Andrew Talansky watched this year’s Tour de France broadcast, in case you were wondering.
Talansky spent July in Truckee, California, training for the upcoming Vuelta a España, the grand tour he has chosen to race this year instead of the Tour. Each morning, Talansky prepared his breakfast and then flipped on the Tour, something he hadn’t done since his days a young up-and-comer.
As he watched the broadcast, Talansky cheered on his Cannondale – Drapac teammates and gaped at the dominance of Chris Froome and Team Sky. He watched the peloton slog up into the Alps and Pyrénées, and marveled at how a sport as painful as cycling can appear so easy on television.
Not once did he regret staying home.
“There was no part of watching it that was bittersweet, or made me wish I was racing it,” Talansky says. “I enjoyed being a spectator. From day one there was no part of me that was second guessing my decision not to go.”
Enjoying his spot on the sidelines during the sport’s biggest race may seem odd for a rider whose nickname “Pit Bull” stems from his aggressive, attacking style. To be fair, the last time Talansky had the opportunity to view the Tour — in 2014 he abandoned after a string of painful crashes — he kept the TV off.
This year is different. Talansky says he is at peace with his decision to skip the Tour. He believes that giving himself three months of solid training will help him regain his top form — something he has not achieved since 2014.
“It just feels like a long time since I’ve ridden at the level that I know I’m capable of,” Talansky says.
Since the beginning of 2015, Talansky has struggled with lingering illnesses, a family crisis, and crashes. He has entered races looking to grab quick bursts of fitness, rather than to win. It’s not the route Talansky prefers, but for two seasons, he played along, hoping that a miracle burst of form would come his way. It never did.
This spring, Talansky was fed up. He made a deliberate, calculated decision to bypass the world’s biggest bike race in favor of the Vuelta. Now, Talansky is betting that Spain’s tour — which runs August 20 through September 11 — will serve as his springboard back into the small circle of grand tour contenders.
“I never want to race unless I’m at my absolute best,” Talansky says. “And the last time I was really at my best was the 2014 Tour de France, and I didn’t even get anything to show for it.”
Talansky’s crash on stage 7 of the 2014 Tour marked a painful bookend to the development phase of his career, which saw him make otherworldly strides in a handful of years. In a story now often repeated in American cycling, Talansky approached Cannondale general manager Jonathan Vaughters at the summit of the Gila Monster stage of the 2010 Tour of the Gila and asked for a job. Within the year, he was racing in Europe on Vaughters’s squad.
Talansky’s career took off almost as soon as he entered the WorldTour. His palmares from 2011-2014 reads like the bragging list of Tour de France greats. Best young rider, 2011 Tour de Romandie. Winner, 2012 Tour de l’Ain. Second place, 2012 Tour de Romandie. Seventh place, 2012 Vuelta a España. Second place, 2013 Paris-Nice. Tenth place, 2013 Tour de France.
The last result on Talansky’s development scorecard is the big one: Winner, 2014 Criterium du Dauphine.
“That was this huge honor — a huge honor for my career and my life,” Talansky says. “When an opportunity presents itself, you’re going to try and win a race like that.”
When viewed through the lens of grand tour progression, Talansky’s early career points toward eventual podium finishes at the Tour, the Giro, or the Vuelta. He scored impressive results at challenging one-week stage races, where his time trialing and climbing could shine.
The results from his early career nearly mirror this year’s Tour runner-up Romain Bardet, who also turned heads from ages 22-25. Winner, 2013 Tour de l’Ain. Fourth place, 2014 Volta a Catalunya. Sixth place, 2015 Criterium du Dauphine. Ninth place, 2015 Tour de France. Second place, 2016 Criterium du Dauphine.
And then there’s the big one for Bardet: Second place, 2016 Tour de France.
Unlike Bardet, Talansky’s upward line of progression plateaued after his 2014 Tour DNF.
