French Teams

Where are they now? Crédit Agricole 1999

Crédit Agricole 1999

The Leopard-Trek team spent the first rest day of the Tour de France at the Gabarit Hôtel and in the reception area were several photos from the past when the GAN team, later known as Crédit Agricole. Fabian Cancellara joked about Stuart O’Grady who features in the photos from the late nineties but he’s not the only big name rider on this team.

I found the full photo on the excellent Site du Cyclisme website and the first thing that stands out is the size of the squad. 18 riders in total, small by today’s standards when several teams are at the UCI-limit of 30 riders and able to cover three races simultaneously even with a few injured riders. Back in 1999 Crédit Agricole was not the biggest team but it certainly was competitive; in 2001 the squad won the team time trial stage of the Tour de France.

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National Championships

Today sees the strangest races on the pro calendar. Across Europe it is time for the national road race championships and the format is unlike anything else all year. Take the French championships, it is possible for four teams to each field over 20 riders. You will see Europcar, Ag2r, FDJ and Cofidis swarming all … Read more

French dropouts cost time

French puncture

A tiny detail for today but sometimes that’s what the Inner Ring is all about. French teams take longer to change wheels in the event of a front wheel puncture than other teams.

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The race within a race

Blel Kadri

It’s a small detail but watching the TV coverage of the Dauphiné yesterday the excitement around the performances of French riders was very noticeable. It’s understandable given four Frenchmen made the top-10 in a French race broadcast live on French TV. But there’s more to it than that.

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What about the French teams this Sunday?

Sebastien Hinault Roubaix

They are not favourites but that’s no reason to ignore them. Paris-Roubaix is the only one of the five Monuments in France so I thought I’d take a look at the French teams and their chances and options for tomorrow. Plus there’s a quick look at France’s best chance, Sylvain Chavanel tacked on to the end of this piece.

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Training the mind

Denis Troch probably isn’t a name you know but he is an instrumental figure for quite a few French riders. A former professional soccer player with several Parisian clubs, Troch retired into coaching and then onto team management. But football management is one of the most insecure jobs in the world, managers can get replaced … Read more

Thoughts on Vaughters Interview – Part II

Earlier this week I wrote some thoughts on Jonathan Vaughters’ interview with cyclingnews.com. Now I’d like to return to a second topic from the interview, namely his time with French team Credit Agricole: “It [Crédit Agricole] was a team where everyone kinda showed up, did their job and went home. I mean, the communication between … Read more

Training by numbers – update

Congratulations to Amaël Moinard. I blogged only last week how Moinard is an intelligent rider who knows how to train and race smart and sure enough he won the final stage of Paris-Nice under the palm trees of the Boulevard des Anglais. His win is a demonstration of what I was trying to explain. Yesterday … Read more

Training by numbers

Watching today’s stage of Paris Nice on TV I noticed Cofidis’s Amaël Moinard in the breakaway, and that he had an SRM meter on his bike. In case you didn’t know the SRM system measures the watts produced by a rider with a pair of cranks that have been modified with strain guages, plus a … Read more

Pro cycling is all about publicity right?

Visit the websites of Cofidis, Ag2r-La Mondiale, FDJ.com and Bbox-Bouygues Télécom and none of them have links to Facebook or Twitter. Given the whole reason to back a pro cycling team is to get publicity for your brand, why aren’t these teams using all the media available to them? A Twitter account is free after … Read more

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