Biomechanics expert Andy Pruitt has worked with Alberto Contador since the rider started using Specialized bikes in 2010, and believes that the Spaniard still has room to improve as regards his time trial position.
“I think we can still work on Alberto’s time trial position to really perfect it,” he told VeloNation, suggesting that further gains can be found.
The American is the founder of the Boulder Center for Sports Medicine and has a senior role in the Specialized BG Fit assessments of riders. He has been part of Bjarne Riis’ team of outside experts for several seasons. A key aspect of the job is to pinpoint problems in riders’ positions and diagnose the best adjustments.
One of Pruitt’s major concerns is to make recommendations to determine the right balance between aerodynamics and physiology. He needs to ensure that the riders are in the optimum position to put out high power while also cutting well through air.
“A lot of riders or their teams try to put them too low, forgetting that they need to be able to put out good power too,” he told VeloNation, explaining what the key considerations are. “The whole thing behind aerodynamics is that you are going to lose some power by assuming that [extreme] position. It is a balance between aerodynamic gains while also trying to minimise physiological loss due to that position.
“Alberto is always aerodynamic because he is small in stature, and he also has the ability to get aero on a time trial bike. However its possible to go too low; being narrow is more important than that is.
“The year that Alberto struggled in the time trial [2010], I had put him in a certain place but then he or the team moved him even lower,” he explained. “He went beyond the happy place between aerodynamics and power loss. He has since gone back up a little bit in the front…that might be counter-intuitive to some people, but you have got to be able to roll the shoulders and get narrow. Narrow is more important than low.”
The message of balance doesn’t always go through, and this has led to a differing of opinions in the past. Pruitt explains that by and large his recommendations are accepted, but that there can be more resistance with the more important competitors.
“Bjarne [Riis] has a strong influence on fit and position of his riders. He gives us a blank cheque on 90% of the riders but on a couple of them, he still wants to be involved,” he said. “So Bjarne and I negotiate, or arm wrestle – whichever way you want to look at it – for those elite riders’ positions.
“I would say that last year, Bjarne had final say on Alberto’s TT position. Alberto had final say on his road position, although he stuck with most of suggestions that I had made. It will be interesting this year. I think we still have a little work to do on Alberto’s time trial position to really perfect it.”
For Contador’s rivals, that may be worrying news as it suggests that the rider can become faster again in races against the clock.
Evolving position for greater gains:
Describing Contador as ‘incredibly efficient physical animal,’ and someone with a ‘phenomenal strength to weight ratio,’ Pruitt is clear on what he would do if Riis gave him free reign to modify the rider’s position.
“I think I would probably raise him in the front end by two centimetres and I would change his saddle,” he explained. “There was a saddle sponsor issue [in 2011] and I couldn’t change it, but it was not a good TT saddle option for him. With the saddle change, he may not have to come up in the front.
“The saddle determines how far you can roll your pelvis forward. If the saddle lets you do that well, you can be more aggressive in the front end. It’s too soon to know what exact changes will be made, but I do know that I am going to have more saddle choices for him in 2012 than I did last year [2011].”
Contador has proven to be a very strong time trialist; surprisingly so, given his light weight. Climbers tend to be weaker against the clock than bigger, bulkier riders, but he has no such concerns; the Spaniard beat Fabian Cancellara to win the final time trial of the 2009 Tour de France, and has taken many other victories in the same way.
Watching him, though, his pedalling in a TT tuck position does not seem as smooth as might be expected from a Tour winner. He tends to shift saddle position with surprising regularly, sliding forward gradually and then scooting backwards suddenly.
Pruitt states that this has been something they have been working on for some time.
“The last year that he was on Astana [2010], my work with Alberto that year was purely to solve some back pain and knee pain issues he had earlier that season,” he said. “That was road only, not TT.
“So then when he came over to Saxo Bank and I had more impact on him, both road and TT, we started to address that. It appeared to me that he was too low at the front and slipping off the nose of the saddle, always having to adjust himself.
“He said, ‘well, that is what people think, but when I do that, they are very hard power strokes. They are moments when I pushed really hard on the pedals and it forces me back on the saddle.’ That was his justification of that.”
It still appears to be extra effort that doesn’t have to be made, though, and Pruitt believes it can be corrected with the right choice of saddle. This will be investigated during the off season, with changes during the racing period being too risky to try out.
“It was better at the Giro and we left his position alone from the Giro to the Tour,” he explained. “But in the Tour he was so fatigued, I think he struggled to maintain his position on the TT bike in the race. I think it was more a fatigue issue than anything else.”
He will work with the rider in the off season to make adjustments to equipment and tweaks to position. It’s not yet certain if Contador will be racing in 2012 due to the pending CAS decision but if he is cleared to compete, Pruitt wants to ensure he is as fast as possible from an biomechanical point of view.
Also see: Pruitt's assessment of world time trial champion Tony Martin