Cycling

[JTMacc99]

Your topic to discuss the Olympic Cycling sports!  BMX Freestyle, BMX Racing, Mountain Biking, Road Cycling, Track Cycling.

[Jazzhands]

Am I the only one who stayed up until after 4:30 a.m. to watch the men's road race?  It was totally worth it. 

[Lady Whistleup]

2 hours ago, Jazzhands said:

Am I the only one who stayed up until after 4:30 a.m. to watch the men's road race?  It was totally worth it. 

Watching the replay on NBC right now. Six hours on the road ... what a tough race.

[Bewitched]

I just watched the end of the women's road race.  One of the pre-race favorites from the Netherlands didn't realize someone had gotten ahead of her and then thought she had won.  A rider from Austria actually finished about a minute and a half ahead of her.  The usual radio communication amongst teams isn't allowed at the Olympics and therefore she had no idea she needed to catch anyone.  That was a bit awkward.

[hjmugillecuty]

Is that what happened? I stayed up late to watch the finish of that and the commentators couldn’t understand why no one had broken off to catch the Austrian earlier. I guess they thought they’d already reabsorbed her into the peloton? Cause they caught the Polish and Israeli cyclists with about 3 miles to go.

[meep.meep]

I watched the replay this morning - when I tuned in they have 30km to go and the Austrian was 5 minutes ahead.  I'd love to see a replay of how she snuck out in front.  Why didn't anyone see her?  It did turn into one of the most exciting things I've seen at the Olympics!

[cambridgeguy]

NBC's replay did a horrible job of explaining it but Kiesenhofer (the winner) was part of a small breakaway that attacked at the very start of the race.  They built a huge lead (11 minutes at one point) and Kiesenhofer managed to drop the rest of her group. 

[Dots And Stripes]

5 hours ago, hjmugillecuty said:

Is that what happened? I stayed up late to watch the finish of that and the commentators couldn’t understand why no one had broken off to catch the Austrian earlier. I guess they thought they’d already reabsorbed her into the peloton? Cause they caught the Polish and Israeli cyclists with about 3 miles to go.

That's what NBC said when they replayed it this afternoon. A reporter asked the rider from the Netherlands what happened and she said she didn't realize the Austrian had gotten away.

[greyhorse]

I watched the men's mountain bike last night.  Holy moley, now I know why I don't mountain bike.  Some of the slopes seemed so steep.  And I was surprised how many of the bikers got off their bike and just started running up the hill pushing their bike.  Guess that's allowed.

Van der Poel (sp?), the guy who I think was wearing the yellow jersey in the Tour de France in the early stages, had a monstrous crash.  They were saying the was a medal contender but after that crash and he was so far behind, he abandoned.  Looked pretty beat up.

Also felt bad for some other medal contender who got a flat tire late in the race.  Why isn't there any fix for that?  I guess there's no team car following you like in the Tour, and depending on where you are in the course it would be pretty impossible to get a spare.  Just bad luck I guess.

[galaxygirl76]

Remember Annemiek van Vleuten from the last Olympics? She fell in the road race in Rio in winning position and it looked like she got really hurt? She just won Olympic gold in the time trial event, following a silver in the road race.

[selkie]

On 7/25/2021 at 5:47 PM, Dots And Stripes said:

That's what NBC said when they replayed it this afternoon. A reporter asked the rider from the Netherlands what happened and she said she didn't realize the Austrian had gotten away.

Have heard something about the Olympics not allowing race radios for the cyclists like pro events have, so it's somewhat easier for a solo breakaway to fly under the radar. 

[Rickster]

5 hours ago, selkie said:

Have heard something about the Olympics not allowing race radios for the cyclists like pro events have, so it's somewhat easier for a solo breakaway to fly under the radar. 

Yes, that was mentioned in the commentary. No race radios.

[galaxygirl76]

First ever BMX gold for the Netherlands by the men followed by a surprise bronze by the women, it started out rough but it turned into a very good day. 

[emmawoodhouse]

Any updates on the American guy who was taken to the hospital?

[MaryMitch]

43 minutes ago, emmawoodhouse said:

Any updates on the American guy who was taken to the hospital?

I heard he is still in ICU but is awake.

[emma675]

51 minutes ago, emmawoodhouse said:

Any updates on the American guy who was taken to the hospital?

Oh yikes, what happened?

[emmawoodhouse]

28 minutes ago, emma675 said:

Oh yikes, what happened?

Bad pileup. He was at the bottom of it. 

[meep.meep]

On 7/27/2021 at 8:40 PM, galaxygirl76 said:

Remember Annemiek van Vleuten from the last Olympics? She fell in the road race in Rio in winning position and it looked like she got really hurt? She just won Olympic gold in the time trial event, following a silver in the road race.

She also fell in the road race this time too.  Not as bad and she went on to medal.  And to think she'd actually won.

[emmawoodhouse]

9 hours ago, MaryMitch said:

I heard he is still in ICU but is awake.

Latest update: he suffered a brain hemorrhage, but the bleeding has stopped, and he's out of the ICU. He remains hospitalized.

[Bill1978]

OK I admit BMX Freestyle was better than I expected. For some reason I thought it would be a halfpipe type of thing. But zooming around a park doing jumps and whatnots is kinda fun to watch. Probably also helped that the Aussie in the Men's comp is seeded first for the final, so I had that extra level of investment.

