How Hard Is Pro Bike Racing? | Exclusive Insights From EF Nippo At The 2021 Giro d'Italia

Racing a grand tour, like the Giro d'Italia, is one of the hardest things a professional cyclist can do. 3 weeks of racing for hundreds of kilometres a day puts a massive strain on a rider's body, and being able to manage this strain is key to winning, or even just finishing, a stage race. Fortunately, wearable teach like Whoop bands, offers riders more insight than ever before into their recovery, their sleep, and their strain, to help make sure they can look after themselves and achieve their goals at the top level of the sport.

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Do you use a wearable device to keep on top of your recovery? Let us know in the comments below!

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[gcn]

Do you use a wearable device to keep on top of your recovery? Let us know in the comments below!

[fkoerner]

The worst answers I’ve ever heard. The head of performance could be a politician.

[cocorocks]

The intro (0:07) showing Remco getting dropped on the gravel followed by an Almeida thumbs up... Brutal from the GCN editors!

[chrisburton]

Personally travel a huge amount for work, the pillow from home for hotels is spot on. Helps way more than you can imagine.

[ShakeNBakeUK]

dayum it's really awesome to get a behind the scenes deep dive on professional rider data like this, especially so close to the event.
sleep is something that is often overlooked but great to get a reminder of how important it is in terms of recovery & performance.

[ashleydarby]

Simon Carr’s sleep is probably helped by listening to himself talk 🥱

[Samuel-buxr]

That EF trainer couldn't do a better job of not actually answering the questions

[CBMaster]

Whoop seems good, but their pricing model is not good for me. I would definitely buy one if it were a one time purchase, but $30 usd per month for this? I'll pass

[rossfripp]

The huge problem with Whoop is that it gets its data by an optical sensor, which is inherently not very accurate. The trouble with this is that HRV is extremely sensitive. Then there's the fact it captures HRV during sleep, whilst this sounds good our HRV will change naturally according to sleep cycle, and there's no guarantee you'd be in the same cycle at the same time each night.

[Ystadcop]

Probably the most informative and best presented item GCN have ever done.
Conor pitched it dead right, he knows exactly what he's talking about and the subject was easy to follow even for us who are scientifically and technically challenged.
Incidentally, great to get a look at Simon Carr, obviously super bright.
And EF? I knew nothing about them until today when Alberto Bertiol gave a heartwarming and inspirational post stage win interview.
This is what pros should be like.

[matthewpasserini]

I’ve got a whoop band and I have to say the HR data is inaccurate when comparing against a Garmin. Im on my second band as the first broke and the same issue. I signed up for a year and won’t be renewing, too expensive for what it is. Factor in rest days after hard and get a good nights sleep, the rest takes care of it self. I’d probably go apple or Garmin watch next time.

[martinandersson]

Very interesting stuff and logical numbers. The heart muscle gets tired eventually and can’t pump the same amount of blood per beat as before. Dehydration must be another factor. No matter how much you drink the blood plasma level drops eventually which leeds to thicker blood, bigger resistance and waste products building up in the body and so on. To put it short a 3 week grand tour is probably f’n torture😂

[blackcyclist]

I love a Giro. Rotisserie Chicken, hummus, tzatziki, tomatoes & a side of fried potatoes, but I definitely like my pitta bread soft, not hard 😂

[steffenandersensahl]

I think Bettiol's recovery score must have been pretty good this morning :-)

[dougbierer]

Would be great if Whoop would allow you to download your raw data or at least offer some metrics on how they calculate their "recovery score". This could have big implications for markets beyond cycling.

[davidburgess]

I can relate to the not recovering till Christmas statement. You can really burn up badly.

[saturday]

Can't believe some of those guys are averaging 350 watts over four hours. Insane ability.

[richaw]

Great insight Conor.. love to know the difference for the climbers v sprinters.. I need more sleep!

[TheTheMScope]

The performance manager's answers aren't very meaningful at all..

[jamesadams]

Great video. Those are very human numbers for a pro rider… I’m sure MVDP’s heart rate variability at the start of this years TDF was over 200… I feel better about myself now!!