Other competitions Fabio has participated in
The other Tour
At the end of the first Pyrenean leg of the Tour de France 2006, the world champion Tom Boonen, destroyed by fatigue, vented: “Today, a normal person would have ended up in the hospital.” Was he right? Is the Tour route truly “inhuman”? Can you do it with “bread and water”?
Sufficiently prepared to face another test, we will volunteer to be guinea pigs for an empirical survey. Monitoring all our physiological data daily, before, during and after the leg, we will study the direct consequences on the organism of the intense effort required by the Tour. Sports doctors, scientists, dieticians and trainers will be involved in the close observation of the results and will comment on the physiological variations found. The psychological aspect, no less important, will be accounted for in a daily trip diary.
(Morning and evening testing: weight, pressure, heart beat, hematocrit, haemoglobin, CPK, etc.) (Testing during the leg: a SRM computer will be installed on the bicycles. This technological instrument measures all the parameters during training (watts, calories burned, pedalling pace, average and maximum cardiac frequency…) and processes them in a complete graph that permits an efficient interpretation of the variations in the cyclist’s performance. Different professionals will also use the SRM during the Tour. This will enable superimposing the graphs that will permit analysing the differences in performance between “subject x” and a professional, during the climb of a mountain pass, for example.
The French Agency for the Prevention and Fight Against Doping, a state institution where sports medicine experts work, will follow the logistics of the blood tests and carry out the analyses. Two daily tests, one in the morning before starting and one at the end of each leg. * in total the surprise tests made on two athletes.
The idea of this “other” Tour de France is also a significant gesture of love and faith in cycling, which is going through rough times. This sports adventure will combine narration with an extremely transparent medical study that will surely give precise answers to numerous questions on the real effects of three difficult weeks of the Tour on an organism without any pharmacological help.
The Other Tour means for us (Guillaume Prebois and Fabio Biasiolo) Living the Tour. Describing it and being subjected to it. Directly measuring its effects. In the month of July 2007, pedalling the entire course of the Tour de France, meter after meter, on the same roads of professional racers, 24 hours before they pass through. With an average of about 7 hours of cycling a day, during three weeks, 3569.9 km in 20 days, a double journalistic objective is set: 1 – Narrate the course of the tour and the crossing of France with another point of view, closer to that of the racers, more intimate. This experience will be characterized by impressions, emotions, the sweat and difficulty of a journalist sitting on a bicycle seat and an Ultracycling Professional. A true, unpublished, epic and human travel diary. 2 – In a moment in which the same credibility of cycling is at risk, the second objective is to concretely study what the consequences of a difficult race like the Tour are on the human body.
MEDIA COVERAGE
- The articles, both the diary and the medical dossier, will be daily published in two influential newspapers: “Le Monde” in France and “Le Temps” in Geneva, Switzerland. - RAI Radio 2 will broadcast live, everyday, from the bicycles with Fabio and Guillaume. On the air, Radio France International (30 million listeners in the world) and RTBF in Belgium, two national radios, will give ample space to the initiative with two daily connections. Moreover, RTBF wants to officially present our project the day of the Liegi-Bastogne-Liegi, making us run the course before the professionals. - The French cycling magazine “Planète cyclisme” will publish the presentation of the project in the June “tour special” issue and our photo album in the “after tour” issue. - The magazine “Il Venerdì” of the newspaper La Repubblica (two million readers) will dedicate a presentation article to us. During the Tour, La Repubblica will publish another piece. They will be written by Paolo Rumiz and Francesco Merlo, respectively, two famous journalists in Italy. - We are negotiating with the national channel “France 5”, which is interested in our project. They would like to include a daily service in the program “Your health” broadcast everyday at 2 p.m. - INTERNET: each paper will set up a specific page on its website where photos, texts, graphs and a quantity of other information on the operation can be found. Furthermore, thanks to the GPS system, just a click on the internauts in order to discover in real time where I am during the leg.
