Has anyone ever been kicked out of the Giro before because their bike was too light? Of course. That was the Italian Fabiana Luperini, in 2013. I was there, it was after the sixth stage on yet another very hot day. The finish was in San Domenico di Varzo, after a steep climb of eleven kilometers in Piedmont.
Several riders appeared to have already ridden a bike that was too light the day before. It was a few years before the introduction of disc brakes, and carbon bikes with rim brakes and light wheels were easily under 6.8 kilos. You had to be careful with that, everyone knew that. My bike was also too light. That’s why it had lead in it.
Warnings and fines were issued after that fifth stage with its finish at Monte Beigua, but everyone was allowed to start again the next day. Also Luperini – while her bicycle was not found to be 20 grams too light (like Lorena Wiebes’s), but 200 grams.
Luperini was a celebrity at the time, a multiple Giro and Tour winner. I don’t know what she must have thought when she simply got back on the light bike for the sixth stage.
Maybe she didn’t agree that she had to carry such a heavy bike uphill at 43 kilos and thought: I’ll just make it a bit lighter. That is fairer compared to heavier climbers. Because if you actually think about it, it really is.
The bicycle is 6.8 kilos for everyone, because that is supposedly fair
This Saturday is the queen stage of the Giro that the women are now riding, from Rivoli to Sestriere. The eighteen kilometer long, steep Colle delle Finestre is in the middle. You’d think it would be just the thing for the super small lightweights.
The cyclist who has long been said to be the best climber in the world is not participating. That is the Italian Gaia Realini, she reportedly weighs 42 kilos.
Suppose she had participated and had to compete against favorites Anna van der Breggen and Demi Vollering. It is estimated that they are both more than ten kilos heavier. But all three riders have to carry an equally heavy bicycle of 6.8 kilos up the mountain. For Realini this is relatively more than for the other two. Of course, they have to take their own weight with them as ‘extra’, but the disadvantage of this is less than ‘dead’ weight, such as a bicycle.
There are many more values involved, but you can imagine that Realini would be much faster at the top of the Finestre if she did not have the disadvantage of the weight of her bike. This would save her valuable time, time that she desperately needs. Because in the descent Realini loses because gravity pulls her down less hard. Had she not had the weight of her bike, she would have had a chance of winning stages like this.
But cycling is simply with a bicycle. A bicycle that is 6.8 kilos for everyone, because that is supposedly fair. Lorena Wiebes was thrown off course because her bike weighed 20 grams too little, in a flat stage where weight matters much less. It is remarkable that the discussion is not much more fundamental, if such a minimal weight deviation is not warned as in 2013, but immediately leads to disqualification.