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Cycling: Totally Dope Rides

SnideAsides

By SnideAsides
in 2016 Olympics

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Superpole2000

Superpole2000

It's amazing that we had no live views and no replays of any of the crashes. In all cases, we just saw the riders sitting on the pavement in the aftermath. I guess the motorcycle camera crews couldn't safely stay close to the riders on the descents. Nibali looked a certainty for a medal before he crashed, and I still haven't seen how it happened (I heard he was the first to go down in the two-person crash). Kind of disappointing to have no view of those crucial moments.

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Sew Sumi

Sew Sumi

(edited)
4 hours ago, Superpole2000 said:

It's amazing that we had no live views and no replays of any of the crashes. In all cases, we just saw the riders sitting on the pavement in the aftermath. I guess the motorcycle camera crews couldn't safely stay close to the riders on the descents. Nibali looked a certainty for a medal before he crashed, and I still haven't seen how it happened (I heard he was the first to go down in the two-person crash). Kind of disappointing to have no view of those crucial moments.

I watched the live feed (I'm on the west coast and all of NBC's coverage is tape-delayed), and they didn't get to the crash until after the fact, but did show it on replay while they were still trying to get sorted out. Nibali bailed on a corner, Fuglsang went up his back, and Majka, a little bit behind, picked his way through the carnage. 

I have no idea who controls the feeds, but the internet feed doesn't use the main announcers (which I missed having just gone through the Tour with them).

Edited by Sew Sumi
candall

candall

It's Sunday morning and I'm chilled back with some (real cream, yum) coffee and Women's Cycling.  They're talking about the Men's event yesterday:  Good Lord! Crashes, broken bones, only HALF the field even finished, because the course was so hard?!?  Cobblestones, crosswinds, some kind of long deadly downhill, hey watch out for those bottles lying on the road!

Is Rio bent on killing the cyclists or is the sport always this bloody and dangerous?

The only cycling I've ever watched had people popping along out in the wide open spaces, but these women are crushed into a little knot, trying to squeeze through bottlenecks under highway overpasses and dodging around support vehicles.  I'm agog.

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Superpole2000

Superpole2000

2 hours ago, candall said:

Is Rio bent on killing the cyclists or is the sport always this bloody and dangerous?

It's a high stakes, all or nothing, one-day event. Cyclists will gamble in this event more than in any other. So some riders blow their energy trying to keep pace in the hopes that they find lightning in a bottle, some riders literally crash out trying to get every last second on tricky descents, and some riders are team players who spend all of their energy acting as a windscreen for the better riders on their team. The course isn't too difficult...it's just a classic case of risk vs. reward where finishing the race isn't much consolation for not winning it.

My complaint with the course is that the windy sections are lined with so much foliage that you can't see the distance gaps between packs of riders. It doesn't make for the best viewing spectacle.

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galaxygirl76

galaxygirl76

(edited)

Our radio doesn't have any updates either and are kinda lackluster reporting the rest of the race because they are clearly not in the right mindset to do so. 

 

Apparently Gazzeta della sport just tweeted that she's ok and being treated by doctors...take that as you want to because no idea how reliable that is.

Well, that's an interesting turn of events for us...wow.

Edited by galaxygirl76
galaxygirl76

galaxygirl76

(edited)

ok, so our chef de mission said she's awake and sitting in the ambulance, the Belgian camera crew that's in charge of the camera work of the race said she was awake but in shock. So it seems things are ok-ish. Radio is talking about a rollercoaster of emotions with the other girl winning the race quite unexpectedly becaus she's not known to be a fast finisher.

 

ETA, we're very carefully starting to be happy about the gold

Edited by galaxygirl76
KenyaJ

KenyaJ

(edited)

I'm glad the Dutch rider is okay. That fall was terrifying. Also, my heart hurts for Maura Abbot. You could see that coming for the last few minutes of the race, but that didn't make me any less sad for her when it happened.

ETA: I loved seeing the interview with Maura. Her attitude was so great. She definitely has a new fan in me.