The Other Tour of Fabio Biasiolo – Full article published in CICLISMO in November 2007
A classic early autumn evening on a Monday, when the fog starts to peep in after the “summer hibernation” and envelopes everything. In that difficult moment o f the year when it is fair and correct, in harmony with nature, to give yourself a well-deserved break and leave space for dreams and plans. Sitting in front of a cold beer and a hot pizza, in one of the many and excellent pizzerias in Riviera del Brenta: I said the “fateful yes” to Messieur Prebois. To be honest, there was no need to reflect or evaluate. Compatibility of plans and times with my Ultracycling season and syntony of views with my loved ones were the only considerations to make. I think that the “French guy” had already been brooding over my involvement in this project for some time. During the period in which I feel he had the reasonable need to weigh me, as a man and an athlete. After some Tour de France and Giri d’Italia, following them as a journalist; Italian correspondent for Le Monde and Le Temps, RFI (Radio France International), Radio Svizzera Romanda and TPS (famous French Satellite channel) commentator, would have irremediably compromised his “difficult and uncomfortable” image of the Don Chixote of anti-doping, in the case I had not been an absolute guarantee of transparency and reliability in all senses. Dilettante on a good level, now cycling fanatic with great talents. With 20,000 km run every year and honourable placements in prestigious Granfondo, he prepared for twelve months with scrupulous methodology and regularity in order to get to the appointment in perfect shape. To finally convince him that it was possible to give a sign, however difficult it was to make understood, and against the world (that of cycling and professional sports in general), very often reticent and deliberately incapable of healing the wound that is destroying it, was a statement made by Tom Boonen at the Tour de France in 2006. The World Champion at the time, at the end of the first Pyrenean leg, destroyed by fatigue, vented by saying: Today a normal person would have ended up in the hospital!” What did the great Belgian cyclist what to say? That we need to be extraterrestrials? That without chemistry you cannot go on? Or what? Was he right? Is the Tour route really so inhuman? Can you do it with just “water and bread”? For my part, after 11 participations in the Race Across America, after almost 14 years of professional Ultracycling. In a world where anti-doping is practically inexistent, where the race judges have no authority to disqualify the competitors if they have been found to have broken the rules. In the constant presence of a doping that is even slyer, represented by how many, not having the physical and mental qualities to compete in this race, or to place better than they could, they let themselves be swayed by their own means of assistance or worse yet, they step on top of you in order to be brought ahead, many of our compatriots are experts at it. In what is unanimously considered: “The toughest sporting event in the world”, that is the RAAM, the simplest thing has become precisely ending it. Perhaps there is something wrong here, don’t you think? Nauseated, bent but never broken by a world where in front of everyone you can reach the finish without ever having pedalled with your own legs, all the 5,000 km of the route, if not even winning the race, therefore the question: Fabio, d you want to be my companion of fatigue at the Autre Tour? The answer was immediately understood. During the phases of getting closer and with the training program moving forward, Guillame was followed step after step, by specialists from the University of Toulouse (France), I, on the other hand, by the Center for Sports Medicine in Noale (Venice), like always, by Dr. Lucio Bigon. Before and after each leg, a doctor from the same French university, who was therefore an integral part of our team, Dr. Dorian Lecamp, took blood and urine samples from both of us and examined them and recorded their values. The project was also born in accordance with the AFLD (French Anti-Doping Agency), the same organism that carries out the anti-doping controls for the Tour. To guarantee the commitment and the responsibility taken on, the same Agency, during the three weeks of “our tour”, gave us eight surprise anti-doping checks, with the same procedures and following the same protocol of the Pros. When setting up this ambitious and difficult project, we tried to reproduce the real conditions and the most comparable ones possible to those of a “normal” leg race. During our daily escape we were followed by a van that gave us supplies and assistance. A driver, a person who passed liquids and food from the window, and a third person sitting in the back that prepared everything. Extra bikes, wheels and all the equipment were also in the van. During the tour food consisted of ham sandwiches with jam, dried fruit and bananas. We integrated this with natural “energy activators”, supplied by the MEI, based on honey and its derivatives. We preferred drinking still water. A camper with another two people on board was responsible for everything required during the leg in progress, it transported baggage and deposited them in the hotel, gave us indications via radio or mobile phone on weather conditions at the top of climbs we were making. In order to guarantee us the proper food, dinner was prepared and eaten in the camper, under the “protective wing” of Claudio Canzian, the cook, and Luigi Lanbranzi, his assistant. Instead, breakfast was eaten at the hotel. At the end of the leg, after a well-deserved shower, we put our muscles in the knowing and magical hands of Marco Coan, the masseuse, an absolutely necessary condition in order to guarantee us the best and fastest physical recovery. Along the most important and legendary ascents of the Alps and Pyrenees, swarms of campers, tents and vehicles of every kind, literally covered both sides of the street, waiting for the “true ones” to pass through the next day. During the climb, we perceived in the distance the inviting smell of a barbeque and all the preparations to guarantee us a place in the first row. Banners and writing on the asphalt dissuaded the mind and body from the difficulty of the climb, while