Pro cyclist Pawel Poljanski has shared a shocking photo of the state of his legs after 16 stages of the gruelling Tour de France.
“I think my legs look little tired,” the polish rider posted on Instagram, along with a photo.
Fans expressed their shock/concern/distress over the image, but a University of Queensland doctor explained what’s going on here…
“The amount of blood that we get normally going down to our legs is five litres per minute,” Dr Bradley Launikonis told the ABC.
“For an untrained athlete, their maximum exercise will have 20 litres per minute flowing through the muscles…
“One of these elite cyclists will have double that, about 40 litres per minute. They have massive volumes of blood moving through.
“The blood can pool there and that’s what’s happening in this extreme case. There is blood pooling in his veins which is why you’re seeing them.”
The scary part for Poljanski — there are still five TDF stages to go.