Talansky says he’s moved on from the 2014 race, which saw him hit the deck multiple times before he abandoned. The most infamous crash occurred in the waning meters of stage 7, when he touched wheels with Australian Simon Gerrans in the sprint. The crash, he says, gave him some valuable perspective on his relationship with the peloton.
“There’s not a rider in the peloton who cares that you’re on the form of your life, and it’s the race you need to win, and you crash,” Talansky says. “That ends up being your own personal deal.”
Form is a tricky concept to understand in the cycling world. Yes, the word refers to a cyclist’s overall condition or “sensations” during a race, but in practice, form is a blend of a rider’s physical strength and self confidence. And only a rider knows his or her form.
As outsiders, we often view a rider’s results as an expression of his form. That’s not always the case.
For example, Talansky won the 2015 U.S. National Time Trial Championship and finished 11th at the Tour de France. Those performances, from a results standpoint, speak of world-class form. For Talansky, not so much. They are an expression of his bad form, which resulted from a lingering infection that he caught during that year’s Amgen Tour of California.
“I was nowhere near 100 percent of what I’m capable of that year,” Talanksy says. “I pulled it together for TT nationals and was strong during the third week [of the Tour de France].”
The next gap between Talansky’s form and results came this past June, when he finished fifth at the Tour de Suisse. Great result, right? For Talansky, it’s another case of bad form.
Talansky’s 2016 winter and spring campaigns could not have gone worse. He lost three weeks of training in February to deal with his unspecified family crisis. A crash and sickness during Paris-Nice kept him out of the Volta a Catalunya, an important form-building race for Tour hopefuls. He then bombed at the Tour de Romandie, where he previously held all-star status.
By May, alarm bells were ringing in Talansky’s head. It’s like knowing you’re a few weeks out from the final exam, and realizing you didn’t do the homework, attend class, or even buy the books.
That’s when Talansky and Vaughters decided to pull the plug on the Tour de France. They left the door open, if Talansky’s form somehow materialized during the Tour de Suisse.
Again, an outsider may look at Talansky’s results in Switzerland and marvel. Fifth place overall. Fifth place in the time trial. Top-10 finishes on all the climbing stages.
But again, there is a chasm between the results and Talansky’s perception of his form.
“Suisse was built off of Romandie, [the Tour of] California, and some training — I showed that I can still time trial but there wasn’t any kind of foundation for repeated hard efforts,” Talansky says. “After the race I was completely exhausted. There was nothing in the tank. I knew that it was the right decision to skip [the Tour de France].”
Talansky is hardly a shoo-in for the Vuelta win, or even the podium. Already, the race will feature stars Chris Froome (Sky), Nairo Quintana (Movistar), and Alberto Contador (Tinkoff), talented up-and-comer Miguel Angel Lopez (Astana), Steven Kruijswijk (LottoNL – Jumbo), and Esteban Chaves (Orica – BikeExchange). The race features 10 summit finishes, and with the cast of explosive climbers, Talansky will endure a challenge.
To prepare for the race, Talansky will compete in the Larry H. Miller Tour of Utah. The weeklong race, which features thin air and plenty of climbs, will serve as the final spear-sharpening effort before Spain.
Talansky says he’s just happy to be racing the Vuelta on good legs. He participated in the race in both 2014 and 2015, but the lacking form led to a 51st place and a DNF.
“The third week of a grand tour is my best, and thankfully that’s where the races are usually decided,” Talansky says.
Talansky will turn 28 in November, which is middle age for a grand tour contender. He recently signed another deal with Cannondale – Drapac, which will make him the team’s grand tour rider for at least two more seasons.
He is adamant that he has plenty of good years left in his legs. He says he still believes he has the strength to win a grand tour, perhaps even the Tour de France.
If skipping the 2016 Tour gets Talansky back on his path, anything is possible.
“If you don’t have the belief that you’re capable of winning the Tour de France, then you don’t get to a very high level in this sport,” Talansky says. “Whether or not it actually happens is something else. There are just so many things you can’t control.”
The post Talansky: It’s been two years since I rode my best appeared first on VeloNews.com.