the article Guillaume wrote everyday for Le Monde, and the connection that he made at the end of the day with RFI and Vivacité about “our tour” got us more than a few supporters. To repeat it once more, how strange and bizarre the society we live in is for the fact that: when we had the television troupes following us, everyone went into the middle of the street, waving their arms and screaming and suddenly we “finally” were someone, while they, for reasons of traffic or filming disappeared, we fell back into the most profound “anonymity”. The Prologue of London and the first leg in the Kent region gave us two fantastic days, if we consider the climate in those parts. A warm sun, refreshed by a constant breeze even if tiring, was a marvellous frame. The days in Belgium and in northern France, instead, made our teeth chatter and us get really wet. Rain, hail and a constant wind against us were a contrast to the enchanting landscape, without ruining it too much. Very often, there, where the leg started, we would find some local cyclists, who having heard of us, asked us to ride along with them. Pain and delight at the same time, we were in a state of total grace, but as soon as the road started to climb up from there we were forced to abandon the pleasant group. In any case, we had the objective of escaping day after day, pulling ahead based on our abilities, in order to race a parallel Tour and to not just have an outing. Always keeping in mind that the traffic was open and that stop signs, traffic lights and yielding existed for us and that when cycling downhill we could not go for it at top speed. As the Official Tour started, unfortunately, the usual problems surfaced, the constant thundering of this non-stop mortification, made our timid attempt at rebellion harder. Along the road meter after meter you could perceive the heavy atmosphere and sadness for what touched on the absurd. Passing the Alps, approaching the coast and the foot of the Pyrenees, coincided with the second week of difficulty. Humid and hot joined with uncontrolled variability brought us from 35° in Marseilles to the cold fog of the routes along the Spanish border. Particularly emotional was the 15th leg, 2nd Pyrenean, Foix – Loudeville – Le Louron of 196 km. I pedalled the entire route with chills, palpitations and a sense of memory/bitterness/pain. My thoughts went back to 1998, when Marco Pantani won alone on the same route. Omitting my thoughts and opinions on the cyclist Pantani, in my opinion inopportune when you speak of such a tragedy, I pedalled with the memory of Marco each kilometre, I raced crying and invoking his help in order to try to get through the countless difficult moments that accompany you during that kind of leg. The loud music playing from the speakers assembled on the vehicle that followed us comforted me. A simple and touching song that Antonello Venditti typically gives us, where the chorus goes: “and when I think that it’s over…it’s precisely then when the climb starts…WHAT A FANTASTIC STORY LIFE IS. Completing the day of memories: the climb to Col de Portet d’Aspet, a 2nd category climb at 1069 meters. I’m racing the last climb of the sport and earthly life of Fabio Casertelli. Olympic champion in the team 100 km, he was racing at the time to Motorola with Lance Armstrong and on that fatal July 18, 1995, when descending Col de Portet d'Aspet he fell on the last curve and violently hit his head. In that moment I was in front of the TV following the Tour and I’ve never forgotten the image of Fabio lying on the ground, immobile and bleeding. At the same point a monument was built in white marble in his memory. I blocked the bike, kissed the nude and cold stone and then ideally continued his course in a strong and constant memory I always keep inside of me. During the entire last week the weather conditions were perfect and ideal for pedalling, supporting morale that was reinforced day after day as Paris got closer and closer, while our physical conditions were still very good. As we arrived on the Champs-Elysee we were welcomed by a world that we had imagined but had never thought as such. The Belgian radio Vivacité had organized a bus for listeners who had won a mini competition by answering some questions about “our tour”; all the TV stations that had followed us during the legs (English, Belgian, French, German, Swiss, and Russian), all the daily papers that had supported the initiative by publishing daily the accounts of our efforts, the cycling magazines and others: they were all there waiting for us. Guillaume’s colleagues (Le Monde), popped open a bottle of Champagne and gave us a yellow medal with our names engraved on it. Hundreds of people, close to or far from the world of sports were there to support the ideal, the project, and the cry of rage that we had tried to transmit apart from all the rest. To demonstrate the fact that when one is well-prepared, you obviously have undeniable cycling qualities and everything is planned very well: the tests but above all the sensations that we had at the end were good and in line with the effort made. Our haematic and urine values were practically unvaried compared to night before. Haemoglobin and hematocrit had undergone minimal and irrelevant variations, compared to the initial value, and only the alteration of the CPK value (index that establishes the entity of the damage and muscular fatigue), proved profuse efforts. Weight and state of general health also remained unvaried. 3,569.9 km, 41,204 meters of climb and 37,467 meters of descent, covered in 119 hours and 5 minutes (the winner of the Tour, Alberto Contador, in 91 hours), at a final hourly average of 29.999 km/hr. What did the great Belgian cyclist, Tom Boonen, mean to say then? We would have wanted to ask him, but not only us. The journalists of the national Belgian TV tried to contact him and the press office of his team, but they slammed the door in their faces, responding that: “We don’t have anything to share with cycling tourists.” For us “cycling tourists” is not an offence, if we closed all the “Pros” in a convent a month before the start of any leg race, you can be sure: we certainly would not see the stratospheric averages that we have been used to seeing them do. Perhaps, therefore, we will never know. Do you need to be an extraterrestrial?
