Re: Re:
PremierAndrew said:
You're horrified that cyclists are forced to risk breaking a collarbone on a flat stage but not risk losing their life on descents? If you were saying that attacks on descents shouldn't happen either, I'd understand a bit more (even though that's another part of racing). Risking your collarbone for 5s is a much smaller risk than risking your life for 1 minute if you ask me
As for me being biased, well you've probably caught on that it's not like I dislike Contador, and it's not like I was suggesting that descending should be neutralised back when Froome was unable to handle his bike
Again it seems like you've not read all of my post or at least not fully understood what I was saying:
1. Downhill, if you have the necessary skills, you'll rarely crash. Only the occasional fukc-up or someone crashing in front of you can take you down, but the latter can be avoided by descending in first position.
2. In a sprint crash, 9 times out of 10, skills wouldn't save you. If you're going 55kph and three riders go down in front of you, yeah, only the supernatural can save you at that point
3. Downhill, groups are often smaller and many times the battle has already commenced uphill. It seems logical to push it here to put pressure on rivals, both in your own group and in other groups further up/down the road, especially because the gaps can get quite extensive. Moreover, if someone pushes the pace, it is easy for another rider to follow if he so desires: he can pass a couple riders (the group is stretched out) and settle in the wheel of the rider attempting to break free.
4. In a sprint finish, a time loss 99% of the time is not due to the GC contender losing time. In a peloton, we have 15 sprinters and 15 GC contenders. The rest don't care about finishing as fast as possible. GC contender A can finish 20th, GC contender B 35th. But guess what, sprinters' leadouts are dropping back, they are empty and just want their sprinter to win. They don't care about keeping the wheel of the rider ahead of then. And, this way, a GC contender can lose several seconds through no fault of their own. I'm sure you'd agree 15 sprinters and 15 GC contenders and 15 leadouts can't all be among the first 20 with 500m to go. Yet if we stick to the current system, this is what we ask of the riders, if they don't want to lose time: with crashes as a result.
Just as I was writing this Alberto posted a rant on twitter aimed at the UCI, you can guess the message: is this really what you want, surely the loss of a favorite reduces the spectacle much more than a lack of crashes ever would, etc.
Now I've read and heard three possible solutions, and while I think any of them would be better than what we have now, but I realize they have their downsides. Those 3 are;
1. Take time at 3km to go (but won't riders try to gain time at that mark? won't it just become a sprint to 3km to go etc.)
2. Require a gap of 5s before taking into account time differences on GC (but what if someone attacks with 800m to go and wins by 3s and could take the jersey?)
3. The GC contenders declare a ceasefire and roll in together (good luck getting everyone to agree)
But what about this 4th option? I had never occured to me before but is it not weird that if 10 riders come in 0.9 second behind the rider in front of him, and rider 11 finishes 1.1 second behind rider 10, rider 11 suddenly loses 10 seconds on all those riders in front of him, even rider 10 who in reality was only 1.1 second in front?
So my suggestion (and am open to discussion) why not take the time between the last rider of a group and the first rider of the next group? I understand that this might seem slightly unfair to the first rider of the first group who was really (as in the example above) 10 seconds ahead of rider 11, but on the other hand, had rider 11 been .2 second faster, he'd have lost no time at all. Of course this is impossible to do on uphill finishes, so an agreement would have to be made on what stages this rule would be in effect. But to me it seems more fair than losing 10 seconds because you were .2 second too slow, or even worse, because the rider in front of you was .2 second too slow.
Personally, as long as the current rules are in effect and some GC contenders still want to push on for seconds, I'd prefer Alberto to stay back and take a time loss. Hang around at the back, worst case, he loses 15-20s, but at least in such a case he could still show his shape to all the doubters and haters. I'm sure he now wishes he'd chosen that option.