Far West movies, there are even Indians, how do you say?’ Michele asks.
Cowboys, Indians and the Wild West, I confirm, wondering where this is going.
‘When you arrive at the Colle delle Finestre, in the last few kilometres there is great scenery, there are these big mountains around you and all the people that are watching down. It’s great for fans because you can watch the road all down the mountain. And so there is everybody looking down, like Indians when they are looking for cowboys and then attacking. You have that feeling!’
Hmmm. So not sadism, but predation instead? But I get what he means. The atmosphere, the wait, the adrenalin and then the chase. It’s a piece of theatre, a show, heightened by the most stunning setting possible. ‘They’re like our stadiums. We don’t have the San Siro, we have the big mountains,’ Michele says. ‘I believe the tifosi [the passionate Italian fans] are an important part of the cycling show. They create the mountain. What creates the mountain is the champion and the fans around him.’
That’s the magic that racing in the
highest peaks brings. A spectacular theatre and a community coming together in an audience, in the expectation of a breathtaking show.
In 1977 Nan Shepherd, a writer, naturalist and walker, wrote what is considered one of the masterpieces of mountain literature, The Living Mountain, about her beloved Cairngorms in Scotland. She was contemplative and lyrical, and did not always strive for the peaks, and there is one line from that book that here seems apt: ‘To pit oneself against the mountain is necessary for every climber: to pit oneself merely against other players, and make a race of it, is to reduce to the level of a game what is essentially an experience. Yet what a race-course for these boys to choose!’
The whole of Andorra is a stadium on 3 September 2015, but the day starts quietly. The mountains around the city are wreathed in cloud and even the orchestral version of the lambada piped into the breakfast room, where team staff are breakfasting, has a melancholy air. The riders are still in bed. It is muggy, oppressive and close.
The morning progresses and my photographer goes off by bicycle to the spots he has picked out for the day’s pictures. I sit in the lobby and plan my movements – the course is so compact that, like a cyclocross race, it will be possible to see the riders several times, either by walking a few minutes or simply waiting in the same place. I wander down to the start village just before the traffic in Andorra La Vella stops and the team buses begin to arrive. Compared with the Tour de France and even the Giro, the Vuelta is very relaxed, one reason why pros like it despite the frequent tough stages and climbs. The buses are not cordoned off and riders are walking through the crowd to sign on. The clouds are burning off and Team Colombia are outside their bus early, under a sun awning, on their turbo trainers warming up – a fair indicator that they expect the day to be lively. So are Katusha, Purito’s team. Other teams are not warming up, which perhaps shows the limit of their ambitions.
Under the heavy sun the mood is one of trepidation mixed with nervous excitement. ‘Purito is crazy,’ says Esteban Chaves, team Orica-GreenEdge’s Colombian climber, or so CyclingNews reports. ‘The stage should have been held over two days. Seriously I think it suits riders like me, Purito or Nairo [Quintana]. We’re all looking forward to this stage.’
I bump into Larry Warbasse, Joe’s flatmate who is riding for IAM Cycling. ‘I want to get in the break!’ he says, ‘But a lot of people do …’ It’s a sentiment I hear repeated by riders to journalists several times. Then I bump into Ian Boswell. ‘My legs feel like shit after the rest day,’ he says.
How hard is it going to be, I ask.
‘I guess that depends how hard we ride it,’ he says, grinning wryly as he turns and walks towards the stage where they’re about to announce his name. Joe is by the Cannondale-Garmin bus, about to get on his turbo and preoccupied about whether to wear a base layer or not. It’s the closest I’ve seen him come to being nervous. I leave them all to it and take my place on the street for the ceremonial roll-out through town before the gun.
The first 3.8 kilometres of the neutral zone are gently uphill. After that, another three kilometres of gentle uphill, then a left turn at a roundabout and straight into a narrow wall of road that signals the start of the first proper climb. The roll-out is not relaxed. Riders are bunched behind the race director’s car, jockeying for position for when the gun finally goes. It looks like there are a lot of elbows. The peloton disappears and the town is eerily quiet. I remember the drawback of watching a race by the side of the road: you have no idea what’s actually happening. I stand by – not in, you understand – a McDonald’s (whose reliable free Wi-Fi is the secret weapon of Grand Tour journalists Europe-wide) then rush to my next rendezvous with the riders. It is on a downhill, and as I wait I hear from another spectator that something has happened to Chris Froome. A crash somewhere near the start, and now he is behind, with his teammates, and Astana are putting the hammer down to inflict as much damage as they can. There was a break that got away on the first climb, but the guy next to me does not, of course, have detailed information about Joe.