It is without a doubt that who races for a professional team comes from a world selection and has widely shown in the past to have the talent to be there. UFO cannot sign up with a federation, right? Perhaps he meant to say, that without chemicals, in order to use a simple term, you couldn’t go on? Certainly you can go on, but definitely not at the same speed of a scooter. Was he right? Is the Tour course really so inhuman? Can you do it with “bread and water”? I think, if he meant to say this, he was absolutely right, the Tour de France course is truly gruelling. The organizers could surely map it out in a pleasant, challenging and exciting way without necessarily making it superhuman. Without a doubt you can do it with “bread and water”, not expecting however from human beings (professional cyclists) hourly averages at each leg that are similar to average cylinder motor. Happy cycling to all and remember that we have only one life on this earth. If you don’t care about this then we must hope that there is at least another, but we’re not sure they will let us pedal.
Fabio’s values before starting the Tour: Weight: 76 Kg Haemoglobin: 12.9g/dl Hematocrit: 39.9% Body fat: 10.8% (these values are after a period of prolonged rest).
Guillaumes’s values before starting the Tour:
Weight: 69 Kg Haemoglobin: 13.8 g/dl Hematocrit: 43% Body fat: 15.3%
Fabio’s values mid Tour: Weight: 76.1 Kg Haemoglobin: 13.7 g/dl Hematocrit: 36% Body fat: 10.1%
Guillaumes’s values mid Tour: Weight: 70.8 Kg Haemoglobin: 14.8 g/dl Hematocrit: 44.3% Body fat: 14.8%
Fabio’s values at the end of the Tour: Weight: 76.5 Kg Haemoglobin: 13.4 g/dl Hematocrit: 37.5% Body fat: 9.8%
Guillaumes’s values at the end of the Tour: Weight: 70 Kg Haemoglobin: 12.7 g/dl Hematocrit: 41% Body fat: 14.1% (to be considered that the last three legs were much less challenging than all the previous ones.)
The essential team: Canzian Claudio, cook, camper driver and factotum;
Caon Marco, masseuse, driver and factotum;
Lecamp Dorian, doctor, daily anti-doping controller on behalf of the University of Toulouse;
Lambranzi Luigino, mechanic, driver and factotum;
Prebois Jean Claude, responsible for supplies and photographer (Guillaume’s father).
The Sponsors: RFI, Le Monde, Le Temps, Vivacité, ITM, Fulcrum, Fi’zi:k, Giant, DMT Diamant, Energiapura, Mei, Sram, L’Insalata dell’Orto, Center Bike di Bartolomiello, Effeggi Grafiche, Hotel Ristorante La Rosina, Osteria il Grottino, Attorney Claudio Pasqualin sports consultant. With the sponsorship of AFLD (French Anti-Doping Agency).
