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Chris Froome on Alpe d'Huez (picture copyright Anne Martin)Team Sky doctor claims "functional dehydration" could make riders climb more quickly
Roger Palfreeman, a Team Sky doctor who has previously worked with British Cycling and BMC, has suggested that 'functional dehydration' could be employed to improve a rider’s climbing ability. Speaking at a conference on heat and cycling in Qatar last week, Palfreeman suggested that Chris Froome would be able to cut 47 seconds off his time up Alpe d'Huez through employing the technique.
According to El Pais, Palfreeman believes that Froome could safely lose 2kg through controlled, functional dehydration over the course of a stage, without compromising his power-to-weight ratio.
"Optimal hydration is not balanced hydration," he said, suggesting that athletes can learn to tolerate the sensations that come with drinking less than they would normally think necessary.
Research carried out at Brock University in Ontario in 2015 countered a commonly held belief that even minor dehydration will hamper sporting performance.
The study saw trained racing cyclists riding stationary bikes while hooked up to either real or fake IV drips. The idea was to separate the conscious awareness of hydration so as to test only hydration status itself.
Researchers found that even at up to three per cent body mass dehydration, no impairment was seen in exercise in the heat.
This contrasts with advice given by British Cycling, with the organisation referring to previous research when asserting that a two per cent drop in body weight due to sweating ‘will impair performance noticeably’ while a five per cent drop will see ‘your capacity for work drop by up to 30 per cent’.
Using Froome as an example, Palfreeman said that if he lost 2kg during a stage – the same weight as two litres of water and equivalent to three per cent body mass dehydration – he would be able to climb Alpe d’Huez 47 seconds quicker.
As the setup of the Brock study makes clear, the ploy could only work if the rider were uninformed about their state of hydration, which raises certain moral questions about a team’s management of its athletes.
Among other measures, Palfreeman suggests using mouthwash with menthol as a means of deceiving the rider’s thirst by generating a sensation of coldness.
Alex has written for more cricket publications than the rest of the road.cc team combined. Despite the apparent evidence of this picture, he doesn't especially like cake.
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15 comments
The research is probably right, but the 47s calculation is probably based on the simplistic assumption of constant 2% deshydration from bottom to top, which is certainly not the case.
this must be why I arrive at work 30 seconds faster on the day after a thirsty thursday night.....so long as I've shit the kebab out
TMI
No cyclist needs two arms. One is quite sufficient, and probably weighs 5 kilos. And toes forward of the cleat - totally superfluous.
a guy came past me on the col de soudet with only one leg - talk about an unfair advantage!
Nothing new .
I am sure we all know that drinking was frowned upon in days go by so this is just a return to those days with possibly a bit more modern science behind it. it will be steak for breakfast next I reckon. Now that would be nice.
Please note: Average Joe weekend rider:
If you drink less you will not go quicker unless you empty your bidons first!!
What next - colonic irrigation before a mountain stage?!
careful what you wish for!
I'd be surprised if that fad hadn't come and passed under the radar already in the peloton. Can't see any doc in recent years allowing it - considered bad for you now.
Reckon if you kept the riders in a sterilized condition you could probably remove all the organs unecessary for survival. Kidney, spleen, appendix, some ear muscles, uterus, etc. In total there's around a kilo of stuff you could remove. Maybe shave bones, or repace them with something stronger and lighter.
Removing a kidney doesn't really work, once you've got used to having just one the other has grown in size to compensate. Took me ages to be able to exercise at a high rate after mine was removed.
Froome can keep his uterus though.
I believe sinuses can be removed, maybe I trust Stephen Fry on QI too much?
This isn't new, and has been used by riders for some time. Dugas and Tucker have written on it a number of times, and there has been a fair bit of research on it in South Africa. It used to be considered bad for you, but no longer is. 2-3% dehydration is a normal physiological state, and performance typically only deteriorates beyond 5%. Much of the myth around dehydration stems from original research that showed 10% dehydration was likely to cause collapse and possibly death. A straight line was drawn from o-10% and inferences drawn from there, but we know that's not how bodies work.
Not. Exactly. Rocket Science.
Imagine carrying 2kg less on a steep climb, the dehydration effect would have to be massive to reduce your performance enough to counter the benefit. I'd be surpised if this hadn't been tried already, it seems obvious to me, I know I would have tried it.
Much of this stuff is psychological... IMHO, any cyclist who puts in less effort, as suggested by the study, because they are informed that they are a little dehydrated, isn't a racer.
Kinda sh**s all over the entire sports nutrition drink market!
oh yeah as if any of that crap would help, water is the best ....
But the doc let the cat out of the bag, we all asked how Frome can lose the weight and keep power (Wiggo) the same, well he told us wwhat the doping was, just that it is still legal.