Originally posted by tomdavis80
It's not inconceivable that Eddy Merckx climbed the Tourmalet in 53x17 if he was grinding at 50-70 rpm. That amounts to a speed of about 12.31-17.23 mph or 19.8 kph-27.7. I wouldn't doubt that Eddy Merckx could cimb in those gears and I don't think you should, Veloflash. Also in point is the way they changed gears is a little different than it is today. Today, one could change gears without losing any momentum or speed, but the way it was set up, you could conceivably lose a mph or two when you were changing gears due to the fact that you had to take your hands off the handlebars and momentarily shift your concentration and lose some of that power from the back muscles. So it may not have been to many cyclist's advantage during those days to shift gears much like we do nowadays.
Sure, in today's racing scene, it'd be a little insane, but keep in mind that in today's racing scene, anyone doing that on the middle mountain stage would be murdered because there are perhaps 10-20 cyclists who would be capable of conserving energy for the next day and then shredding that person. But the level of competition was not that high back then. In today's racing scene, how would EM do? I don't know but I suspect he'd be damn near the top or AT the top.
Thomas Davis
Thomas:
I can recall from another thread the "80" refers to your year of birth. I doubt whether you have experienced friction shifters (indexing came in 1983) and most probably have only had to use STS type brake integrated shifters (introduced by Shimano in 1990 when you were 10
).
My first bike in the 1990's had downtube indexed shifters which could be adjusted to friction shifters if you had indexing problems.
As Limerickman has agreed, there is a problem downshifting with friction shifters. You have to search and find the gear you are after and you have to unweight the pedals. You have to anticipate gears when climbing and know the road. You can be in a position on a very steep climb that to change down you have to stop the bike!
What alerted me to the idiosyncrasy of the friction shifter was Limerickman's quote from the 1969 event:
“at the foot of the Tourmalet, Merckx geared down from 53x13 (my original, initial typo) to 53x17. I was directly behind Merckx in the bunch and I saw him gear down. I thought that he was having problems with his gears because he was pulling at his (gear) lever."
You should lose no time reaching down to change using a downtube index shifter as you have claimed. As a matter of fact, a lot of riders used to change from integrated STS shifters to downtube index shifters in mountain stages to save weight.
As regards weight, frames and components have tumbled in weight over the years. So that now the UCI have placed a minimum weight of 6.8kgs (14.994lbs). I can recall lifting a 1980 museum race bike and it was HEAVY. It had alloy wheels which had come into vogue at the time.
A 1969 bike would have even been heavier. Riders of EM's time, comparatively, had the extra burden of at least 12lbs (my estimation) dead weight to lug up the mountain. Greg Lemond said that every extra pound on a 30 minute climb will cost the rider 30 seconds.
Their climbing speeds would have been slower than the speeds of today.
It is not inconceivable that Merckx used a 53x17 to climb all the way to the summit of the Tourmalet, one of the steepest and toughest HC climbs. Without debating Merckx's superior athleticism, I would say that given all the factors of the equipment of the day, the sports medicine, the gradient of the climb, the progress of the stage and the stage within the overall Tour, it was impossible that Merckx used that gear.
Also, once you climb with a very low cadence, you do not tax your aerobic system. There is so much time between muscle contractions that there is reduced demand on oxygen and muscle fuel. The problem is that you have to increase your pedal forces to such an extent that you overstress your muscles. Your legs will become heavier and heavier. This is not an economic pedalling application midway through a three week Tour. Ask any rider who trained using the outdated Coconi method of strength training of riding up 4km hills in a 53x12 between 30 and 40rpm.
EM would have been competitive today but only using the equipment of today, the training methods (particularly training cycles and recovery for adaption), nutrition and sports medicine. In the 1960's and before it was standard practice not to keep up hydration on the bike. It was believed you toughened yourself by depriving the body of fluids. Bernauld Hinault used to consume one bottle per long stage. When they discovered the beneficial effects of rehydration his intake increased sevenfold.
