It was another high w/kg performance in Norway after three years, this time on an 8-minute climb with Tom Pidcock outperforming Corbin Strong.
The 2022 Tour of Norway delivered huge w/kg performances on a 30-minute climb with then Remco Evenepoel fighting against Jay Vine on Stavsro and delivering, until that point, one of the most impressive climbing performances since the 2000s, with young Cian Uijtdebroeks, Tobias Halland Johannesen, and Luke Plapp finishing in the top 6. This time there was an 8-minute mountain top finish in the Arctic Race of Norway on Malselv (3.45 km, 8.52%).
With a very easy stage, Corbin Strong burned 2278 kilojoules at a rate of 8.17 kj/kg/h for 4:25 h, this being perhaps the easiest pro race stage in European cycling history, and with a wide run into the climb there was practically no fatigue in the pro riders’ legs. It created a perfect storm for something unusual.
Tom Pidcock won two similar stages in the Saudi Tour in February, with mountain bike XCO world champion Alan Hatherly performing there in his first pro race. On a similar finish they were again flying, but this time there was much stronger competition with Corbin Strong, Christian Scaroni, Clement Champoussin, and other hilly specialists. Q36.5 did a lead-out for Pidcock until 1.5 km to go, with Nick Schultz taking over after that. Pidcock attacked soon after and dropped everyone except Strong. Despite all of the drafting, Pidcock in the finish won, but lost the GC to Strong, who scored more bonus seconds from sprints in other stages.
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The W/kg on this climb seemed too good to be true, but it was just the perfect stage with perfect conditions on a day easier than the easiest World Tour training days. Tom Pidcock climbed Målselv with 7.91 ᵉW/kg for 8:16 min, with Strong doing it with 7.82 ᵉW/kg. In the Saudi Tour, Pidcock did 7.69 ᵉW/kg for 7:27 min, which is a very similar performance. Everyone from 3rd to 18th place did 7.33–7.64 ᵉW/kg, showing how high the fitness levels of World Tour cyclists are. Pidcock’s climbing score was not that high, with only 648 aslp (adjusted sea level power), with very low altitude not inflating his absolute watts numbers.
The greatest short effort of all time, with or without context, is Evgeni Berzin’s 1995 performance in the Euskal Bizikleta, where he produced 8.50 ᵉW/kg for 4:46 to beat Alex Zülle and Alberto Elli. Also notable, at middle altitude, is Marco Pantani’s 1995 effort on Mende, where he managed to be faster than Miguel Indurain and Bjarne Riis by one second with 7.62 ᵉW/kg for 8:59. Another highlight is Michael Woods’ ride on Mirador de Ézaro in Gran Camiño, producing 7.64 ᵉW/kg for 6:58. Joaquim Rodríguez, in the Froome era, delivered 7.88 ᵉW/kg for 6:46 on the same climb in the 2012 Vuelta a España, beating Alberto Contador, Alejandro Valverde, and Chris Froome.
good god, no wonder people got excited about Tom P.
This doesn’t seem right; the whole distribution of the group from Rota to Pidcock is shifted up with respect to the rest of the dataset. 7th-12th as all-time top 200 climbers? Something is wrong — assumptions about the weights, tailwind, etc. This does not pass a statistical sniff/sanity test.
It doesn’t mean they’re the best climbers, just the best short climb efforts ever done in a race. Best efforts in the context of a race are very different to an effort in training when fresh. Given the stage was so easy, it makes sense that the riders produced some of the best numbers seen on a short climb in a race
TP’s career continues to blossom and bear fruit in spectacular ways. What a talent!
Great article! Puts it all into context with bona fide research and not just an aggregation of opinions.
Why do you look at stats from the 90s ,we all are aware what took place then, you can’t use stats which are not relevant for a omparison