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Tour de France prologue winner Cancellara goes hypoxic
Jul 19, 2004 11: 38 EST
It was pretty sweet when an unknown beat Lance Armstrong in the Tour’s prologue earlier this month. In doing so, he picked up the yellow jersey (overall leader), green jersey (point leader), and white jersey (best rookie). Since then, he’s dropped back into the pack, however, for that day, Fabian ruled supreme.
One tidbit of info that ExplorersWeb found out about is that Fabian used the Go2Altitude hypoxicator to ‘legally blood dope’. Here’s the scoop in a nutshell – more oxygen carrying red blood cells in the body means better performance – faster and more efficient delivery of oxygen to the muscles and other organs.
Different means to an end
There are a variety of ways to increase the amount of red blood cells in the body. By going to altitude, the body isn’t getting enough oxygen circulated, so it starts to generate more red blood cells to make up for it. This is the ‘natural’ way. You can also ‘blood dope’ – have a doctor draw blood from you and store it. Since the body lost all those red blood cells, it starts to generate more. Once you are back to normal, you put back the blood you took out. Or you can even take drugs – EPO is what it’s called. Still yet, there are alternative ways to simulate the altitude process, from chambers to tents, to Go2Altitudes hypoxicator masks; what Fabian used. In all these instances though, once you return from altitude, stop taking drugs, or stop the use of the chamber, tent, or mask – the extra red blood cells just die off, as your body doesn’t need them anymore.
Good for climbers
Not only does a higher red blood cell count help with cyclists, it’s also a major part of climbing and acclimatization. Part of the acclimatization process is developing more red blood cells to compensate for the lack of oxygen present in the air at higher elevations. If you went into an 8000m expedition with an artificially elevated red-blood cell count, you have an initial edge over other folks for the beginning. Of the three most common techniques, the chamber, the tent, and the mask – only the chamber truly simulates the pressure drop at altitude as well as the lack of oxygen.
How they work
All three, however, work on the premise that the human body will respond to a sustained lack of oxygen by generating more red blood cells to more efficiently deliver what it can breathe in. For the chamber, a sealed tube in which you sleep in sucks out air, simulating a higher altitude – the opposite of a pressurized airplane, which simulates a 5000 ft altitude even though the airliner is flying in excess of 30,000 ft. The tent and hypoxicator mask system work by delivering air at the ambient air pressure, however, a device strips that air form a bit of its oxygen content – tricking the body a little bit. Since the air has more nitrogen and less oxygen, it starts to generate more red blood cells.
Believers and non beleivers
Each system has it’s up and downsides, and as for climbers, the consensus on its effectiveness has yet to be reached. With some saying it’s great, and others (remember the Kazakh national 3 in 1 team) saying it was horrible, and even providing the pictures to prove it! Check out some of ExplorersWeb past articles on the devices, the theories behind them; and the good experiences as well as the bad.
Lance Armstrong is currently en route to win his 6th Tour de France. He is down by over 14 minutes and in 38th place, but is expected to excel once they hit the mountains. Fabian is back down in 138th place, however, he is just over 15 minutes behind.
Image of a hypoxicator courtesy of Go2Altitude.com.
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