Tour de Suisse Stage 5 results (make benefit glorious nation Slovenia)

(Originally published 15th of June 2011)

Oooh, we were close with our race tips today! While we didn't give an actual prediction, we reckoned that Thor Hushovd, Peter Sagan, Marco Marcato and Oscar Freire would be battling to be first over the finish and in all likelhood coming in in very quick succession.

We were close, too. The actual sequence was Borut Bozic in first (OK, we didn't see him coming), Freire in second, Sagan third, Tejay van Garderen in fourth, Jose Joaquin Rojas Gil fifth and Marcato sixth with so little space between them that they all recorded the same time. Not bad, we reckon - and to make it even sweeter, Team Sky's Tom Swift came in in tenth place which is the best result for a British rider in the Tour so far.

Borut Bozic takes Stage 5. Very nice!

We also said that the top ten overall leadership would most likely remain little changed, as has proved to be the case with Damiano Cunego retaining the top spot, followed by Juan Mauricio Soler with +54" and then Bauke Mollema with +16" on him.

Tomorrow will be different. Following a reasonably flat first 145km, punctuated only by a couple of Category 3 climbs and a smattering of uncategorised hills, the riders will have to contend with the enormous Triesenberg just over the border in Liechtenstein for the final 15km, climbing a vertical kilometre to reach the stage finish at Malbun. The sprinters may have their fun in the earlier part of the day, but Stage 6 will be all about the climbers.

Path Profiler app

Ever thought how handy it'd be if you could have one of those route profiles like you get to show the climbs, altitudes and descents on each stage of a bike race? Well, you can provided you have the relevant Ordnance Survey map, a pencil and the know-how.

But what if you haven't got any of those or are riding further afield, perhaps somewhere where OS maps aren't available, such as Foreign? The answer is here - a very useful little application that uses Google Maps, allowing you to select a start, several checkpoints and a finish, and then - as if by magic but probably actually using algorithms or sumfink, draws the desired profile for you. What's more, you can have it in Imperial or metric too. This can then be used alongside a gradient calculator, such as the one here.

Find it here. 

The page is ugly, but it works and that's what matters!

Example: Cambridge - Haverhill - Great Thurlow - Bury St. Edmunds - Newmarket - Cambridge, 100km following the A roads. (Click to see it full-size, which makes it look a lot better)

Tour de Suisse Stage 5

(Originally published Wednesday 15th of June 2011)


It's another day for the sprinters today with a long, flat(ish) course of 204km. However, this being Switzerland, even the flat stages are peppered with a few respectable climbs to make sure the rider's knees take the abuse that all cyclists know and love and Stage 5 is no different - there's a Category 3 and three Category 4 climbs lurking out there today ready to catch those who expend too much energy of maintaining a high pace as well as four uncategorised climbs of reasonable size. One, in fact, is very nearly as high as the Cat 3 and with just 20km from summit to summit will no doubt catch a few people out. Like yesterday the stage finishes with a circuit, looping for 40km or so around Tobel-Tägerschen but at least keeping to a steady altitude rather than the climbs and descents that must have tortured the leaders fighting for the finish in Stage 4.

Staffelegg Pass - doesn't look like much, does it? That sign reads 621m, though!

Starting where yesterday left off at Huttwil, the route travels downhill for 25km before a small climb at the 35km mark then 10km on the flat before reaching the first proper climb in the form of the Cat 3 Staffelegg Pass at an altitude of 621m and featuring a dangerous intersection at the summit, scene of many accidents when the Pass is open to traffic. There'll only be bike traffic as the Tour passes through, of course, but even the terrifyingly efficient Swiss clean-up crews can't be guaranteed to get every spot of oil and broken glass.


