Growing roses is top sports, as is growing most things, by the way. People often ask me how on earth I manage to operate 140 hectares of production. The standard answer is that there is no ‘I’ involved, but that we do this together with a highly motivated team of almost 2,000 people. And I have recently learnt something new which is part of the answer: Zone 2.
In the last edition of the Tour de France, the cyclists cycled faster than ever before, even faster than during the infamous doping-ridden years of 1995 - 2005. They went up a mountain faster than Marco Pantani, who was sky high on drugs, or Mister 60%, Bjarne Riss, who owes his nickname to his hematocrit count. The top times of EPO champions Jan Ullrich and Lance Armstrong are being struck from the record books. Surely this arouses some suspicion...
I am not condoning the use of doping, but those were great times to watch the Tour de France, much like today: great stages with battles being fought between Vingegaard and Pogacar and the clever team tactics of Jumbo-Visma and UAE. I thought it was one of the best editions in recent years, regardless of whether they’re on something or not. Once you delve into things a bit deeper, you’ll hear terms like improved material, special diets and the famous Zone 2 training.