Hosting the start of the Vuelta so late at night is something which will make this evening’s team time trial a highly unusual one, but also is something that would be impossible to see happening at many other races on the calendar.
If such a stage was tried at the Tour de France, it’s not difficult to imagine the riders protesting strongly; in fact, its hard to imagine ASO going along with something so experimental in the first place for their big race. The Vuelta is marketing this as a plus, though, with chief organiser Javier Guillén saying that it is important to push the boundaries at times. "You have to do new things and for the riders this doesn’t require a significant effort. The journey is short,” he told AS in May.
The earliest team will begin at 22.04, when the Footon-Servetto team rolls down the starting ramp in Seville to begin the 13 kilometre test.
The last set of riders will get their test underway at 23.28, with the Andalucia-CajaSur team effort looking at a time of midnight when they start to head back to their hotel. Whoever wins the test will be delayed even longer, meaning that it could be 2am before some riders get to bed.
Garmin Slipstream manager Johnny Weltz sounded unsure about how the experiment would work out, saying that it would certainly have an effect on the riders. “I know it will have an impact on their sleep,” he told VeloNation today. “When you make an effort like that at night, it is going to be quite late by the time your heartrate gets down.”
Part of the reason for the timing of the event is the huge heat that has been experienced in the area. “One thing is that it is extremely warm, it is 45 degrees and it so hard for anybody to be outdoors,” he explained. “So if you had to do something [racing] in that, it would nearly be impossible. Perhaps it is a good thing to do it late. Perhaps it will be successful, maybe this could be a good way to manage things like that. We will see…”
Aside from getting to sleep so late, an additional complication is the issue of when to eat. Will teams have dinner when they return to their hotels, or will they aim to have eaten their evening meal hours before the time trial, and just snack afterwards? Also, how will this change to their schedule and the lack of sleep affect the riders in the opening week - will it cause an early tiredness that will make the three week race even more difficult than usual?”
Whatever way that pans out, there’s another issue that may be even more immediate; namely, the question of safety. The earlier teams will have better conditions as it may still be relatively bright, but that will soon change as the evening progresses and it becomes darker and darker. In a bid to combat this, the race organises have made a big effort to artificially illuminate the route, installing lights on both sides of the road. Yet even with that assistance, it won’t be the same as racing in daylight.
“I don’t know what it will be like, I have never done a race under these conditions,” said Weltz, sounding cautious. “You have 26 kilometres of light out there on the circuit, so the organisers have done everything possible so that the conditions are good. Yet it is still hard to know what to expect. At night, you feel the speeds to be much higher, so it is going to be a weird experience. When you are going at 60 kilometres per hour and there are shadows, it is hard to know what to expect.”
What’s clear is that the measure is unlike anything that has been seen in recent years. Spain, with its cultural tendency for late nights, is the ideal location for such experimentation, and the organisers will hope that this captures the imagination of the public. However if there are any bad crashes as a result of the lighting, or if riders experience real fatigue as a result of the irregular hours and the lack of sleep, it will be seen as a step too far. Either way, the riders, fans and media are likely to be talking about this for quite some time.