Next comes a fast descent into the village of Hornussen, designated in its entirety a Swiss Heritage Site and not to be confused with the peculiar Swiss sport of the same name which resembles a cross between golf and baseball and which takes its name not from the village but from the noise made by the puck which, traveling at up to 300kmph after being hit with a wooden bat, creates a buzzing sound said to sound like a hornuss (hornet). It no doubt stings like one too if you don't get out of the way fast enough. The route then takes in an uncategorised climb of around 133m (bigger than both of the upcoming Cat 4s) up to Mönthal, site of a Bronze Age fortress and a few still-standing Middle Ages houses dating from the 14th Century. There follows a reasonably flat section of some 50km, with the day's first Cat 4 - a short but steep climb of 103m  thrown in for good measure. There's a couple of climbs up to almost the same altitude later on but with much gentler gradients, so this ought to be where the same sprinters who made the most of Stage 4 can shine once they've picked up bidons and musettes at the 100km mark. There's an Hors-Categorie climb of 803m in the last 25km of tomorrow's Stage 6 and then the 2383m Flüela Pass to contend with on Friday, so they may as well grab whatever glory they can right now!

Hornusson in winter.

A Cat 4 climb of 153m marks Freudenberg before the riders hit Tobel-Tägerschen for the first time and embark on a 40km circuit taking in a very steep Cat 4 climb at Eschlikon, a plateau at 600m around Balterwil and the final 15km back to Tobel-Tägerschen.


The weather for Huttwil looks set to be bright, sunny and warm at 20 C with light wind, Tobel-Tägerschen later on this afternoon ought to be much the same with a little more cloud, but little chance of rain. The forecast is thunder and rain tomorrow which, when combined with that killer of an HC climb at the end of the stage, ought to make it a truly horrible experience for the riders. So that's a must-watch then.

There's a high probability we'll see a Hushovd v. Sagan battle again today.

Predictions for today? Sprinters again. We suspect the overall classification will change little, but the stage winners' board may get shaken up a bit. Thor Hushovd will no doubt fancy another go at victory, but whether or not he can beat Peter Sagan for the second day in a row is hard to say. Marco Marcato will fancy another good result but when you have Óscar Freire, at 35 still one of the world's most feared sprinters, right behind you (Marcato and Freire finished in a group yesterday, thus recording the same time with Marcato just crossing the line first) you really need to work hard.

Tour de Suisse Stage 4 results

(Originally published Tuesday 14th of June 2011)


Peter Sagan, our prediction for today's stage winner, looked set to win but managed second place as Thor Hushovd, the Norwegian Garmin-Cervélo rider who won both the UCI Road Race World Championship and the Norwegian national Road Race Champion title last year gained the lead just 50m before the finish and achieved his first win of the 2011 season with a time of 4h 46' 05". Thor, somewhat predictably nicknamed the God of Thunder by his fans, has given top sprinter Mark Cavendish a run for his money several times in the past and it looks like he will do again on the flat sections of next month's Tour. Vacansoleil-DCM's Marco Marcato took third, crossing the line a mere 2" after Sagan.

Hushovd won the Tour de France prologue back in 2006.

The overall classification remains the same: 1. Cunego. 2. Soler. 3. Mollema. 4. Ten Dam. 5. van Garderen. 6. F. Schleck. 7. Fuglsang. 8. Di Luca. 9. Kruijswijk. 10. Leipheimer. Still no signs of Andy Schleck!

Doping in Cycling

Depending on who one talks to, doping (the use of drugs to have an effect upon peformance) is either the biggest problem to face cycling or one of the more amusing and interesting aspects of the sport. Doping allegations have been a part of the Grand Tours since the inaugural Tour de France in 1903 when riders used alcohol and ether to deaden the pain felt during and after the phenomenally long stages. The use of performance enhancing drugs dates to even earlier days, having been a part of the sport before the Tour began. Health concerns - as opposed to allegations of cheating - didn't appear until the years following World War 2 and  began in earnest following the death of British rider Tom Simpson from heart failure brought on by  amphetamines, alcohol and sheer exhaustion on the slopes of Mont Ventoux in 1967, though concerns had been raised earlier including in 1960 when Frenchman Roger Rivière plunged into a ravine and broke his neck, choosing to blame a mechanic for leaving oil on the wheel rims. Doctors who treated Rivière later stated that their patient had such high levels of drugs in his body that, in their opinion, he would have been either unable to judge when to brake or physically incapable of doing so. Rivière later admitted this and confessed to having a drug addiction and swallowing thousands of tablets each year.

