Not the Wall of Kigali, but an "invisible" wall strikes fear into riders ahead of the World Championships

The World Championships in Kigali, the first of its kind on the African continent, can be considered the most unique in twenty years. In 1995, the event was held in Duitama, located in the Andes. That World Championships in Colombia were held at an altitude of 2500 (!) meters, with peaks of around 3000 meters.

Abraham Olano won that day, ahead of Miguel Indurain and Marco Pantani. In total, only twenty riders finished, the last two of whom arrived almost 38 minutes later. The Dutch riders—Michael Boogerd, Erik Breukink, Erik Dekker, and Frans Maassen—and the Belgians—including Kurt Van de Wouwer and Nico Mattan—did not finish.

Nevertheless, there was also Dutch success at that World Championship, which was held in the narcotics-infested regions of Colombia: Danny Nelissen won the amateur race to everyone's surprise and later spoke about the crazy championship. “If you watch Narcos on Netflix now, that's how it was. You simply couldn't leave the hotel without a military escort. With a rifle on his back and a moped.”

Okay, it's not that crazy in Kigali. The capital of Rwanda is situated at an altitude of 1,500 meters, and the World Championship course—for men—reaches a peak of 1,800 meters above sea level at Mount Kigali. Additional factors include relatively poor air quality due to heavy traffic, fairly uncomfortable heat at 27 degrees Celsius, and, for the men, a high UV index, which is expected to reach 10 around noon on Sunday. Notably, the highest UVI ever measured in the Netherlands is below 9.

Anyone who has run in Kigali will have experienced this: your heart rate shoots up immediately after setting off and is much more challenging to regulate than in our flat little country. That is why Anna van der Breggen and Thymen Arensman decided even before the time trial to just go with the flow.

"Anna rode without a power meter, purely on RPM. Because we are at 1500 meters here, afterward, she said: I normally ride at this power during training, but we are now at altitude. Your heart rate stays high. I rode behind Anna on my moped during the recon, and I could see her heart rate: it was pretty high," national coach Laurens ten Dam told us. "Absolutely. I just saw my wattages, and for a 50-minute effort, it was 50 to 60 watts less than normal," said Arensman.

Remco Evenepoel also completed his time trial based on his feelings. “We didn't really want to focus on the wattages. You have to deal with the altitude and the heat, so you knew you wouldn't be able to achieve the wattages you would normally achieve. How big is that difference exactly? We had an idea, but you can never be 100 percent sure. If you let someone ride on instinct, you're closer to reality than with the numbers,” said trainer Koen Pelgrim.

Arensman himself lives in Andorra, which, like Kigali, is 1,500 meters above sea level. “Altitude is altitude, but here there is less oxygen due to the air quality. The day before the recon, you were really riding in smog here. That's different from Andorra, which is more in the mountains. But anyway, that's the same for everyone,” he said, explaining the differences.

And according to the Dutchman, that could also have an impact on Sunday. “If you go into the red once, you'll pay for it dearly. I think it might be a very conservative World Championship, because you can hardly go into the red. I'm curious to see how it goes, maybe it suits me,” Arensman cautiously looked ahead immediately after his time trial.

Ten Dam compares it to his first experience at altitude. “The first time I raced at altitude was in Colorado. What you get then is a kind of novice race. You can attack, but nothing more. You have one shot, and then you run out of oxygen; there’s a kind of brake on it. It’s like riding in the toughest gear.”

It's something we saw and heard a lot on Sunday: a kind of wall that you hit when you're riding at full effort, which seems to instill more fear in the riders than, say, the Wall of Kigali. “You really have to ride with the handbrake on. Once you go over your revs, there's no turning back,” we heard one of the Belgians say to his colleagues from Flanders.

Vollering, Paul Seixas, Isaac del Toro, and even Tadej Pogacar also indicated that the conditions played a role during their time trial. However, the short period of acclimatization may prove to be an advantage a week later, after roughly 10 days on African soil. “The altitude will also play a role there, but within a week it could be completely different because the riders will have recovered,” Pelgrim said of Evenepoel's competitors on Sunday.

In any case, nearly all participants have adapted their preparations to the expected conditions. Training camps above 2000 meters above sea level, altitude tents, and extensive heat training: sitting on the rollers with multiple layers on and sweating profusely for about an hour to elevate the core temperature as high as possible.

Finally, altitude can also affect the bowels, as evidenced by the 2018 Giro, when Tom Dumoulin had to stop on the side of the road. In the Tour de France, too, there are plenty of stories of riders diving into campers during mountain stages to go to the toilet. How should the riders prepare for this, knowing they must consume a large amount of fast carbohydrates on a 268-kilometer course with 6,500 meters of elevation gain?

National coach and ultra-cyclist Ten Dam nuances the possible influence of food intake in these circumstances. “Maybe you need a little more carbohydrates. It's not 2,100 meters, so they're still hungry at 1,500 meters. Above 2,000 meters, that's sometimes less of an issue, but we're keeping a close eye on it. You guys in the press are used to it after two or three days, so I expect the riders will be too.”