| | By Fred Rodriguez
Special to ABC Sports Online
American cyclist Fred Rodriguez currently rides for the Italian Mapei team -- ranked the number one team in the world for the past three years. In just his fifth year riding professionally, Rodriguez won the US Professional Championships in Philadelphia on June 4. Over the next several weeks, Rodriguez will take you through his first Tour de France -- sharing with you the ins and outs of the world's preeminent cycling event.
We had an early morning today, as we checked out the coarse in a car most of the way, and then we rode the last 30 kilometers. Right then and there, we know we had a tough day ahead of us. We were all pretty nervous going in.
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The team trials format is much different than other stages. |
The thing about Team Trials is if your team loses a rider, he's eliminated. So we decided right from the start that if anyone on the team dropped within the first 40 kilometers, we were going to wait for him.
It was also really windy. There was a bridge that was about one and a half kilometers with a nasty crosswind that made it almost impossible to keep your bike steady. When this happens, you pretty much grab a tight hold on the handlebars and pray that the wind doesn't knock you off the road.
We started out o with a pretty smooth pace. We tried to find a rhythm that everybody on the team was happy with. We didn't want to come out too hard not really knowing how the individuals on the team would respond. As the race progressed, we figured out who was feeling stronger than others and some pace fluctuations took place. We got thrown off our rhythm a bit, and the most important thing with Team Trials is having a smooth rotation. You don't want to have any severe fluctuations in speed, whether it be fast or slow. It made for a pretty chaotic race for our team today, especially at the beginning of the race.
I think we were about one and a half minutes behind the leader at the first checkpoint, but I was feeling pretty good. I've always trained for events like the Team Time Trials and have had good success in such events in the past.
After our poor start, we started regaining a rhythm, and we were going pretty strong. Once we found our "weak links," so to speak, we managed it so they wouldn't disrupt the team's rhythm.
So we finished pretty strong, but we just got out too slow in the start to get a good time. It was a hard event. I mean, we had headwind up to something like 50 miles per hour. It was an amazingly grueling day. Team Time Trials is harder than climbing, because at least you're going at your own pace when you climb. With the Team Time Trials, you have to work within the framework of a team despite your yearning to move at your own pace. It's a difficult format.
I don't think a lot of people understand what kind of effort is needed for an event like the Tour de France. I think I can speak for all of my teammates that today was one of the most difficult events that we, as riders, have ever been involved in.
I think the ONCE team is really strong. After the Time Trials, they've got like seven of the top ten riders in the standings, so I think they're probably going to control the race for at least the next few stages.
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Rodriguez Diary No. 2
Rodriguez Diary No. 1
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