As the cycling race reaches the mountains, its dangers are all too clear
skill to urinate off the side of a moving bicycle. Tom Pidcock did so after zooming down the Col du Galibier during the 12th stage of last year’s Tour de France. He had just finished demonstrating another of his cycling proficiencies: descending. The progress made by Mr Pidcock, who won a gold medal in mountain-biking in the delayed Tokyo Olympics in 2021, is one of the talking-points of this year’s tour, which began on July 1st.
At times, as he sped to catch up with the leading riders, Mr Pidcock exceeded 100kph . He then powered up the Alpe d’Huez, to become, at 22, the youngest rider to win the stage that finishes on that renowned mountain. But it was his exhilarating earlier descent on the Galibier that set up his victory.
Downhill “attacking” is new to cycling. “Thirty years ago, no one attacked on a descent. It was too dangerous,” says Steve Chainel, a former professional cyclist, in “Unchained”, a newly released documentary on the tour on Netflix. “These days, it’s a key element for a fully rounded rider.” This development has made the sport more exciting but has inevitably increased the risks. That was tragically underscored in June on the Tour de Suisse.
Such measures are welcome, but the dangers faced by professional cyclists remain serious and varied, whether the road is steep or flat. The “bunch sprint”, when riders charge in a group for the line, separated by milliseconds, is a dangerous cocktail of elbows, wheels and speeds exceeding 60kph. A Dutch sprinter, Fabio Jakobsen, suffered life-threatening injuries after crashing in the 2020 Tour of Poland.
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