"There was a kind of revolution in 2010 when cycling teams started looking at what was being done in athletics or swimming."
Jean-Baptiste Quiclet, Head of Performance DECATHLON AG2R LA MONDIALE
This phrase caught our attention as much as it piqued our curiosity when we spoke to Jean-Baptiste about the major contemporary developments in professional cycling. Our sport has always evolved rapidly. It's in its DNA. But never before in the last fifteen years have there been so many radical changes.
Reduced competition volume, sequencing of seasons by objectives, riders groups, increased training camps... Behind the scenes of the performance unit, Jean-Baptiste explained to us how our riders seasons riders planned and organized. It's a complex process that requires coordination between a multitude of players (coaches, riders, sports directors, technical experts) and three main phases: preparation, competition, and rest.
For the dozen or so coaches and experts behind this performance, planning has become a battle horse.
1. Preamble: metamorphosed seasons
Although cycling seasons are among the longest in professional sports (approximately 10 months of competition spread out from January to October), the number of days spent competing by riders has been declining for two decades.
In the 2000s, a professional rider raced an average of 95 times per season, while riders committed riders could accumulate up to 110 days of competition per year. In 2008, the winner of Tour France finished the season with more than 80 days of racing.
Twenty years later, cyclists race 20% less than before. An average of 75 days compared to a maximum of 92 days (Patrick Gamper in 2024). Contenders for the overall classification in the Grand Tours are reducing their volume even further: Jonas Vingegaard did not race more than 60 days in 2023, the year of his second Tour France victory.
At the heart of this evolution is a change in approach to training and, more generally, to performance: run less but better.
This new paradigm has radically changed the way seasons are planned, with training becoming more intensive and optimized. At the heart of these changes is the multiplication of training courses.
2. Train harder and better
Today, a rider spends roughly as many days competing as they do training over the course of a season (around 60 days for each of these two blocks).
In the past, cycling seasons consisted of a few months of endurance training in winter, followed by a very long season of competitions and (short) rest periods. Considering competition to be the best form of training, cyclists raced until they reached their peak.
Since 2010, cycling has taken a new direction, drawing inspiration from other endurance sports such as swimming and athletics. In these disciplines, where the volume of competition is lower than in cycling, the seasons are designed around targeted and distant objectives, making the training phases distinct but essential to be sure of arriving competitive on the day.
It was this desire to optimize performance and results that was the primary driving force behind these changes: to better manage peak fitness levels so as not to miss out on major events.
In addition, other more marginal factors have also prompted performance professionals to review the place of training in relation to racing, and to give it priority in the organization of seasons. According to Jean-Baptiste Quiclet, training makes it possible to :
- Reduce the mental and physical fatigue generated by competition (travel, stress, risk of illness).
- Better managing effort and workload: given the impossibility of predicting race scenarios, competition has proven not to be the best place to manage the intensity of effort. Technological advances have made training extremely precise and even "harder than races," according to Jean-Baptiste Quiclet, Head of Performance our team.
- Overcome the constraints associated with certain preparation methods, such as altitude training.
3. Structuring performance
This mutation in the way cycling is practiced was a challenge for the professional structures. With ultra-innovative teams at the helm, each quickly realized that they had to create the conditions for innovation.
In our team, the aim was to bring a fresh eye to preparation and to individualize it. Jean-Baptiste Quiclet was a pioneer in this approach, aimed at decoupling season planning from the simple world racing calendar.
The DECATHLON AG2R LA MONDIALE team's performance unit has been set up to ambitiously rethink planning and provide the means for experimentation.
Today, it is managed by its director, Jean-Baptiste Quiclet. He oversees all aspects of performance:
- Technical innovation: equipment, aero, nutrition, positioning. He is supported by multi-disciplinary technical experts, the craftsmen of innovation and the geniuses behind its implementation.
- Training planning. Accompanied by Head Coach Stephen Barret, who supervises a team of around ten specialist coaches.
A complete team motivated by the same objective: to enable the sports management team toline up the most competitive frontrunners for each race.
In their planning work, the team's coaches build different strategic plans on several scales:
- Race groups and sporting objectives for each group (Classics, stage races, Grand Tours).