Tom Simpson brought doping to the public's attention after he died as a result of heart failure brought on by amphetamine use in 1967. A memorial erected where he fell on Mont Ventoux has become a site of pilgrimage for cyclists from around the world.

Since the criminalisation of doping in 1965, the UCI and race organisers have introduced ever more sophisticated measures designed to prevent doping, whereas those riders willing to risk it have strived to keep one step ahead - as one observer put it, "The Tour, in fact, is only possible because - not despite the fact - there is doping." Mandatory testing in French events began in 1966, revealing that a third of the riders subjected to tests at that year's Tour returned positive results.

Tests for other drugs became available in the 1970s including for Pemoline, a drug which has a similar effect to amphetamines and saw Eddy Merckx (considered by many to be one of the greatest cyclists in history) caught out in 1977. Steroid and corticoid use became so prevalent during that decade that it was said that only the high cost of obtaining them in the sort of quantities cyclists got through limited their use; when Jan-Luc van den Broucke tested positive in 1978 he went on record saying, "There was a mass of steroids used in the Tour, everyone will admit that. How can we stay at the top otherwise?"

EPO, erythropoietin, was a revolution in cycling on a par with the invention of derailleur gears and had a correspondingly enormous impact on the sport. Not only did the drug boost the production of red blood cells, thus allowing the muscles to receive more oxygen and nutrients for a longer period, it was also impossible to distinguish it from the testosterone naturally produced in the body. Organisers were forced to adopt a system whereby any rider tested and discovered to have a haematocrit level (red cell count) in excess of 50% (45% in men and 40% in women is considered normal in healthy adults) would be required to "rest" from a race for a given period. However, since cyclists frequently use high-altitude training to boost red cell counts, this system could lead to false accusations and was far from ideal.

Richard Virenque confessed to using EPO, a drug that became so prevalent in cycling that the term was almost synonymous with doping.

EPO use became so prevalent that estimates of how many riders were using it in the Tours between the late 1980s and 2000, when a test was finally developed, and the term became almost synonymous with doping. To this day, messages still appear painted on the roads of the Tour accusing riders disliked by those respinsible of "l'EPO." Matters came to a head in 1998 when the Festina team soigneur Willy Voet was arrested as he attempted to enter France with a bag full of banned drugs including EPO, testosterone amphetamines and an assortment of various growth hormones and narcotics - now, even those with no interest in cycling became aware that drug use was rife within the sport and there were even calls for all cycling events to be axed from the Olympics for fear of giving out the message to young sports fans that drugs could be used to enhance performance. Such has been the furore surrounding the matter since that accusations of doping, even when based on no evidence, are now used as an underhand tactic designed to undermine an opponent's credibility and tire him out with the rigourous testing to which anyone under suspicion will be subject - and testing can be rigourous indeed; as Lance Armstrong, himself the target of several doping allegations based either on nothing or his association with Michele Ferrari, who was convicted of supplying drugs to athletes, reveals in his autobiographies the UCI testers can strike at any time, anywhere and any attempt to escape them is liable to result in increased suspicion. They can even show up at a rider's private home and demand a test there and then - and a positive test isn't the only way to get a ban, failure or refusal to give a sample can also be viewed as legitimate reason.

The 2006 Tour looked set to become farce when Operation Puerto carried out by the Spanish police revealed yet more widespread drug use. Five members of the Astana team were banned, leaving an insufficient number to start the race, along with two members of T-Mobile and one each from CSC and AG2R-Prevoyance. Floyd Landis of Phonak tested positive for suspiciously high testosterone after Stage 17 and was later banned from the sport for two years.

2006 was possibly the worst ever year for doping in the Tour de France with one team unable to start after five members received bans. A number of other riders were also later caught out.

