Ben recently connected with legendary lead out man Michael Mørkøv, and took the opportunity to find out more about his career and use of VeloViewer. It is always fascinating to get the view from a rider as to how VeloViewer has changed the logistics of racing, and how it is integrated into team and race organisers’ planning systems.
Can you tell us the background to your cycling career and highlights?
I started off as a track cyclist and grew up on the boards (ed: Velodrome) and I won Worlds and World Cup medals, going on to win Olympic medals. I then turned professional on the road starting with Saxo Bank, the former CSC team. There the main focus was to participate in the Tour de France and be optimistic for the GC riders. I then moved to Katusha and Quick Step where I took on the role as lead out man for the best sprinters of the time. As a result I combined road and track cycling for many years.
What is your current role?
I was lucky enough, when I announced my retirement from racing, that a vacancy was open for a new National Coach in Denmark. My very good friend Anders Lund stopped as National Coach after 9 years, and in taking on the role I was very motivated to work with young Danish cyclists, and of course we have a very strong group of riders at the moment.
We just completed the Nations Cups, Grand Prix Orlen, and last week the Peace Race for the Under 23’s, so far winning a stage in each and achieving second in the nations ranking. I’m really pleased and proud of the first two races I have completed with the Under 23 team.
You’re known for your lead-outs, even long before VeloViewer existed – before VeloViewer what information did you receive as a rider, and how did racing change once you started using our WorldTour package?
The road book as a rider was very important before VeloViewer as only a few days before the race you would get this to study the finals and run into the sprint, which I was most interested in. You could also use Google Earth and other map programmes to figure out how a finish would look, but for me VeloViewer was a game-changer in 2019 because it collected everything together – with a bunch of very handy tools for Directors, but also for riders and staff. I realise that now I work with soigneurs and mechanics, this is game-changing for cycling. The way you can organise yourself and study the parcour and track, seeing the Google Earth man alongside pictures of each road and corners you’re going to ride through is brilliant.
Luckily experience as a rider comes into play together with VeloViewer tools; if you have a random person looking at VeloViewer data they would perhaps not have a good view on how a race will go, but as an experienced rider having ridden the Tour de France you know how these different circumstances can be anticipated, for example, in the last 2km of Tour de France they remove all road furniture.
Logistically it’s very difficult to send people to France in advance to take pictures and video of the finish, so as a rider it’s very good to be able to use the VeloViewer tools and combine this with in-race experience.
Without this normally either a DS or soigneur ahead of the race film key points and call the director who would then watch and listen to an explanation – the danger here is the information is passed through many people so can get lost in translation. Equally with 25km to go riders are focused on the race so not really listening to Sports Directors on the radio.
That’s why VeloViewer works best as a sprinter/lead out as the tool allows you to spend a lot of time watching the run into the finishes, taking pictures from Google Earth, and being specific on metres from the last corner, or the 2nd to last corner. VeloViewer is fantastic as it can run from start to finish, or last corner to the finish line. As a rider you try to fill your mind with as much information as possible before the race to have an idea of what you’re facing – then get confirmation from directors/team car as to what you imagined, VeloViewer is invaluable in this respect.
How long in advance would you prepare for a race like the Tour de France? Would you try to ride the finish ahead of the race or just use Street View in VeloViewer?
I don’t do much recon, GC riders do a lot on TT and climbs but I think as a pro cyclist with such a busy programme it’s a balance of how you spend your time. Usually in the run up to the Tour de France you have races and training camps so mostly little time for recon, but with VeloViewer tools, and experience as a rider, you can figure out how you want the finish to be. Sometimes it may be a few days before you see a few finishes, if it’s near a hotel, or if a rest day gives you the opportunity. Most of the time you’re riding in blindness, arriving at important finishes at the Tour de France where you’ve never ridden but have to perform at the highest level to contest for the win. This is always a challenge but super exciting – sometimes you’re looking three months ahead but to actually do it in the race, it’s cool to realise it’s close to what you already imagined.
As lead out guy do you work together collaboratively with the sprinter or do they rely on you to do the prep?
I’ve worked with a lot of sprinters, more than 10 top sprinters and different personalities, some totally trust me and focus on their sprint at the end. This is the feeling I prefer so I can take responsibility as lead out man to take care of the parcour, and explain the run-in to the sprinter with as few details as possible, so they keep their mental energy for the last 200m sprint.
Some sprinters are as much into the parcour as me, and long discussions days before the race take place on how to anticipate the event. It varies but as lead out man I feel it’s my main responsibility to know the parcour and have a game plan.
Cavendish always trusted me 100% so often he didn’t look much at the parcour. He was interested, but I always had the feeling he trusted so much in me and my skills; often he asked ‘when should we be at the front’ and ‘how should we do the sprint’. From that point of view we worked really well together as he was one of fastest riders in the world and I was lucky enough to bring him to a winning position.
Then riders like Sam Bennett and Fabio Jakobsen were very interested in parcours and details before – so it all comes down to different personalities of riders.
Would you be involved with the team presentation beforehand?
Usually days before the race, before important sprints I would have small words with key riders around the lead out. After years with Quick-Step I had a close relationship with the Sports Directors who produced the main strategy and we ran this through VeloViewer. Before the stage we would discuss how to approach, and of course he would do tactics, but when on the bus, and before the start, I would come with last ideas or motivation for team mates to make sure everyone was ready to perform on the sprint.
How much information would you try and remember going into a sprint stage – would you rely on information provided over the team radio or waymarkers on your head unit?
Good point with waymarkers, as a rider I didn’t use them much as I used to use a smaller Garmin unit so never got it to run with waymarkers during the stage. As a lead out man I’m very focused on the last 10 kms so memorise the roundabouts and last corners. I have very specific points in my mind, and when riding fast it’s unrealistic to look down on the Garmin unit. It was very handy the day before the race to look at VeloViewer, running through the course, where’s the feeding zone, how long the climb was etc. I was focused on learning and remembering the race route as I could not sit and look at the computer unit on the bike.
Waypoints are super cool now for me as a DS and National Coach. When I add my mechanic to the VeloViewer Race Hub we have all these cool features on the parcour live, and we can move the bullet points to where they are actually standing, so as a DS waymark tools are amazing.
For the World Championships we are not using radio so a lot of the information is more for myself and super handy, as every time a rider passes the car in races without radio it is important to give them vital information in the five seconds they are passing. Without a radio as a DS you have to be super sharp to pass on information when you have contact with riders in the car.
With the World Championships being in Rwanda this year in-person recons will be hard for staff/riders for logistical reasons, how do you manage this?
VeloViewer almost saves us from a trip to Rwanda to check out the parcour, as the tools with VeloViewer are so precise that actually looking at home you get a pretty good view of the parcour. It is expensive to travel and fit into a whole national programme so I am really pleased to have the tool so that we can spend the money better in the Federation, and prepare from home. We’re working closely with the Norwegian Federation who have been to Rwanda to look at the routes and I have confirmation of what I can see on VeloViewer – with this being so specific it has meant we have not needed to travel for recon of this World Champs.