When the Tour sets out today on its first road-race stage, what you will see is a mass of cyclists in a large group travelling at great speed, but inside it is far more complicated than that. Everyone in there has a purpose and all that activity is not aimless at all - far from it.
It is best explained from the point of view of the domestique , or team rider, which is the role I would have been playing if I had started the race. We are workers who have to look after the needs of one or two key riders in each team - in US Postal Service, it is eight racers looking after Lance Armstrong, in our Crédit Agricole team it is two or three riders looking after our sprinter, Thor Hushovd, and our man for the overall standings, Christophe Moreau.
Hushovd will be going for stage wins and as many high placings as he can get, so he earns points towards the green jersey, while Moreau will simply be trying to stay out of trouble. The first week can be more dangerous than a mountain stage for an overall contender because the entire field is nervous and you have 200 riders trying to stay in the front to avoid crashes.
So every morning at the team meeting, the manager will explain who is doing what. Someone like me would be told to look after Hushovd, keep him in the front 20 until seven kilometres to go, then get him to the front with 700 metres to go.
Four riders will look after Moreau, keep him in the first 30, stop if he gets a puncture, drop back to the team car and get him bottles of water if it is hot, or a cape if it rains. If he wants a leak on the bike because it is going too fast to stop, he will need a push as he does what has to be done. That sounds straightforward, but at the front of the bunch it is a constant battle; you see an arrowhead of riders, but in reality they are moving up and down all the time. It is not as if you move to tenth wheel and stay there; you have to fight to hold your place and fight to get it back.
You will see leaders such as Jan Ullrich and Armstrong staying in the first 15 in the final kilometres because the speed is so high. Merely moving forward is hard - the bunch is moving at 30 or 35mph, so you have to go at 35 or 40mph - and if the domestiques do the work, that is energy saved.
It actually takes less energy to stay in the front than it does to be farther back, because of the whiplash effect as the bunch goes through corners at 35mph. The first 15 or 20 riders go straight through, those farther back have to slow down and accelerate again. When you are going through a town and the corners come in quick succession, the riders in front can be two bends ahead and the constant changes in speed sap a rider's strength. For someone who is riding for the overall, it all adds up over three weeks.
The really key stage for the domestiques this week is the team time-trial on Wednesday. The race can be won and lost there, so you have to be fully committed.
In a team as strong as Telekom or US Postal, the domestiques will just be trying to match Ullrich or Armstrong, pedal stroke for pedal stroke for 60 kilometres; in a team such as Liberty, with a climber the calibre of Roberto Heras, they will just be trying to nurse him through and make sure he does not lose time.
Personal ambition just goes out of the window, but we can live with that. We have a lot of faith in our leaders - if it does not work out for them, it will not be for want of trying, so you do not usually get annoyed about it.
Being a domestique is about doing your job. If you have done what you had to do and the leader has not done his, it is not your fault. It is all very businesslike.
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