- Groups of riders facing sporting goals
- Preparation blocks for each group based on major objectives
All this work leads coaches to produce the following for each rider the team:
- A race calendar
- A daily training plan
- A calendar of courses
4. Types of internships and their objectives
In this approach, training camps played a decisive role. Training camps were the subject of much discussion in the cycling world. Once questioned, it was considered that rider could train seriously at home.
However, beyond the specific features of certain training courses (such as those at the start of the season or at altitude), professional structures have multiplied them with the same concern for optimizing training, the backbone of all these transformations.
While the technical objectives of the training camps may vary, they are all designed to offer riders optimal working and recovery environment. They provide rider to dedicated on-site staff to supervise training and provide the necessary care and equipment management (cook and nutritionist, physiotherapists, osteopath, mechanics, assistants).
Training camps are also opportunities to bring together riders same racing group and get them working together. They are key to building strong group cohesion and provide additional motivation to push each rider exceed their limits in training.
Apart from the training camps at the start of the season, which are attended by the entire team, each training camp is limited to riders ten riders in order to allow for a highly personalized approach to training during these key periods.
These courses are organized, prepared and placed by coaches according to their speciality: the sprinters' coach organizes the sprint courses and the climbers' coach runs the altitude courses.
All courses are organized around a specific theme. The theme is generally an overall focus for a block of racing, but it can also be linked to a specific race, as in the case of reconnaissance courses.
Although the type of courses and their recurrence may vary according to objectives and numbers, there is a list of "pillar" courses that appear throughout the seasons, of which the following are a few examples:
- The early season training camps in December and January. These are attended by the entire team and serve to kick off the season. They are a valuable time for team building and groundwork on and off the bike, particularly thanks to numerous muscle strengthening sessions. They are also a time for discussions between the riders all members of staff to plan rider season. Finally, it is a time to set up new equipment and any communication requirements.
- The first high-altitude training camp shortly after the first races, in February. These camps are mainly aimed at riders the Tour France. The distinctive feature of altitude training camps is that they are particularly long. The acclimatization period lasts several days, and the benefits of altitude training only become apparent after several weeks. riders go to high-altitude training camp therefore find themselves in a real bubble of work for several weeks. They are in very small groups (includingriders staff), which also has the benefit of promoting group cohesion. In winter, these camps mainly take place in Sierra Nevada in Spain, on the island of Tenerife, or on Mount Etna in Italy.
- In the run-up to the classics, reconnaissance courses can be organized. These are designed to give riders the chance to put in some intense "conditioning" sessions on the cobblestones of the Flemish courses. They can also be used to test the equipment needed to tackle these highly tactical events.
- Depending on the objectives and the riders , a training camp to prepare for Giro place in April. This year, it will be a training camp focused on sprinting, centered around Sam Bennett and the team that will accompany him on the Tour .
- In May or June, a second high-altitude training camp place in preparation for Tour France. This is the final block of intensive training before the races leading up to Tour France (Critérium du Dauphiné or Tour Suisse). There are more destination options during the summer, as riders go to high-altitude Alpine resorts (Les Arcs, Tignes, Val d'Isère) or Font-Romeu, which are located at sufficient altitudes to benefit from the advantages of altitude training.
- Depending on the schedule, mini reconnaissance stages take place at the beginning of summer to recognize the most important (or most technical) stages of Tour France.
- In July, riders are not participating in Tour France undergo a "mountain training camp" to work on significant elevation gains during training. This year, the training camp will be divided into two groups to promote individualization: a Vuelta group Vuelta a group of riders to other goals for the second half of the season.
- At various times during the season , other "technical" courses can be organized to work on the equipment or position: wind tunnel days.
So that's why and how these training camps have become (among other things) a cornerstone of our riders season riders their quest for performance.
Seasons that are definitely built around complex roadmaps, and where the goal now counts just as much as the road to get there.
While it's true that the role oftraining has evolved considerably, it has also made cycling even more competitive. Cyclists run less, but they run better.
Each race is a spectacle played out by finely-prepared and super-determined actors, not least because their calendar is getting lighter. A call for panache, to our great delight.