[SunnyBeBe]

I missed it.  Here’s a story on it.

https://people.com/sports/tokyo-olympics-bmx-olympian-connor-fields-suffered-brain-bleed-in-crash-during-race/

 

 

 

[blackwing]

On 7/31/2021 at 3:46 AM, Bill1978 said:

OK I admit BMX Freestyle was better than I expected. For some reason I thought it would be a halfpipe type of thing. But zooming around a park doing jumps and whatnots is kinda fun to watch. Probably also helped that the Aussie in the Men's comp is seeded first for the final, so I had that extra level of investment.

I watched NBC’s coverage of the BMX Freestyle and I was pretty impressed with the skills.  But I wish there had been a better explanation of the scoring.  
 

Particularly in the women’s competition.  The British woman who won was amazing.   So many complicated tricks and spins on her second run.  But her score didn’t seem that much higher than the second run of the second American.  The American who got silver, Hannah something, did pretty well on her first run, it was impressive.  I believe she did at least one upside down flip and she scored 89 something.  
 

But then the other American, Paris something,     she was clearly not as good.  Lots of jumps where she just went into the air and didn’t do much.  No upside down flips.  The only thing she really did was this stupid looking “twist the handlebars”.  Yet her second run she scored an 88, barely less than Hannah’s really good first run.  Not sure how that works.  Interestingly, I think she actually thought she would win a bronze medal with her average looking run.  She looked so disappointed when she realised she only got an 88.  
 

if there was more of a breakdown of the scoring showing points for difficulty and execution, like in diving, it would make more sense perhaps.  

[Danny Franks]

I don't know if this is the end of a glorious era in British track cycling, or just a lull before the next generation of competitors come through, but there's been a marked decrease in success at this Olympics. 

Still, at least we can rely on Laura Kenny, who became the most successful female Olympic cyclist ever today, with her gold in the Madison following silver in the Team Pursuit.

[greyhorse]

Tried watching I think what was called the "Omnium" last night.  Boy was it confusing.  From this article, I'm guessing what I was watching was the "Tempo Race", which apparently is one of the four races of this so-called Omnium.  Was that ever explained in the broadcast?  I felt like NBC sort of just cut-in to the race without any introduction, sort of like how they've been doing with all of these lesser sports.  "And now, we're going to make our way over to <Japanese venue name and location, which means nothing to us viewers> and we'll join action already in progress for <sport you're not interested in but we'll show you because there's nothing better on>.  <Announcers that you might not recognize, although I think in this case maybe it was Christian Van De Velde even though we never saw his face?> has the call."

I deduced that you gain points for winning sprints and for lapping the field, which I think I saw happen two or three times. 

Many questions since there wasn't any explanation...

With 20-30 riders, it seemed like 1 or 2 would break away so they could get 20 points.  Why would the field allow them to do so?  To lap the field, does the rider have to make it in front of every other single rider?  Or just make it back to the end of the peloton (I know that's not the right term for this type of cycling but it's the only term I know)?  If it's that you have to start at the front, go all the way around super fast, catch up to the back of the field, and then make your way to the front of the pack again, that seems quite difficult.  

Why were so many riders going "up" the curved track?  Wouldn't it be most efficient to stay down low so you're not cycling as much?  Or are they going "up" because they're out of gas, and they're moving out of the way so the riders behind them don't run into them?  Why can't you just slow down?  Is it common courtesy to move out of the way?  Just odd that you would see riders voluntarily giving up position when it didn't seem like they needed to.

Edited August 6, 2021 by greyhorse
deduced and deducted mean different things...

[Bill1978]

Should I be surprised that Australia isn't racking up the medals in cycling? Has my memory duped me into thinking we were once a force? I wasn't expecting a gold rush but I thought we use to get a decent amount of silver or bronzes. 

[Trey]

I thought all events were finished so didn't watch last night.  I would have loved to have seen Kelsey Mitchell win her gold.

Edited August 8, 2021 by Trey

[proserpina65]

I saw some of the men's Madison race this weekend.  I didn't really understand it, but it was fascinating to watch.

[Danny Franks]

On 8/7/2021 at 12:05 AM, greyhorse said:

With 20-30 riders, it seemed like 1 or 2 would break away so they could get 20 points.  Why would the field allow them to do so?  To lap the field, does the rider have to make it in front of every other single rider?  Or just make it back to the end of the peloton (I know that's not the right term for this type of cycling but it's the only term I know)?  If it's that you have to start at the front, go all the way around super fast, catch up to the back of the field, and then make your way to the front of the pack again, that seems quite difficult.  

Why were so many riders going "up" the curved track?  Wouldn't it be most efficient to stay down low so you're not cycling as much?  Or are they going "up" because they're out of gas, and they're moving out of the way so the riders behind them don't run into them?  Why can't you just slow down?  Is it common courtesy to move out of the way?  Just odd that you would see riders voluntarily giving up position when it didn't seem like they needed to.

I'm not an expert, but I'll attempt to answer these:

The longer track races are very tactical affairs, with lots of mental calculations about how many sprints to do, how to ensure you're still in the running without burning all your energy. So for each sprint session, riders will make a decision as to whether they want to be part of it and expend extra energy, or wait for what they consider a more opportune time. Sometimes they're not positioned well on the track to go with the leaders, or they might have been in the previous sprint and want to recover a little.

There are a lot of courtesies in track cycling, because crashes are so common and so dangerous, so riding up to the top of the track is what they're supposed to do if they're riding much slower than other riders. Also, a lot of track cycling is about finding slipstreams behind other riders, so if you've been in the lead for a while you're expending a lot more energy than those immediately behind you. Again, part of the courtesies of the sport (which is true of road cycling too) is that people take turns to lead the pack so the energy burn is shared. If someone wants to break away and go it alone, they'll be using up a lot more energy than if they were in a group that was taking turns to be the lead rider.