50 days

**Bubble Boy** · 04-30-2007, 01:09 AM

Could someone like Lance Armstrong go from couch potato to Tour De France in 50 days?
How far off would he be if not?
What would he do to get close?

Point being, all the tactics, bikes, team, diet, etc are in place. Everything. Could he get off the couch and be reasonable in 50 days.
Sincere questions with hopes of scientific answers.
Thanks ahead of time.

The Jake · 04-30-2007, 08:28 PM

He went to www.rosstraining.com

- J.

Lopyswine · 04-30-2007, 08:58 PM

it really depends on where he is starting from.

i doubt even a highly trained athlete could do the tour de france with only 50 days of training.

a super marathoner might be able to.

dont forget that TONS of the riders cant even finish the race.

the_w1se · 04-30-2007, 09:09 PM

yeah, someone like kevin james on the tour. makes me chuckle

-Rottweiler- · 04-30-2007, 09:12 PM

In short: no way.

Bamaispriceless · 04-30-2007, 09:21 PM

Absolutely, positively, no way in hell. Lance rides his bike for like 6-8 hours a day...the Tour de France is freaking brutal. In 50 days, the dude might be able to compete in some sprint distance triathlons, but a 3 week ride through the alps and pyrenees? NO WAY.

Lopyswine · 04-30-2007, 09:38 PM

an old boss of mine used to cycle. he said that tons of cyclist cant finish the middle of the tour. there are multiple days of uphill in a row.

Dan's Knuckles · 05-01-2007, 02:07 AM

Lance Armstrong is genetically superfit. At an ACSM conference I saw the guy who did most of his testing from when he first turned pro to after his first few Tour wins. He had a VO2 max of over 65 after being treated for cancer and being pretty much bedridden. He also ran the NYC marathon with what most serious runners would consider almost no preparation at all. The truth is, a lot of people are genetic beasts like he is, but he's got what we in the science world like to call "work ethic". He has an understanding of what pain really is, and he's willing to push himself extraordinarily hard. He trained on the hardest hills of the tour the years he won. Plus cycling is a team sport, the rest of his team protected him and did a lot of work for him on a lot of the course.
So, basically if lance armstrong sat on the couch for a year, or basically was forced to detrain for a long period of time (like when he had cancer) he could beat most of the non-elite competition with very little training, but when he was competing, he trained like a maniac.
On a side note, the researcher said he saw one other cyclist who had physiologic measures like Lance, and that guy quit the sport.

tri4ben · 05-01-2007, 02:22 PM

This thread is retarded and not a serious question.

The average american can in no way get fit enough to finish the course that the TDF guys ride even if they had a team of "domestiques" whose sole purpose was to give the guy anything at all that he needed to finish. I would go so far as to say that 99% of the population would not make it to the starting line if they tried to go from couch potato to riding 100 - 150 miles per day.

If you just took the top 1% of athletes (not that you could measure that, but about .01% of the population) and gave them 50 days to train only cycling, some of them may get fit enough to complete the course, with some help.

After 50 days of training (after not riding a bike at all in the year before), there are maybe a handful of people in the world who could somehow make all the time cutoffs and make it to Paris. I am not saying that it is impossible, but it would have to be someone with Lance Armstrong's mentality and his genetic gifts that would do it, not Kevin James.

ephman · 05-02-2007, 04:22 AM

I think what you`re getting at is is it possible to go from doing nothing to being in world class shape in only fifty days? In that case I would say no, it takes more than two months to really peak even if you keep in relatively good shape normally. But to ask your body to go from doing nothing to reaching it`s genetic potential in only fifty days I think you would probably injure yourself along the way. Now three months might be possible, I don`t think it would take all that long if you devoted yoruself to training full time to reach your genetic limits.

I mean, if you just jump off the couch now and start running to get the fastest two mile time your body is capable of, your gains would really drop off after two months of hard work. After three months you would probably be pretty close to your max potential and then it would just be a question of shaving seconds off your best time.