by David Millar
Calpe, north of Benidorm, is the favourite of teams – sometimes, in December and January, it’s possible to find five of the best cycling teams in the world staying there at the same time. I’ve spent months of my life in Calpe. It’s why I’m thankful to be in Mallorca for this, my final pre-season camp. At least it’s different from what I’m used to, makes it feel a little bit unfamiliar.
The routine, on the other hand, is always the same:
08:30 Breakfast
10:00 Leave for training
15:00–16:00 Lunch
17:00–20:00 Massage (45 min)
20:00 Dinner
There will be a day with physiological testing, another for the team photo, but, all in all, that’s it. The training will vary but not significantly. Ryder and I have, of course, added juicing to our daily schedule, and a pre-dinner beer if our massage rotation matches up. Apart from that it’s general skulking around. I used to read, now I waste time on my computer or phone, surfing the web. I miss the days when we didn’t have internet or smartphones. I actually used my brain.
As usual I build my form up slowly through the camp, then on the final day we’re split up into groups for team time-trial training. Rohan Dennis and I find ourselves in the smallest group, going off last. We’re probably the two purest time trialists on the team, he young, me old. We both raise our game and I find myself doing what I do best and loving it. The two of us together go faster than the two groups of eight that are chasing. It makes me feel young again, and reminds me of what I’m capable of and why I do it. It is the perfect way to finish the camp.
Stage Racers
You’ve got the crazy bastards, the Classics racers, frothing at the mouth, champing at the bit for early season form in Qatar. Then there are the stage racers, capable of winning the general classification/overall of any stage race without ever actually crossing a finishing line first. The stage racer’s primary objective is damage limitation through racing conservatively and minimising time losses; aggressive racing is only encouraged if there is near certainty of gaining time. It’s for this reason general classification racers will only dare to spread their wings close to the finish line – that way if it does backfire they can limit their losses because they are so near the finish.
It’s also why whole teams are used up on the front of the race before a leader will show himself. In an ideal world the leader would never actually be seen exerting himself at the front – he’d always be there, yet invisible, economising as much energy as possible in preparation for the following day’s racing. It’s a numbers game: everything is measured and calculated in order to generate the most efficient result. To put it simply, discretion is the better part of valour.
I had, over the years, grown a stage-racing mentality. I would assess all the applicable factors and decide what was the most efficient and effective way for me to race; the only time I would take risks was if I was in a winning situation, more often than not during a time trial. Even then they were calculated risks, as I would have done sufficient reconnaissance to allow me to corner faster – so although from the following car it might have looked like I was hanging it all out, clipping barriers and basically being a maniac, from my point of view I knew exactly what I was doing. And therein lies the biggest difference between a stage racer and a one-day racer.
A stage racer is always trying to control the variables – if risks are taken, they are calculated – whereas a one-day racer essentially knows they can’t control the variables, so they reduce them by racing aggressively, fighting each other to be at the front of the race in order to enter a particular corner that leads into a narrow road, or smashing each other to be the first into a dangerous section of cobbles, and demanding their team sacrifice themselves in order to be at the front in crosswinds. The closer to the front they are the fewer riders they have to deal with – for a one-day racer the biggest variable is the number of racers in front of them. Classics turn into wars of attrition, they become elimination races. It doesn’t matter how strong you are, if you’re not in the right place all the time you won’t win.
Classics Riders
I had made an early career choice to avoid the Classics: they were so long and hard, and I’m not ashamed to say that, at the time, I didn’t have the skill set for that. I spent my early years targeting races that I could win clean. In my mind Classics were up there with Grand Tours in their necessity for perfomance-enhancing drugs in order to compete. That was what I’d convinced myself anyway.
Now, looking back, with all the knowledge I have I can believe that a few special guys did compete and win clean against the dopers in the Classics (I don’t believe it was possible in the Grand Tours during that time), but they were a minority. Of course, I didn’t know that at the time (well, why would I?). Even the clean guys couldn’t allow themselves public pride in winning the right way. Which, in a way, sums them up: the few that could do it were made of a different stuff, they were secure in themselves, they weren’t affected by peer pressure, so at the same time they never needed to convince people of anything. They did it for themselves. It was never omertà for them, it was simply their nature. For a time, I was one of them
Classics riders are what we call ‘one-day racers’. This title alone pretty much sums them up. They are obliged to be more aggressive in their style of racing because, contrary to stage racers, there is no tomorrow. Crossing the line in first place on that day is the only thing that matters. They have a ‘he who dares wins’ attitude. Every generation has its greats: the seventies had Roger De Vlaeminck; the eighties Sean Kelly; the nineties Johan Museeuw; and the peloton of today has Tom Boonen and Fabian Cancellara sharing the honours.
