Comparing race speeds (2/2)
Race speeds compared over the years. Earlier this year an article (translation by tourdejose) was published on the “het nieuwsblad” website. It talks about the declining speeds in the grand tours. It points towards a possible relation with the use of banned substances. Velofacts tried to find a trend over all UCI races
In this post the winning speeds from 2004-2011 are compared
The winning average speeds of .1 or higher classed races. Time trials were ignored. The speeds are very similar
| year | speed | avg distance | races |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2004 | 41.35 | 168.8 | 506 |
| 2005 | 41.40 | 172.1 | 502 |
| 2006 | 41.23 | 172.7 | 502 |
| 2007 | 41.46 | 174.4 | 477 |
| 2008 | 41.32 | 170.5 | 516 |
| 2009 | 41.49 | 171.2 | 479 |
| 2010 | 41.22 | 173.0 | 461 |
| 2011 | 41.36 | 172.2 | 488 |
Grand tours
Now the grand tours. Again the time trials were ignored because they tend to be a lot faster or slower (mountain time trial) than a normal race. This time there are bigger differences. But no trend in slowing down. The number of uphill mountain finishes is probably a much bigger factor than the use of doping
| Year | Grand Tours | Tour | Giro | Vuelta |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2004 | 39.67968 | 41.23345 | 38.5764 | 39.35899 |
| 2005 | 40.62062 | 42.39865 | 38.38985 | 41.07337 |
| 2006 | 40.0483 | 41.21353 | 40.05937 | 38.87138 |
| 2007 | 39.38595 | 39.66611 | 37.68209 | 40.73471 |
| 2008 | 39.77107 | 40.89552 | 38.71916 | 39.57763 |
| 2009 | 39.5956 | 40.47216 | 40.27035 | 38.04429 |
| 2010 | 39.8721 | 39.81779 | 40.41947 | 39.43667 |
| 2011 | 39.51444 | 40.13695 | 39.70141 | 38.72465 |
Conclusion
The statistics from both speed topics were disappointing. Conclusion is that there is no clear decrease of speeds over the recent years. The fact that the average speed of .2 races aren’t slower than world tour races is interesting. Next post will be about Tirreno – Adriatico and Paris – Nice as preparation races for the classics
Tags: speed