Visit the blog Il blog
Denver to Aspen
Denver - Aspen Classic 2001
Movie (.mov - QuickTime needed)
Denver - Aspen 2002
Denver-Aspen (2002) "The American climbs are much longer but less steep [than the European ones], so you can use a stronger gear with a high RPM for an incredible speed." by John Hughes Four riders finished the mountainous 200-mile Denver-Aspen classic in 10 hours 27 minutes. The eighth annual ride, which features 13,000 feet of climbing, took place on August 3. Fabio Biasiolo, Kelly Shannon, Robin Gregory and Robin Thurston finished just 20 minutes off the course record set by Michael Carter, the former Motorola pro. Ann Crossland was the first woman in 13:17, 22 minutes shy of Rita Saunders' course record. The ride started at 3 a.m. west of Denver. The field broke up on the first climbs up the foothills of the Rockies and by the first pass (Kenosha, 10,100 ft.) about 15 riders were off the front. By the first control in Fairplay (91.6 miles), the break was down to six riders, who had a 10 minute gap. From Fairplay the riders faced a brisk headwind; two riders fell off the pace on the way to Hartsel (108.7 miles.) The leaders averaged 19 mph for the first 100 miles. After climbing Trout Creek Pass (9,346 ft.), the riders faced a stiff headwind through Buena Vista to the turn to Twin Lakes. Crossland rode this section alone - she said it was one of the hardest parts. The four leaders worked together to Twin Lakes, covering the first 163 miles with 9,000 feet of climbing in 8:36. Leaving Twin Lakes, the riders faced the final climb: Independence Pass (12,095 ft.). Biasiolo reported that "We climbed the Independence Pass very fast, never under 15-16 mph most of the time and close to 20 mph until five miles to the top, and in the last four miles never under 10 mph". On the climb one of the riders proposed finishing together. Since Denver-Aspen is a timed event, not a true road race, the others agreed. Biasiolo decided to finish with the others because "they helped to keep fast against the wind and on the flats and they were always a good company." Crossland said "I got a second wind heading up the pass. This year my training was geared for events over 200 miles, and I passed quite a few people riding up Independence Pass. I felt like I could have kept climbing. Last year, I struggled going up Independence Pass, this year I felt like a different cyclist climbing up the pass. . . . I live in Aspen, and it made it even more exciting to Ride Home from Denver." Biasiolo said that the American passes are much easier than the European climbs. "The American climbs are much longer but less steep, so you can use a stronger gear with a high RPM for an incredible speed." Conditions were warm: 60s in the morning to upper 80s in the afternoon. Riders generally had a headwind coming out of Hartsel and heading up the Arkansas Valley from Buena Vista. Most riders encountered rain at some point; there were intermittent showers in the afternoon between Twin Lakes and Aspen. 85 riders started the 200-mile ride and 73 started at the 50 mile point, for a 150-mile ride to Aspen. Only 12 sagged into Aspen with one couple getting to the top of Independence Pass and then turning around to go back down to Twin Lakes to get sagged! Biasiolo said that riders and officials at the controls "recognized me from last year [he also finished first in 2001] and because of RAAM, they were nice, friendly and kind and this for me is the best prize I can get". RAAM veteran Jack Vincent stamped Biasiolo's race card in Hartsel. "I had the desire to give him a hug, but the situation was too haste." Footnote: The Central Coast Double in the California Triple Crown Stage Race is 210 miles with 13,200 feet of climbing. California Triple Crown website The top men this year finished in 10:56 (19.2 mph). It would be interesting to see how they would finish on the Denver-Aspen course, where most of the course is over 9,000 feet. Complete results: Denver-Aspen website Top Finishers Rider Time / Speed Biasiolo, Fabio 10:47 / 18.59 mph Shannon, Kelly 10:47 / 18.59 Gregory, Robin 10:47 / 18.59 Thurston, Robin 10:47 / 18.59 Atkins, Dale 11:09 / 17.98 Snyder, Shawn 11:20 / 17.69 Caruso, Scott 11:29 / 17.46 Dennis, Tasshi 11:41 / 17.16 Pahl, Martin 11:43 / 17.11 Dodge, Tim 11:49 / 16.97 Past Winners Male Year Rider Time 2001 Fabio Biasiolo, Martin Pahl, Robin Gregory 11:21 2000 Steve Riggie 11:49 1999 Robin Gregory 11:16 1998 Gary Lunsky 11:16 1997 Mike Carter 10:27 Course Record 1996 Mike Carter 11:14 1995 Gary Lunsky 11:30 Female 2001 Ann Bond Crossland 13:17 2000 Leslie O'meara 13:41 1999 Rita Saunders 14:16 1998 Mandy Fraylick 14:48 1997 Rita Saunders 12:55 Course Record 1996 Rita Saunders 13:48