The 2012 London Summer Olympic Games

[KelOnWheels]

@DaveK 26773 wrote:

Usually they wouldn’t race against each other – teams have a designated sprinter if they come to the line with more than one racer together. For example – if the USA came together to a bunch sprint in the Olympics they had said that Taylor Phinney would lead out Tyler Farrar for the win. If it was from the breakaway, Tejay Van Garderen and Timmy Duggan had been working for Taylor Phinney to take the win. If for some reason two teammates in a breakaway come to the line together I imagine they’d work it out together beforehand and probably wouldn’t sprint for it. Alberto Contador gave away a stage to a former teammate in last year’s Giro when they came to the line together because he was already in the race lead and didn’t need yet another stage win.

Shorter – they usually work this out in advance.

Thanks! I was wondering how that worked.

My comprehension of the road races this weekend was somewhat confused by my newly-discovered ability to fall asleep during the final approaches.

So for the men’s race I was all “Yay, Team GB!! Zzzz… Kazakhstan!”

And for the women’s race I was all “Yay, Team GB & Team USA! Zzzzz… Netherlands!”

[PotomacCyclist]

Reminder: The men’s and women’s cycling individual time trials take place tomorrow (Wednesday)!

7:30-8:45 am, Women’s time trial, LIVE – NBC Sports Network

10:00-11:05 am, Men’s time trial, LIVE (joined in progress) – NBC

The women’s TT will be rebroadcast on NBC during the late night show: 12:35-1:35 am

http://www.nbcolympics.com/tv-listings/index.html

[rcannon100]

Cool

[ATTACH=CONFIG]1473[/ATTACH]

[PotomacCyclist]

Who is this person?

http://www.london2012.com/imgml/athletes/l/1254507.png

The former guitarist for The Byrds? The bassist for The Jimi Hendrix Experience?

[KelOnWheels]

@PotomacCyclist 27124 wrote:

Who is this person?

The former guitarist for The Byrds? The bassist for The Jimi Hendrix Experience?

Time Lord.

[Certifried]

http://www.foxnews.com/sports/2012/08/02/london-police-name-cyclist-killed-by-olympic-bus648383/

so very sad, thoughts and prayers to everyone involved

[KelOnWheels]

Very sad indeed.

Interesting helmet debate spurred by the incident; some good comments: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2182586/Bradley-Wiggins-knows-lot-cycling-But-wrong-safety-benefits-wearing-helmet.html

[krazygl00]

@KelOnWheels 27238 wrote:

Very sad indeed.

Interesting helmet debate spurred by the incident; some good comments: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2182586/Bradley-Wiggins-knows-lot-cycling-But-wrong-safety-benefits-wearing-helmet.html

There is no such thing as an interesting helmet debate. (Clicks link anyway).

[mstone]

@krazygl00 27301 wrote:

There is no such thing as an interesting helmet debate. (Clicks link anyway).

There are actually a lot of interesting new points in that thread.

Made you look?

[krazygl00]

@mstone 27302 wrote:

There are actually a lot of interesting new points in that thread.

Made you look?

I am particularly susceptible to following links.

It wasn’t a total loss…it is Mail Online so there were plenty of links to other articles with racy photos

[Certifried]

Unfortunately, I don’t think a helmet would have helped this poor soul. From a first hand witness who wrote about it, the cyclist was crushed by the bus tires in the middle

[PotomacCyclist]

Will I get banned from the forum if I say that I’m a bigger Olympic swimming fan than an Olympic cycling fan? There isn’t as much drama in individual time trials and flat road stages, not like the giant mountain stages at the Tour de France. The track cycling is interesting because it’s so different from what I’m used to. But it’s kind of like a Jetsons Space Age sport to me. Olympic swimming is what inspired me to take up triathlon and thus cycling. The Games have been awesome so far.

I’ve also caught some of the more obscure sports like table tennis, water polo and team handball as well as a couple of the early soccer matches. The Olympic marathons will be another highlight for me. Until 2008, I thought marathons were boring. Now I find them fascinating. (I also thought cycling races were boring until 2008. I had two chances to see the Tour de France in person in the past, when I was in Paris for the summers. But I never bothered to look up the schedule and watch. )

[PotomacCyclist]

These track cycling races are… different. The keirin is strange. The entire group rides slowly for several laps, following an electric bike. (I’m not making this up.) Then the electric bike pacer drops out and the cyclists speed up before sprinting for the finish.

The sprint event also starts out slowly, but without a pacer. The first lap is extremely slow, maybe slower than 5 mph. Then they start to speed up in the 2nd lap. The 3rd lap becomes the all-out sprint, where they reach speeds of around 45 mph. This would be fun to watch in person, but probably not so fun to race. (Those all-out sprints have to hurt!) Supposedly a temporary velodrome is supposed to be installed at Buzzard Point in SW DC, but the initial schedule of June 2012 has come and gone. Maybe we’ll see track cycling races in DC next summer.

http://www.dcvelodrome.org/

[PotomacCyclist]

http://www.nbcolympics.com/video/cycling/track-w-keirin-m-team-pursuit-finals.html

[PotomacCyclist]

I saw some of the BMX qualifiying rounds. It’s an odd format. They have multiple “quarterfinals” except that everyone races, unless they have already accumulated enough points to move on. Then they drop out of the next qualifying heats. They get points based on their position in the race, with fewer points being better.

I probably haven’t watched a BMX race since the 2008 Olympics. Plenty of nasty crashes, almost during every heat. Most of the riders were able to get up, but one guy seemed very wobbly. He had to be helped off the course. A female U.S. rider smacked into the course head-first on one heat. Fortunately she was able to sit up soon after, and spoke with the interviewer later on. I think she was OK. The riders wore motocross-type helmets and large neck collars that help to prevent their necks from snapping back violently. It’s probably not the most dangerous Olympic sport but there is the potential for a lot of minor injuries. (Platform diving and gymnastics are probably more dangerous.)

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