Contador on Nevegal vs Horner on Sierra Road

Quick post today.....

I estimated the power taken for Contador to do the climb to Nevegal, which took him 20:58 from the checkpoint at the base of the climb to the summit:

CyclingNews

600 meters climbed in 7.30 km for an average grade of 8.2%.

For direct comparison with Horner's Sierra Road climb I used the same numbers: 65 kg body mass, 6.8 kg bike, 1.5 kg of other stuff, 0.32 m² CdA. I reduced rolling resistance from 3% to 2.5% since Contador was on time trial tires. I still assumed 3% drivetrain loss. I used a power-speed model including inertia. I assumed he started the climb at 40 kph.

The result: 6.24 W/kg. This is lower than the 6.56 W/kg I had for Horner on Sierra Rd. Horner's VAM was 1916 m/hr while Contador was 1750 m/hr.

Of course it's not a fair comparison as Contador had finished two brutally tough stages immediately preceding the rest week the day before, and may not have fully recovered. It seems riders aren't having rest days as productive as they had a few years ago.

Comments

jrennie said…
I think you have contador's weight way too high at 65kg most list him at 62kg but I would still bet it is less than that.
May 26, 2011 at 9:54 AM
djconnel said…
Thanks...Since I convert back to W/kg there's not much difference, however. I don't know Corner's mass either (just a guess).
May 26, 2011 at 7:45 PM
Péter I. Pápics said…
I think it is not possible to compare two riders with a completely different race beyond them. One week versus two weeks, different stage structures, etc. What really covers the story well, is how Contador really beat everyone on the TT, even with taking the first part much more securely than Scarponi or Nibali. I was also calculating the VAMs, and got a bit surprised by Contador's value, but hey, he won by a huge margin at the end, so it is probably truly just the building fatigue of the peleton...
May 27, 2011 at 2:41 AM
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