Edited by KenyaJ
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galaxygirl76

galaxygirl76

Happy for Kristin Armstrong(what a story!!) but very, very unenthused about the Russian lady even being allowed to be there after being suspended for a year and a half in 2014 after failing a drug test and getting the silver. I thought the IOC said no Russians athletes with a dirty past were allowed period. Added to that bitterness is the fact that a Dutch rider got fourth, happy about the bronze for Anna though.

galaxygirl76

galaxygirl76

(edited)

Cancellara is a beast, good for him in his last year. Too bad my fellow Dutchman (and Olympics boyfriend) Tom Dumoulin couldn't win but a few weeks ago he didn't even think he would be able to go to Rio at all after a nasty fall in the Tour de France, which resulted in a broken bone in his arm and now he wins the silver. I'm sure he's disappointed now but will realize in a bit that he did a great job.

Edited by galaxygirl76
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ElDosEquis

ElDosEquis

What I don't understand is all the whining about the road courses.

The fucking Tour is 2k of all kinds of different challenges - What does a flat course with nothing to challenge a rider prove ? The Men's RR was one of the best races I had seen in a long time - there were a whole Tour's worth of obstacles to ride thru on that circuit.

I thought it was a ball buster and rightly so, It is the Olympics.

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Danny Franks

Danny Franks

(edited)

Crazy stuff in the Keirin race. Seems like a combination of cyclists being over eager and the derny rider being a little slower than expected. Chris Hoy said on commentary that the derny rider usually accelerates down that back straight to ensure there's no chance of overlap. He also said that, crazily, the rules are not clear on how to determine if an overlap has occurred.

Half the field would probably have been disqualified, if the judges had started eliminating people. But without level cameras, they didn't really have the proof to disqualify anyone.

Edited by Danny Franks
Superpole2000

Superpole2000

In theory, I could love velodrome cycling...especially the head to head sprints. But I feel like they could be hyped and organized much better. I watched an hour of coverage this week, and sometimes there would be one on one races, sometimes team events, sometimes six riders at a time, sometimes more than a dozen riders, sometimes some omnium stuff...it was all very confusing. Either there are too many events, or they need to keep them separated better. They just seem to randomly rotate between them.

Also, they should show a bracket with the cyclist matchups. Show us the seedings. Show us where each cyclist ranks in the world so we know who the favourites are. Give us the context needed to appreciate the competition. I want to love you, velodrome cycling, but I have to know what the hell I'm watching!

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Danny Franks

Danny Franks

10 hours ago, Superpole2000 said:

In theory, I could love velodrome cycling...especially the head to head sprints. But I feel like they could be hyped and organized much better. I watched an hour of coverage this week, and sometimes there would be one on one races, sometimes team events, sometimes six riders at a time, sometimes more than a dozen riders, sometimes some omnium stuff...it was all very confusing. Either there are too many events, or they need to keep them separated better. They just seem to randomly rotate between them.

Also, they should show a bracket with the cyclist matchups. Show us the seedings. Show us where each cyclist ranks in the world so we know who the favourites are. Give us the context needed to appreciate the competition. I want to love you, velodrome cycling, but I have to know what the hell I'm watching!

I think velodrome cycling has all the ingredients to be a compulsive spectator sport. The tension of the sprints, the chaos of the keirin, the excitement of the elimination race... the utter confusion of the points race. It takes place in an arena where everyone can see everything that's going on, it has interesting personalities and rivalries. There are other, even crazier, events that aren't included in the Olympics, as well.

But I agree that it could be more organised, and they could present the events more clearly. It's a shame, because the UK is so good at velodrome cycling, but no one (including me, in my hypocrisy) pays it any attention outside of the Olympics. We're all too invested in the football monoculture to care about niche sports.

I guess this is why the British team talks about this four year cycle, where they aim to peak at the Olympics. They know few people care about cycling world championships, and the nation's eyes will only be on them when they compete under those five rings.

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