The Tour in 2007 began with suspicions flying all over the place - even Alessandro Pettachi, an asthmatic, was suspended after he tested positive for salbutmol, a very common anti-asthma drug. The suspension was later overturned after further tests revealed that the drug was present only in quantities confirming to standard therapeutic usage but too late, he'd already had to miss the Tour. Two German television companies abandoned their plans to film and televise the event and Astana abandoned the race after Kazakh Alexander Vinokourov tested positive following the second time trial, subsequently retiring from the sport (though he has since returned and raced in the 2011 Critérium du Dauphiné. Then following Stage 16 and a positive result supplied by Christian Moreni, Team Confidis also abandoned and Michael Rasmussen was ordered to leave the event by his team Rabobank for failing to provide a sample when required to do so during two consecutive days a fortnight before the Tour.

A list of riders convicted, sanctioned or suspected (with some grounds) to have doped is virtually indistinguishable from a list of the great names in the sport: Jacques Anquetil, Tour winner in 1957, 1961, 1962, 1963 and 1964 who managed to achieve detection whilst active, confessed to doping following his retirement; Eddy Merckx, five time Tour winner and one of the most successful cyclists in history, provided four positive samples and was banned from one Giro d'Italia; Stephen Roche, tour winner in 1987, was believed to have used EPO in 1993 but never supplied a suspicious haematocrit; Jan Ullrich, Tour winner in 1997, banned for apparently recreational amphetamine use; Marco Pantani, received a six month ban following the discovery of insulin in his hotal room; Alberto Contador, involved in the Operation Puerto case and later banned in a 2010 unrelated test; Bjarn Riis, Tour winner in 1996 and current owner of Saxobank Sungard, later admitted to have won with the help of performance enhancing drugs; Pedro Delgado, Tour winner in 1988, tested positive for a questionable substance but escaped sanctions as it was not yet banned by the UCI; Laurent Fignon, Tour winner in 1983 and 1984, positive test results after two separate events in 1989; Joop Zoetemelk, tested positive in three different Tours de France; Bernard Thévenet, confessed to doping (but wasn't caught) in the 1975 and 1977 - but not, coincidentally, in the 1976 Tour which he won; Lucien Aimar, Tour winner in 1966, banned from the Vuelta the same year after a positive test... In the last half decade, a mere nine have never tested positive for doping - Carlos Sastre in 2008, Lance Armstrong (tested positive for non-prescribed drug hormone, but result believed to be false and caused by the large number of drugs used during his cancer recovery) with his unprecedented seven wins, Greg LeMond, Bernard Hinault, Lucien van Impe, Luis Ocaña, Jan Janssen, Roger Pingeon and Felice Gimondi. Were they truly innocent or were they lucky enough to escape detection? Unless any confess, we'll never know.

What would professional cycling be like without doping? Bernard Hinault, winner of five Tours de France and the only man to have won all three Grand Tours more than once, is apparent proof that results can still be achieved - he's never given a positive test.

So what will the 2011 Tour bring? The madness of 2006 and 2007 has long since died down and some commentators are willing to suggest that anti-doping tests are now so effective that the problem has been brought into check, but past history suggests it never will be and it's only a matter of time before the latest doping methods emerge into the daylight. 2010 was an unusually dope controversy-free year: French newspaper l'Equipe published a leaked document listing all the riders and the level of suspicion they were under, from 0 (no suspicion) to 10 (extreme suspicion), with examples likely to give rise to suspicion including:


 1. sudden drop in hemoglobin one month before the summer of 2010 which could point to an important loss of blood possibly destined to be re-injected during the Tour


2. suspicion of EPO use during the 2009 Giro


3. hematocrit, hemoglobin or stimulation index superior to 2010 values, which could have led to a start ban before the UCI rules were changed


4. low parameters off-race

...which revealed that the vast majority of riders were rated less then 4 - winner Contador, who returned a positive test for the banned bronchodilator Clenbuterol during the race but was not banned after successfully claiming that contaminated food was the cause, was rated at five. At present, there's no way of knowing but the riders can be sure of scrutiny this year as cycling attempts to show the world it's cleaned up its act.

Tour de Suisse Stage 3

(Originally published Monday 13th June 2011)

Another exhausting day for the riders touring Switzerland today with the majority of Stage 3's 108km taking place at altitude. The race starts out today from the almost ridiculously beautiful town of Brig-Glis (I visited once as a child) which is home to the vast Stockalper Palace, at the time of its construction the largest private building project ever seen in Switzerland, and where inhabitants speak a unique German dialect used nowhere else in the country.

