Cycling: Racing into the Headwind

Chapter 177: Chapter 126: Scientific-Style Training for the Best Result (Part 2)

But the climbs on this course were much harder than in Beihai. Each lap required tackling a Category 2 climb with a total elevation gain of 237 meters, a length of 1.4 kilometers, and a staggering average gradient of 11.8%.

Unfortunately, this climb wasn’t located at the finish line, but rather at the 5.5-kilometer mark of each lap.

So in the end, it would still come down to a contest of anaerobic power among the sprinters. The climb definitely wouldn’t be enough to create any significant gaps.

Stage Four, the Queen Stage of the Tour of Guangxi, was a 161.4-kilometer route from Nanning to Nongla.

This stage contained two climbs. The first, at the 30.5-kilometer mark, was a Category 3 climb with 293 meters of total elevation gain over 1.7 kilometers, at an average gradient of 5.2%.

Then there was the First Category Climb at the finish line: Nongla Mountain.

It had a total elevation gain of 469 meters, a total length of 3.3 kilometers, and an average gradient of 6.6%.

But it included a 700-meter section with an 11.2% gradient, and the final 500 meters to the finish was an 8.7% climb.

All in all, this was definitely a stage for the GC Cyclists.

In any case, after 160 kilometers of hard racing, a pure sprinter wouldn’t be able to handle a long climb like this.

For Stage Five, the riders would need to transfer to Liuzhou first, then ride to Guilin, a total distance of 209.6 kilometers.

Strictly speaking, the overall difficulty of this stage was no less than that of the Nongla stage.

Although the final 30-plus kilometers of the stage were on flat roads, there were three climbs along the way:

At the 68-kilometer mark, a 1.5-kilometer-long Category 3 climb with an average gradient of 5.8%.

At the 168-kilometer mark, a 5-kilometer-long Category 2 climb with an average gradient of 3.3%.

And at the 174.5-kilometer mark, a 4.5-kilometer-long First Category Climb with an average gradient of 4.6%.

After the first four days of racing, getting dropped on this stage’s climbs due to a lack of recovery would be an absolute tragedy.

And the final stage, a 168-kilometer circuit race in Guilin, only required a single lap.

This stage was somewhat similar to Stage Five. At the 116-kilometer and 126.5-kilometer marks, there was a Category 2 climb immediately followed by a First Category Climb.

The Category 2 climb was 2.7 kilometers long, with an average gradient of 5%.

The First Category Climb was 4.2 kilometers long, with an average gradient of 4.6%.

Seeing the elevation profiles for the six stages, Huang Chong felt a considerable amount of pressure.

He realized that Coach Han’s description had been too vague, too simplistic.

While it was true that only Stage Four truly suited him, there were far more stages that would require him to grit his teeth and just hang on.

The reason was that when competing head-to-head with World Tour Teams, the pace was relentless. Even if he achieved a good result in Stage Four, he could still have his lead overturned if he couldn’t hang on during the climbs in Stages Five and Six.

After all, the level of a World Tour Team was a completely different matter from that of a Pro Team.

The former could easily cruise at 50 km/h on the flats.

Under normal circumstances, it was already extremely difficult for a Chinese rider to just hang on and finish all six stages.

"This Tour of Guangxi... on the surface, it looks like five stages will be decided by a final sprint. But if you look closer, you’ll see that all the climbs along the way are traps.

Once a rider gets dropped on a climb, they’re doomed. There’s no way they’ll be able to chase back on."

Huang Chong said this to Chen Junyi after he had finished reviewing all the stages.

The main issue was that in the later stages, he knew he would be without teammates or domestiques, which would be the most difficult part.

And these World Tour Teams were all ruthless. If he managed a good result on Nongla, they would never let him draft off them in Stages Five and Six.

On the contrary, the teams would only band together to attack, constantly wearing him down and tormenting him.

"Just ride your best. It would be great if you could win this race, but if you can’t, it’s really not the end of the world."

Chen Junyi took back the tablet, pulled up the rider lists for the participating teams, handed it to Huang Chong, and continued:

"As long as you fully showcase your abilities, I’m sure the team directors and managers of those World Tour Teams will recognize your talent.