I watch the break come past, a broken line of riders that will try to coalesce again at the bottom of the downhill. An Astana rider is near the front, and that’s significant: if Astana are motoring on behind the break – essentially chasing their own man – the Froome situation must be serious. Ian Boswell also comes swooping past. He is hunched over the handlebars, one of the front four or five. They are en route to the final couple of climbs. In the time it has taken me to check the internet and make my way across town (OK, maybe drink a coffee too), they have raced almost both of the butterfly’s wings. It is a short stage and, despite the difficulty, it is passing quickly. There is no Joe, but no time to worry about that now. After a long gap the peloton comes through, another stream of riders all trying to hang together for dear life.
When the race has finally passed it becomes clear that I will not get up to the finish: the cable car to the top is too far away, and very crowded, and if I try I will likely miss them. This is always the way when chasing racing with no accreditation. The reliable option is a bar. So I find myself sitting at the back of a hole-in-the-wall bar squashed in with 30 or so Andorrans, watching Ian, a guy, like Joe, I know a little, battling for a podium place with Mikel Landa and Fabio Aru of Astana, with a big lump in my throat. Ian stayed at Team Sky when Joe left, and became one of the team’s trusted mountain domestiques. This is also his first Grand Tour, and watching him contest a podium spot on a stage is emotional. So much for the shit legs, I think. Landa takes the win and Aru comes in second, but Ian holds on for third.
I watch the riders streaming in behind Landa, Aru and Boswell, ashen-faced and spent, and reflect on the sadism thing. We want our champions to be worthy of our adoration and so we give them mountain-sized obstacles to climb. The high mountains, with their snow and their remoteness and their inherent danger, are literally and symbolically the biggest challenges we can ask of them. And, while it may not be sadism, precisely, it would be impossible to deny the thrill when the mountains exercise their caprice or take their toll.
Froome comes in eight minutes down, his hopes of winning the Vuelta gone. He cracked, everyone says, but the full story emerges overnight: he was knocked hard sideways into a barrier and a stone wall at the start of the first climb, and he has fractured his foot. His Vuelta is over. I speak to Ian the day after the stage, and he explains how he fought to hit the first climb at the front, made the break that went near the top and then rode all day expecting to be called back to help out. ‘Once we got to the last two climbs, I hadn’t heard whether Froome was in the group or not,’ he told me the day after. ‘I heard a lot of Spanish on the radio talking to [Mikel] Nieve, so I put it together that Froome wasn’t there any more.
‘Even going into the final climb I didn’t expect us to stay away. We got to the bottom and Dario [Cioni, the Sky sports director] said, “You’re racing for the stage win now.” Half my mind was like, oh sweet, I could do well on a stage! The other half was, oh shit, I kind of wanted to be called back so I can do an effort and call it a day, because I’m pretty tired!
‘I still have a lot to learn about racing in the breakaway,’ he continued. ‘When Landa jumped at the bottom, ideally I would have gone with him. Maybe that’s a bit of a lack of confidence or experience not following that move right away. I eventually jumped and was able to ride my own pace. I had a bit of a side cramp from taking too many gels. There were a couple of kilometres there where I was actually kind of creeping.’
As for Joe, the evening after the stage he tweeted: ‘Cycling is cruel. Objective: breakaway and go for stage. Reality: Crash at km 0, bash knee, go full up climb 1 and catch broom wagon on top.’
We don’t catch up in person for a month or two after the race, by which time it’s all in the past, another lesson learnt. ‘I know I’m biased, but I don’t think there’s a harder sport in the world,’ Joe says. ‘And it’s so humbling. You go from being in training where everything is under your con
trol, and you think you’re going good, because you’re doing all the right things. Then you go to a high-level race and it’s like nothing’s in your control any more! And that can be quite uhhh … you know, shit happens.’
The best laid plans of mice and men go awry.
‘Yeah. I mean, it sounds clichéd because people say it so much, but that’s bike racing, I guess.’
Curiously enough, I reflect, for all our prognosticating that the GC battle would not ignite on that first mountain stage at the start of the second week, that’s exactly what happened. Froome departed and Fabio Aru (though he would lose the red leader’s jersey for a few stages) gained a chunk of seconds that were his springboard to winning overall. That’s bike racing.
It might sound clichéd, but you have to recognise the truth that gives rise to clichés – and you have to accept that bike racing is bike racing, or else you’ll drive yourself mad. Some days you don’t have the legs. Some days your head’s not in the right place and you miss your chance. Sometimes you have bad luck. Shit happens.