Stockalper Palace

Lying 691m above sea level, the town nestles among high Alpine peaks which have brought winter prosperity in the form of skiers and snowboarders and which also ensure that the riders will be met with a climb immediately upon leaving the town - it's a relatively minor one so far as gradient is concerned, rising some 655m in around to Ulrichen in around 25km, but it should be more than sufficient to get the old knees woken up. Next comes a flatter stage of around 15km, a welcome chance to summon up the energy to face the day's biggest challenge which comes in the form of an 819m climb in 10km to the Grimselpass at 2165m, the highest point of the stage and from which riders will be able to see the Rhone Glacier, source of the river Rhone, should any of them have achieved a sufficient lead in the climb to be able to afford a spot of sight-seeing.

The view from Grimselpass

From the summit, the riders descend 1520m in 30km (imagine that, Cambridge bikers! Makes the Coldham's Lane bridge seem a bit boring, eh?) to the stage's lowest point. This may prove to be a very interesting section - Andy Schleck, who took second place in last year's Tour de France following an incident in which his chain came off allowing eventual winner Alberto Contador to take a 39" lead (the margin by which he beat Schleck in the overall classification), has taken a bit of back seat thus far in the race, leaving his older brother Frank to defend Schleck family honour (their father and grandfather were also professional cyclists) on the leadership board, may decide to use today to demonstrate his form, displaying the ability as a grimpeur which had Contador looking extremely worried in the 2010 Tour, which could allow him to either lead or at least be one of the first over the Grimselpass. In addition to this, Andy demonstrated almost yogic serenity in France, looking calm and even smiling for the crowds at times when other riders were grimacing. If he's got the same form this year, he might be able to maintain any advantage obtained on the way up all the way back down again when other riders get a bit twitchy at high speeds.

Andy Schleck may decide to put on a show of strength today

Although nobody's going want to take their hands off the bars at those sorts of speeds, they're going to have to take the opportunity to top up on the energy gel because at the 78km mark there's a fearsome Hors-Catégorie climb to contend with. Despite reaching the highest point of the stage, the climb up Grimselpass begins at altitude and as such is rated Category 1. Once they've completed the descent, the competitors don't have any flatland whatsoever, allowing no respite before beginning the 1317m ascent of Grosse Scheidegg, a pass at 1962m which is usually only open to buses and the location of the final fight between Sherlock Holmes and Professor Moriarty, in which Moriarty was killed permanently and Holmes temporarily (it's amazing what public demand can achieve). 

This is going to be a very, very tough climb indeed and any rider for whom the descent was not enough to rest is going to suffer - we shall almost certainly see at least one rider abandon in this section, but anyone with the strength left in them will be wanting to get a lead because once they're over the top there's a shorter but even steeper descent, 958m over just 11km, to the finish. Anyone with significant lead on the pack will be able to use this section to cruise comfortably without needing to risk life and limb in a hairy free-fall to the finish at Grindelwald, a town that virtually defines what a Swiss town should look like and which was once home to the world's most talented anti-semite Richard Wagner. Keen-eyed sci-fi fans may also recognise the mountains surrounding Grindelwald as they were used to form the outline of the mountains surrounding Alderaan in Star Wars Episode 3 - Revenge of the Sith. 

Grindelwald - more typically Swiss than H.R. Giger eating a Toblerone while building a cuckoo clock and brewing up LSD with Albert Hoffman. In a bank.

You can watch very nice 3D Google Earth animations of the Grimselpass and Grosse Scheidegg sections courtesy of steephil.tv.

Tour de Suisse starts in earnest today

(Originally published Sunday 12th of June 2011)

The Tour de Suisse is the second big race at this time of year. Though it doesn't have the profile enjoyed by the Dauphine, it's another opportunity for riders to test themselves and teams to test their tech in preparation for next month's Tour de France. Beginning yesterday with a time trial, Stage 1 saw world time trial champion Fabian Cancellara complete the 7.3km course on the shores of Lake Lugano, including a climb of just over 400m roughly halfway in 9'41.83", his fourth victory in the first stage of this event since 2003 and in spite of a problem early on with his electronic gear shifters. HTC-Highroad's Tejay Van Garderen finished just nine seconds behind him and Liquigas rider Peter Sagan 17 seconds behind. Cancellara can be seen in a post-race interview on his (rather ugly) website.