There’s Nothing Quite Like Racing in Flanders
The first two Classics of the year are Het Nieuwsblad and Kuurne–Brussels–Kuurne. They’re the first test for all the one-day specialists whose principal goals still remain a month away. The same guys whom I’d perceived to be trying to kill each other in Qatar all those years ago were actually just sparring in preparation for this opening weekend a few weeks later.
The races are mostly held in the Flanders region of Belgium. They do, on occasion, find themselves further afield, yet are still referred to as Flandrian in style. These are a particular type of race; they involve cobbles, small country lanes, steep hills, bad weather, muddy roads and about 342,105 corners. All one-day racers dream of one day being referred to as a Flandrian. This means you’re one of the hard bastards who excels on that terrain.
The essentials of the Flandrian calendar are:
Omloop Het Nieuwsblad
Kuurne–Brussels–Kuurne
Dwars door Vlaanderen
E3 Harelbeke
Gent–Wevelgem
Three Days of De Panne
Tour of Flanders aka Ronde van Vlaanderen
Paris–Roubaix
Some professionals will base their whole season on this racing block alone – these are the proven and recognised Flandrians. Once Roubaix is completed in mid-April they will effectively end their season; they’ll keep racing, but with none of the impetus, aggression or motivation that they showed from Qatar to Roubaix. Those of us who stage race through the summer find their lackadaisical behaviour for the rest of the year near incomprehensible. It’s as if they’re in hibernation until they arrive on that start line in Qatar in January, ready to begin their annual three-month crazy-batshit phase.
The Flanders specialists seem to enjoy bad conditions; they have a skip in their step and a sparkle in their eyes when they wake up the morning of one of their beloved races and see wind and rain. Their enthusiasm for those six weeks of the year is uncontrollable and made all the more annoying by the fact you know that once Roubaix is done and dusted they’re going to spend most of the rest of the season whinging about everything when everybody else has to keep their head in the game. It’s clear their season’s worth of mental energy burns brightly, and violently, for a very short period of time. The rest of us hav
e to spread it out till October – we don’t really stand a chance on their terrain. There are a few of those mad bastards who can spread it out through a whole racing season, but they’re rare beasts, certainly not the norm.
I’ve grown to love the Classics. After spending so many years repeating the same races, season after season, it was a joy in 2010 to find myself thrown in among the Flandrians. I won the Three Days of De Panne and was racing the finale of Tour of Flanders with the favourites, something I had never thought I’d be doing. I discovered too late what I was maybe most suited to. Of course, the problem was my disdain for winters, which meant that truly I was never meant to be a Classics rider, no matter appearances.
There is nothing quite like racing in Flanders. I do believe it is the home of professional cycling. The atmosphere is unique – the enthusiasm the locals have is contagious. I get the impression that little has changed in decades; the fans are from all ages and backgrounds, and the races themselves are as chaotic and nonsensical as cycling. It beggars belief how it’s possible to organise and marshal a Flanders race, for they go round in circles, figures of eight, back and forth. To quote Churchill, they’re like a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.
In order to be a specialist Classics rider it is not enough simply to have the right genetics and work ethic, and hit the right numbers in training then turn up as a contender – you have to know the roads intimately, much like a London taxi driver must possess the Knowledge. And not only do you have to be familiar with the route – you must be aware of every road that leads to and from it, the corners and turns, the cobbles and climbs. Each year the races will use these roads in slightly different combinations, and being able to know exactly where you’re going next is a key ingredient to success.
For the uneducated, you will feel like you are trapped in a labyrinth, all sense of direction lost and absolutely no idea where you are in relation to where you have been or where you are going. You won’t understand why all of a sudden everybody is racing like a maniac at what appears to be a random moment in the race, far from the finish. Then you’ll see the lead cars and motorbikes far ahead veer to the left on to a single-track country lane, the front riders will follow close behind, sprinting out of the same corner in a scattered single file … while you’re still braking in a densely packed bunch that feels miles behind. You may as well not be in the same race. That is what racing in Flanders is like.
Het Nieuwsblad this year lives up to its reputation: the weather is atrocious, barely going above five degrees all day and raining the last two hours. In these conditions there is very little you can do to prevent yourself getting cold – well, there is: you can wear a big jacket, but then you’ll be dropped because the terrible aerodynamics will slow you down too much. I am far from setting the world on fire but manage to complete my assigned job and continue on to finish, which, considering the conditions, I am satisfied with. Ian Stannard of Team Sky, and a Brit no less, wins it, in the process becoming the latest pro to earn himself the moniker ‘Flandrian’ – something that Ian has always dreamt of the way others dream of winning the Tour de France.
The next day is Kuurne–Brussels–Kuurne. Although I’ve done Het Nieuwsblad in the past I have never doubled up and done Kuurne, too. I don’t really know what to expect. In the end it’s anti-climactic, as our leader for the race, Tyler Farrar, is involved in a crash and I am the man to get him back on, which involves a ten-kilometre chase back to the peloton to drop him off just before a key moment in the race, meaning my race is over. This isn’t ideal, but it is often my job to fix things that go wrong for our leaders, and frequently that means sacrificing my own race in order to save theirs.
