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Tour de Tech: Product failures at critical moments

Published: Jul. 22, 2004
Phonak and other teams have opted for the red Corima cork pads
Phonak and other teams have opted for the red Corima cork pads

Dear Lennard,
How about a report on the stuff that hasn't work in the Tour? I don't think I've ever heard of more riders being injured in crashes or having to stop from broken handlebars, stems and forks and other equipment-related mishaps. One really goofy example is Phonak using track tires in the rainy team time trial.

Are these folks pushing the envelope too far? I didn't used to thinkthe minimum bike weight was a good idea, but it might keep things safer.

On the other hand, how about Ulrich on L'Alpe? It looks like he carriedan extra couple of pounds of useless aero stuff up the hill. It sure lookedslower than the lightweight wheels and other components from the otherleaders.
Larry

Dear Larry,
Yes, there has been a lot of broken stuff. It is a big change fromthe days even of Greg LeMond and Miguel Indurain, I think. Or maybe it'sjust people did not pay as much attention then. The push for low weighthas not only brought about a rash of broken stuff, but it has also broughtpoorer braking and cornering performance as well.

Great tire, but not for those conditions
Great tire, but not for those conditions

Tires
Oh, don’t get me started on those tires of Phonak in the TTT.

A look at one broken part
Crashes are part of bike racing, and they have been a particularlyimportant part of this year’s Tour. The tragic part is that many of thosecrashes are the result of human decisions made well in advance of the incidentin question.

Certainly the choice of course routes, team tactics and racing rulescontribute, and we have heard much grousing and suggestions for futurechanges to those. However, when a crash is caused by an equipment failure,it is as tragic and equally avoidable. And it may cause a re-examinationof the lengths to which teams go to gain a technical advantage with theirbikes. It may indeed support the UCI’s contention that its minimum-weightrule improves rider safety.

Haselbacher after the crash. You can see the offending bike, and its broken bar, leaning against the barrier o
Haselbacher after the crash. You can see the offending bike, and its broken bar, leaning against the barrier o
Photo: AFP

The repercussions of the massive crash at the 1km-to-go banner in thesixth stage to Angers are very sad for any cycling fan, and to think thatit might have been caused by an equipment failure makes it particularlyso. The race is less competitive because of that high-speed, 65kph pileup.It put many riders out of the race, dashing their dreams of stage and overallvictory or podiums, most notably our own Tyler Hamilton. It also forcedmany others riders who were looking to be in great condition to scale backtheir aspirations for the race, as their injuries would continue to causethem great suffering. One of these was a rejuvenated Bobby Julich, havingone of his best Tours since his breakthrough ride in 1998.

If you saw that crash, even though the camera angle was poor, havingbeen taken from the front, you saw that it was so devastating because thecrash propagated all the way across the road from one side to the other,right behind the front 30 or so riders including the fortunate stage winner,Tom Boonen. While final-kilometer crashes often take down lots of riders,as the stage 1 crash in 2003 that took out Levi Leipheimer and broke Hamilton’scollarbone did, they rarely take up the entire road so that there is absolutelyno way through. What was different about this one?

After the crash, the fiery Robbie McEwen clearly was blaming it on Gerolsteiner’sRene Haselbacher, cursing the Austrian as he lay bleeding and semi-consciouson the ground. But the Australian’s blame was likely misplaced, as thecrash may have been due to a product failure, as opposed to inattentiveness.Gerolsteiner’s director sportif, Christian Henn, said that Haselbachercrashed because his handlebar broke, which threw him off balance when itgave way while he was pulling hard on it at that high speed. Henn, as quotedin the Frankfurter Allgemeine, said, “There was nothing he (Haselbacher)could do about it. Because of it (the broken bar), he went from right toleft through the field.” You can certainly imagine how a rider would swerveacross the road if his bar suddenly broke while pulling on it.

Gerrolsteiner’s handlebar sponsor is Ritchey, which has made its namewith superlight equipment, but it is also has a reputation for thoroughlytesting its products. Ritchey’s marketing manager Jed Spangler would onlysay afterward,

“On Friday's (July9th) stage of the Tour de France a Gerolsteiner rider crashed in the finalkilometer. A Ritchey WCS alloy road bar was broken at some point of theincident. At this time, we do not know whether the bar was broken at thepoint of impact or previously, nor do we know the history of that bar.We are currently seeking information relating to the crash and workingwith the Gerolsteiner team to determine the circumstances of the incident.The Gerolsteiner team has expressed 100 percent confidence in the Ritchey componentsthey have used over the past two seasons and will continue to use themthroughout the Tour.”

