Nîmes (AFP)

Forty degrees on the road to the Tour de France: the heat wave announced in the south of the country will hit the peloton full force between Tuesday and Thursday and could cause damage, but the riders know how to cope.

The day of rest fell right, Monday in Nîmes, to acclimate to the hot weather. Between the rainy summit of the Prat d'Albis, Sunday evening, and the furnace of the Gard, the thermometer took a sudden fifteen degrees.

No question for the runners to drag on their return from the morning workout: all are quickly returned in the cool of their air-conditioned rooms. At Ineos, while leader Geraint Thomas was plagued by autograph requests, the Dutchman Dylan van Baarle quickly disappeared into the elevator with two large bottles of water and two cold sodas in his hand.

"On a third week of the Tour de France, such heat, I think it can make differences," says Davide Bramati, the sports director of the team Deceuninck, the yellow jersey Julian Alaphilippe.

- "A disturbing factor" -

If the professional cyclists "have a physiology and an exceptional training", as the Groupama-FDJ team doctor Jacky Maillot explains, the heat remains "a disruptive factor for the performance".

"When we sweat in the race, we can lose about a liter of sweat per hour (...) and when we lose a liter, we can rehydrate only half a liter, we only compensate for half of our losses, "says the specialist. "You have to take it into account."

How to cure it ? "Anticipate", first, by ensuring daily that the hydration of the runner is optimal, knowing the "tolerance" of each, because it differs according to the runner, answers Jacky Maillot. Organizing upstream of a test a period of "acclimatization, a warm environment training for example", is useful, he says, because "tolerance to heat is working very quickly."

And during the race? "Make sure to have as many as two cans on the bike," says Julien Bernard, the runner of the Trek team. For the sports assistants, it will be a question of multiplying the points of supply, to distribute more cans - "up to three per hour per runner", or 1.5 liter, estimates Jacky Maillot -, to make sure that the ice which Preserves drinks cool during the race does not come running out.

- "The water does not hydrate enough" -

"We have an ice machine in the team, but it happens to us to get more in hotels," says Konstantin Permiakov, an assistant of the Astana team, in full preparation of cans. At his feet, three huge coolers filled to the brim, which can hold up to 70 cans each, will be replenished with ice again on Tuesday morning just before the stage. "We fill them up whatever happens and we are sure we will not miss them, but we will probably use them more than usual," he continues.

The only difference compared to a usual stage, he plans for Tuesday to put ice bags available to runners wishing to reduce the temperature of their body, which sometimes reaches more than 39 degrees in very hot weather.

"Above 39 or 39.5 degrees, we know that it is a limiting factor of the performance", justifies Jacky Maillot, hammering the importance of preparing a "strategy of cooling" in parallel with the "strategy of fluid intake throughout the stage ".

This is essential, according to him, because "the water does not hydrate sufficiently". Hence the interest of enriching the water with "mineral salts and carbohydrates".

The pack seems so prowled at these high temperatures. The race will not change radically but a detail may be noteworthy: it concerns spectators dreaming of receiving a can on the roadside. "We'll probably give it a little less," says Deceuninck, "because we do not have that much and we need it!"

© 2019 AFP