Former pro Michael Rasmussen did not hold back over Chris Froome’s statement that the measurements on his current bike on Israel – Premier Tech did not match that of his Tour de France winning-Pinarellos from the Team Sky days.
In an interview with cyclingnews.com, Froome said he was checking out his set-up between old and new and was surprised with what he found. “At first I thought it was age starting to catch up with me but then I started questioning my position actually on the bike and then started comparing it,”he said. “I had one of my old bikes from Team Sky/Ineos days so I was able to compare the position on the two different bikes. I found that my reach, from saddle to the handlebars, was over three centimetres of difference between the two bikes, longer on the current bike.
Hopeful for 2024
Froome, who won the TdF four times and the Giro d’Italia and Vuelta a España twice, has struggled to regain his form after breaking his fractured right femur in 2019. He was actually pleased with learning about the differences between the bikes as he hopes it will help him in 2024.
“It’s a positive thing for me. I’ve found it’s given me a lot of added motivation now because it might be part of the puzzle, missing pieces, as to why I haven’t quite found the level that I’ve wanted to get to,” he said. “I took my old bike and went to a specialist and found very big discrepancies between my positions. But now we’ve made some big changes, more than centimetres in terms of saddle height, in terms of the reach, it’s really a lot, we’re not talking millimetres.”
The chicken weighs in
Michael Rasmussen, who won four stages of the Tour de France as well as the climber’s jersey, was not buying it. The former pro, who was banned for lying about his whereabouts and ultimately confessed to doping, said what Froome was saying made no sense to anyone riding at the professional level. He quote-tweeted a story from road.cc, calling out the British rider.
“What a load of BS from Froome. Any pro cyclist who has done 1000s of hours on a bike will instantly feel a change in the set-up,” he chirped. “Froome could ride his Pinarello from 2015 and he still wouldn’t crack the top 20 in Tour du Rwanda with his current level.”
Froome has not replied to the zinger from the Dane.
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