Road Captain
My role within the team has become more and more that of a road captain as the years have gone by. This is a natural progression that happens to many professionals who pass their peak yet are still capable of competing in the biggest races. I may have lost my ability to consistently deliver results, but at the same time I have such a depth of knowledge that I can read races better than anybody else in the team and have never been afraid to make decisions and call the shots on the road. Most importantly, at this point, I am still strong enough to be at the front of the race in key moments when the most important decisions have to be made.
In a way, I have always been a road captain. Even when I was a young pro at Cofidis I would be the one who made the tactical decisions on the road. The difference then was that I also had the responsibility to get the result at the end of the day, so most of the decisions I made were for my own benefit rather than the team’s. Now, all the decisions I make represent what is best for the team rather than individuals. If we go to a race and we have a stand-out leader then we dedicate all our resources to him. But if he crashes or falls sick or simply isn’t as good as expected, I have to come up with a plan B quickly.
When I was younger, and both leader and road captain, if things went wrong then there was no plan B. It was a two-edged sword: if I was going well and was motivated I lifted everybody up; but if I wasn’t going well and wasn’t motivated then everybody came down to my level, and there was nobody there to step in and take over the situation. For this reason it’s always good to have a leader whom you can count upon to get the result and a captain to manage plan A and create plan B if necessary. Those decisions have to be made on the bike rather than from the following car because, more often than not, they unfold very quickly at key moments in the race, to the degree that the directeur sportif in the following car is unaware of what’s happening.
There’s also the fact that a good road captain stays on top of how his team is shaping up. It’s all well and good having radios but they can’t be trusted to work all the time, and you can’t trust your riders to use them in the way they should. It’s common practice when in bad shape during a race to simply ignore the radio – also, if you’re feeling terrible the last thing you want to do is broadcast it to all your teammates and the following car. It’s embarrassing to be the one who says, ‘I’m not feeling good.’ Without fail, you know all the other guys will be thinking, ‘Of course you don’t feel good, dickhead. It’s fucking hard right now.’ Plus every single one of us knows what message we’ll get back from the directeur sportif in the following car if we admit that. ‘Everyone feels bad, just hang on, it’ll get better.’ That’s why a racer going through a bad patch will disappear deep into their pain cave hoping to be left to suffer alone in silence.
So, as a road captain, if you notice that one or more of your teammates aren’t where they’re supposed to be (i.e. near their leader or at the front of the bunch) then you go looking for them and talk to them and make a decision on what to use them for before they give up completely and are totally useless to the team.
More often than not when you feel bad in a race the best thing you can have your road captain do is come up and empathise and then give you a job. Simply being sent back for bottles can sometimes give a new lease of life, but more often than not riding on the front is the best solution because, psychologically, it’s ten times better being at the front of the peloton – riding in the wind, controlling the effort and dishing out the suffering – than being back in the wheels feeling like you’re being pummelled by everybody else, while listening to your internal monologue telling you repeatedly how much you suck and how it’s just a matter of time before you’re dropped like a stone.
It happens at the other end of the scale as well. Sometimes the leader will come up and tell the road captain they’re not feeling good and that it’s not their day. Often this has to be ignored. If they’re a climber and the tactic is to place them at the front for the last climb then you simply tell them, ‘Everyone feels bad, just hang on, it’ll get better.’ Then continue setting them up for the final climb. If it’s a sprinter who comes up to you and tells you they’re feeling terrible and the tactic is to chase down the break and set up a bunch sprint, you tell them, ‘Everyone feels bad, just hang on, it’
ll get better.’ Then continue chasing down the break to set up the bunch sprint. Generally you have to ignore how people feel, because even though we’re elite athletes there are times when our perception of effort in a race is completely wrong. It’s not unusual for the guy who wins to have endured a moment in that very race where he was convinced he’d get dropped and not even finish.
So my job in almost every race I go to now is road captain. It’s good, up to a point, but there are times when it would be nice to just switch off from the race and be able to hide in the peloton. I appreciate now how easy I used to have it when I was younger, calling my own shots and not answering to anybody. Of course, being younger, I had no idea of that at the time.
Being Older
Making it through the first weekend in Belgium unscathed is a relief. We go up there prepared for the worst, be it weather or crashing. I wasn’t very affected by the cold on the Saturday and avoided crashing on both days, which feels like my own little victory and means I head home in jubilant spirits. I’ve been away for almost a month. In the old days that would have been no bother whatsoever – it was part of the job and lifestyle. Since having children that’s all changed. I’m now that old guy who says he wants to retire to spend more time with the family. Not so long ago I could not even begin to fathom why anybody would say that, let alone do it. I just couldn’t believe that could happen. Racers can’t talk about missing their wife and children, it’s not very racer-like.