While it is easy, and often warranted, to point the finger for equipmentfailures at the manufacturer, there are always other factors involved.How the part was installed, how long it has been used and under what conditions,if it has been crashed before, and if it is being used for a purpose forwhich it was not designed all play a role. In this case, for instance,the cobbles on the way to Wasquehal on the third stage may have done damageto the bar that went undetected, and then the stresses of the sprint mayhave been the straw that broke the camel’s back. With superlight stuff,frequent replacement and inspection, as well as careful installation tothe proper torque setting is critical. Just because you paid a lot forsomething does not mean it will last longer; in fact, it is often the opposite.

Equipment failure is always something to consider, and riders (and theirmechanics) sometimes put naïve trust in items that do not warrantit.

Carbon wheel issues
Carbon wheels are a case in point. Almost all of the riders are usingcarbon wheels on mountain stages now because of the weight savings, butbraking continues to be a problem with them. Simply getting carbon-specificpads is insufficient, because carbon is an insulator and seeks to retainheat, while aluminum is a conductor and seeks to dissipate it. This cancause all sorts of problems.

Most Tour riders are using the red Corima cork pads (see photo) on theircarbon rims, although U.S. Postal is using a special pad that Keith Bontragercame up with. It is of the utmost importance to have a good pad. I havedescended our steep, five-mile Flagstaff Mountain west of Boulder manytimes with various carbon wheels special carbon pads, as well as standardpads. All of them, save for the ADA cork pads (I have not used the Corimacork pads, but I assume they are similar), wore down a huge amount witheach descent. Besides the visible reduction of the pad thickness, the padsbuilt up a lot of melted pad material ahead on the leading end. AndrewJuskaitis, our other VeloNews tech guy and a big man himself, meltedright through a new carbon-specific pad on a single descent of Flagstaffso that the pad holder scored the carbon rim, and his brake failed.

Braking on carbon rims tends to be grabby anyway, and the rim heatingaccentuates it. I think that Jan Ullrich’s crash on the descent of thePyresourde in the Pyrenees in 2001 (when Armstrong waited for him), wascaused by poor braking performance on carbon rims, and I think when healmost went off the road on a downhill switchback when he was on his longbreakaway during the stage to Villard de Lans on Tuesday was also due tothat. I think that the crash of Garzelli and Pantani on a critical wetdescent in the 2003 Giro could also be partially blamed on poor carbon-rimbraking, this time not due to heat but lubricated by water.

When there is a lot of heat with tubular wheels, there is always thepossibility of rolling tires. Even with aluminum rims, the glue gets softon a hot descent, and the tires visibly slip around the rim, causing thevalve stem to be angled sharply. We used to flip our front wheel aroundon subsequent mountain stages so that the valve stem would straighten backout. But the heat with a carbon can be far more extreme. I think JosebaBeloki could have avoided his crash last year had he not been using carbonrims. The hot rims grabbed when he braked hard, locking his rear wheel.When the wheel came back down, the hot glue allowed the tire to roll rightoff of the rim.

This year, Thomas Voeckler switched bikes a number of times on mountainstages while wearing the yellow jersey. His director sportif, Jean RenéBernadeau (who won epic mountain stages a rider himself – remember hiswin in Sondrio in the Giro stage over the Passo Stelvio with Bernard Hinaultin the early 1980s?), said it was due to fear of rolling a tire, sinceVoeckler’s carbon rims were getting so hot.

Perhaps it is good that riders can only seek the 6.8-kilo weight limit.If there were no limit, the arms race for the lightest parts would haveno end. There’s nothing wrong with that in principle, as long as the superlightstuff holds up as well and performs as well as what it replaced. But sofar, that has often not been the case.

As for Ullrich in the TT, his bike only weighed 400 grams more than the others (7.2 vs. 6.8 kilos), and he is a big guy. Any way you look at it, that is still a pretty light bike for him. He must have done tests to determine that he was faster with that aero’ bar. And that Lightweight rear wheel he used is quite light, despite being deep section. That’s what he used on the Villard de Lans stage. I don’t know how heavy the Xentis wheel he used on the front is.

Until tomorrow.
Ciao.
Lennard

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