The views from the 2478m Nufenen Pass are some of the best in Switzerland, but none of the riders are going to want to stop and enjoy them today.

Today's stage, 148km from Airolo to Crans Montana in the south of the country with some extreme climbs including one of 2478m, will almost certainly see the leader's board shaken up and looking very different by the end of the day, especially when the super-fit German Andreas Kloden in fifth place and American ace all-rounder Levi Leipheimer in 9th. With Tom Danielson, the current holder of the record time in the Colorado Mount Evans Hill Climb (which pits riders against a 4307m ascent, easily surpassing anything in any of the European tours), Peter Sagan (about whom Cadel Evans said, "he makes my legs hurt") and Bauke Mollema (still just 24 but a very promising climber) all in the top ten, making a prediction with any confidence in getting it right is all but impossible.

Critérium du Dauphiné

Since it's ignored by the mainstream British press, many people are unaware that the 63rd Critérium du Dauphiné has been in progress for the last week - a pity, because it's a spectacular and important race. It also provides an interesting chance to predict performances in the upcoming Tour de France and a sneak preview of the bikes as the teams and manufacturers put their new technology to the test on the grueling mountain stages. The chance to predict Tour performances is of particular interest this year due to the impressive rides put in by British rider Bradley Wiggins who is currently in the lead with a 1'26" advantage over Australian Cadel Evans in second place.

Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne.

31-year-old Wiggins, who was born in Belgium but has lived in the UK since childhood, finished the 2009 Tour de France in fourth place on Mont Ventoux in 2009 and, with a long list of excellent results to his name (bronze in the 2000 Olympics, gold/silver/bronze in the 2004 Olympics, a brace of golds in the 2008 Olympics, an assortment of stage wins over the last three years) leading many people - myself included - to predict that we'd have the first ever British winner in 2010's Tour. However, it wasn't a good race for the Team Sky leader and he managed 24th overall, describing his 2009 success as "a fluke." Still, I didn't put money on him; nor shall I be doing so this year: a look at the points awarded for climbing in the Dauphiné reveals Wiggo isn't even in the top ten and the 2011 Tour is going to be even more all about the climbers than Tours usually are. A couple of stage wins during the early stages when the riders can concentrate on speed in the flatlands of Northern France may well be on the cards though - and a few Wiggins versus Cavendish battles for supremacy in the final kilometre would be nothing short of spectacular.

Joaquim Rodriguez is
worth watching

Today's stage, the last of the race, is a short one at just 117.5km but after a relatively easy first 53km, the riders have two serious climbs with which to contend. The first is the 2067m ascent of the Hors catégorie
Col de la Croix de Ferre from Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne in the beautiful Savoy region, featuring a grinding 29.5km with a 5.5% average gradient - and a few 9.5% sections thrown in just in case the riders aren't suffering sufficiently. This is followed by a descent of some 14km, which should offer some high speed action as riders seek to let gravity take the strain and give their burning legs a break, before they face another steep climb to reach the finish 1703m above sea level at La Toussuire with the final 14.4km averaging 5.9%. A strong climber - such as Joaquim Rodríguez, currently in 6th place overall 3'01" behind the lead but in second place among the climbers and leading on overall points - could theoretically break Wiggo's hold. Unlike the Tour, in which the overall winner is often revealed several stages from the end, nothing is yet concrete in this year's Dauphiné and that'll make for some great racing today.


Rodriguez may be in 6th overall, but he'll doubtless be glad - the 32-year-old Katusha rider made the decision to take part at the last moment following his 5th place success in the Giro d'Italia. He'll be worth watching next month in France.


The fun starts at 13.25 CEST (12.25 BST) - as ever, it won't be on British TV but you can follow the action live at the Dauphine website or you can watch it live in French on sport.francetv. Links to live video in other languages (none of them English, unfortunately) and delayed video (including English) available from steephill.tv.