You’re the new king of Asia who just defeated Lutsenko, after all. You have to have confidence in yourself!"

Hearing Chen Junyi’s words, Huang Chong felt a little better.

However, when he saw the rider lists for the various World Tour Teams, his brow furrowed again. Even with his terrible English, he recognized a whole bunch of familiar names.

In his past life, he had followed the World Tour for three years, so he was naturally very familiar with some of the riders.

Some were long-established big names, while others were rookies who had just burst onto the scene this year and were not yet widely known.

But in the next two years, some of these rookies would shoot to fame.

Among the riders he could recognize were Vader and Kooij from the Jumbo Team; Wellens from the UAE Team; Ethan and Narváez from the Ineos Grenadiers Team; Jorgenson from Movistar Team; Onley from Team DSM; and Milan from Bahrain Victorious, among others—

Especially Milan. In the next two years on the World Tour, that guy would become a beast in flat-road sprints.

In 2025, he would even win the Dash King Green Jersey at the Tour de France.

"That may be true, but if my overall ranking is too low, it’ll still be hard to get noticed by these guys.

You know that Europeans already have their stereotypes about Chinese riders.

If we want them to take us seriously, we have to deliver an even more outstanding, almost superhuman, performance, precisely because we’re at a disadvantage."

Chen Junyi had done her undergraduate degree at the University of Birmingham, UK, so she had firsthand experience with European arrogance.

Discrimination against Chinese people in fields where Europeans excelled was a common sight.

But there was no other way. When you played a sport under someone else’s rules and system, if you wanted them to fix their attitude and shut their mouths, the only way was to display extraordinary strength, win by their own rules, and utterly crush them.

"I believe you can do it."

In truth, Chen Junyi didn’t know how else to comfort Huang Chong, because, in the end, an athlete could only rely on themself.

But she had seen his grueling training, day in and day out. She had seen his meticulous, rigorous attitude for over a year, and she had seen him win one championship after another.

She continued:

"You’ve persevered for so long, and now you’ve finally reached the most crucial stage. How could you possibly step down without giving it your absolute all?

Forget about how your opponents perform. Just focus on yourself, and everything will turn out for the best!"

Hearing this, Huang Chong nodded emphatically and replied:

"Yeah. I’ll get my head right and just ride the race with a clear mind."

...

After arriving in Guangxi, Huang Chong and the others sorted out their accommodations and quickly threw themselves into training.

For Huang Chong, training was a bit more complex. He not only needed to ride the flat sections of the course but also had to focus on each of the climbs.

Before he had seen the elevation profiles, he had planned to focus his training solely on Nongla Mountain, hoping to master the long climb, familiarize himself with every turn, and identify the best places to attack.

But after seeing the profiles, he realized he also had to train on-site for the two consecutive, difficult climbs in Stages Five and Six, not just Nongla Mountain.

Chen Junyi naturally followed close behind him in a car, communicating by radio. Based on his feedback as he rode, she began to manually record real-time data for every part of the climbs.

Their preparation was far more meticulous and rigorous than it had been for the Tour of Qinghai.

She recorded everything with absolute clarity, down to the details of each climb’s gradient changes, its exact length in meters, and the number of turns it contained.

Chen Junyi deeply admired Huang Chong’s rigorous approach.

The danger for an athlete is that after a little success, they grow complacent, underestimate the competition, and become arrogant.

Huang Chong’s studious nature, however, was the exact opposite of carelessness and would only be a massive help to him in the races to come.

After several days of training, October 10th arrived. With just two days left before the race began, the various World Tour Teams started arriving in Guangxi.

Before training that day, Chen Junyi reminded Huang Chong that it was his birthday. She asked if he wanted to take the day off and have a small celebration with his teammates.

But he refused without a second thought.

In Huang Chong’s mind, as long as he was alive, birthdays would come around every year.

But if he failed to showcase his abilities in this upcoming World Tour race, he feared it would be very difficult to get another opportunity like this again.

The priorities were self-evident.