July 8, Stage 8: Belfort - Porrentruy 157.5km

Stage 8 featured seven mountain climbs in only 157 kilometers and finished in the Swiss town of Porrentruy. Chris Horner, of RadioShack Nissan Trek, was in his climbing element finishing 11th and shared a post-race tweet: "It was a good day for RadioShack Nissan Trek - full gas from mile zero thanks to Jens Voigt.  Drag race from the final climb to the line with four in the front."  The team had five riders finish in the top 15 and Jens took the first two climbs of the day.

Watch Horner's video diary with Bycling Magazine below.

Chris Horner's SRM race file below illustrates his average power was nearly 250 watts with a cadence average of 68rpm and speed average of 39kph for the stage.  He climbed a total of 2,770 meters and burned approximately 3,469 kilocalories assuming the human body has ~23% efficiency on the bike. 

RadioShack Nissan Trek: Chris Horner (Stage 8)

Click on SRM File to Enlarge

Chris showed some very impressive maximum power values in Stage 8.  His 1 second maximum was 1,072 watts. Horner's 8 minute max was 408 watts, with a body weight around 64kg, this translates into 6.4 watts/kg.  The 1 hour maximum power was 300 watts further proving this was a very long, tough day in the office for Chris.

Chris went hard "right from the gun" with an average power of more than 260 watts in the first 2 hours.

The final ascent, Col de la Croix, was a Cat 1 climb and Chris averaged 401 watts in the steep 3.6km effort.  The infamous climb has been included in the Tour de France 16 times since 1947.

Chris describes the final descent as a drag race to the line and averages over 275 watts downhill into the flat finish.

RadioShack Nissan Trek is sponsored by SRM, training and racing on the SRM Dura-Ace PowerMeter and PowerControl 7