Solutions to make classics less boring

[willbick]

One of the best races i saw was the world champs when Thor Hushovd won (2010?). They need to make races like that

 

[proffz]

ban radios , power meters, smaller teams.
very simple , it has already been proven that this will work.

Wt points: this is an another issue to discuss.

liege road was almost perfect, but nothing happened .
FW, amstel and primavera roads have to change, but that is a secondary issue.

 

[willbick]

make them ride penny farthings with no brakes

 

[pigoonse]

Vote for smaller teams; ban the race radio's, the power meters, ban head turning (that would be impossible, though ). Did not understand what backloading was until AFrank clarified...definitely change that too. Bring back Angelo Zomegnan for race director. Hire the brilliant CN poster, Libertine Seguros, as race designer too.

Wide open, smooth roads = dull racing. More narrow, winding, preferably wet roads - turn a water hose on them now and then if the weather won't cooperate.

 

[hrotha]

Eh, Zomegnan backloaded his races a lot.

 

[richo36]

The biggest issue is points. Take FW, If you place 10th you get 46 points. So going into a race like FW where there is a high chance that it will be a sprint up the mur with the favorite winning, a lot of teams would rather just top 10 or even top 20 than gamble for the win as the points are to good to lose.

I can see 2 options to solve this:
1.just give points to top 3. They are the riders who deserve it. Maybe even have points given to the most exciting rider as well decided by the public/commentators vote.

2. Change the format of teams and with it the point system. What I mean by change team format, is we go back to having teams with places(or just a title in the name such as legends that doesn't change) such as London (insert sponsor) or merckx (sponsor). Then you have 2 leagues, pretty much how we have it now with the Wt. As in the top league always gets invited to Wt events with wild cards from league 2.

Points are then allocated to the team not the rider. So top 3 get points. Each race has different points allocated so for instance a classic such as lbl offers more than FW. If your team comes 1st, 2nd, 3rd you receive all the points. Points are then added up bottom 4 teams in league 1 are relegated and top 4 in league 2 are promoted. Also whoever comes first gets rewarded with a trophy.

 

[veji11]

The biggest issue is points. Take FW, If you place 10th you get 46 points. So going into a race like FW where there is a high chance that it will be a sprint up the mur with the favorite winning, a lot of teams would rather just top 10 or even top 20 than gamble for the win as the points are to good to lose.

I can see 2 options to solve this:
1.just give points to top 3. They are the riders who deserve it. Maybe even have points given to the most exciting rider as well decided by the public/commentators vote.

2. Change the format of teams and with it the point system. What I mean by change team format, is we go back to having teams with places(or just a title in the name such as legends that doesn't change) such as London (insert sponsor) or merckx (sponsor). Then you have 2 leagues, pretty much how we have it now with the Wt. As in the top league always gets invited to Wt events with wild cards from league 2.

Points are then allocated to the team not the rider. So top 3 get points. Each race has different points allocated so for instance a classic such as lbl offers more than FW. If your team comes 1st, 2nd, 3rd you receive all the points. Points are then added up bottom 4 teams in league 1 are relegated and top 4 in league 2 are promoted. Also whoever comes first gets rewarded with a trophy.

Both bolded points. To me the point system where Riders have points and keep them is just absurd in terms of shopping for rider with points. Teams should hire riders because they have value as riders, be it as a domestique, as a sprinter, leader, whatever.

Second points should be awarded only to top finishes. I would support something like for the WT :
- WT one day races : 100 / 60 / 30.
- WT monuments : 200 / 100 / 60
- WT one week races final classification : 200 / 100 / 50 / 25 / 15
- WT one week races stages : 25 / 15 / 8
- WT GT (Giro and Vuelta) final classification : 600 / 300 / 200 / 150 / 100 / 80 / 60 / 40 / 20 / 10
- WT GT (Giro and Vuelta) stages and special jerseys 40 / 20 /10
- WT Tour de France final classification : 750 / 400 / 250 / 200 / 150 / 100 / 80 / 60 / 40 / 20.

And that's it for WT points. No points for team classifications, points go to the team's total.

No point finishing 7th of the Dauphiné or 12th of the Giro, it brings you nothing in terms of points, so you just have to try to get in the top 5 or top 10.

 

[stutue]

A single landmine under a cobble.

Same for football.

 

[VO2 Max]

turn a water hose on them now and then if the weather won't cooperate.

this, and more F1-style gimmickry! Let's have movable spoilers so the guys in the bunch have to ride with vertical boards to slow them down but fold up when you go in the attack. And giant fans alongside the road so that flat races always have cross winds. And 'surprise' WT points to be available at intermediate points along the route only announced over the (organiser->rider only) radio's 10km before hand. Double WT points for wins without anyone else in the photo obviously.

 

[ILovecycling]

Lol,why 24 people voted for harder parcourse is beyond me

 

[Arnout]

this, and more F1-style gimmickry! Let's have movable spoilers so the guys in the bunch have to ride with vertical boards to slow them down but fold up when you go in the attack. And giant fans alongside the road so that flat races always have cross winds. And 'surprise' WT points to be available at intermediate points along the route only announced over the (organiser->rider only) radio's 10km before hand. Double WT points for wins without anyone else in the photo obviously.

I'd say no to the movable spoilers, that's just too fake and artificial, even F1 wouldn't implement that.

Oh wait.

 

[personal]

Smaller teams will mean less team domination, more teams in peloton = more team leaders to fight it out.

Five or six.

 

[Netserk]

Lol,why 24 people voted for harder parcourse is beyond me

Maybe because hard races usually provide more action than very easy races?

 

[Echoes]

3) Parcours changes, not necessarily harder. I think most races should have a really difficult section from 60km to 15km before the finish. The new RVV has such a parcours: from the 2nd passage of the Oude Kwaremont to the final climb with 13km to go, and then a stretch of flat roads to the finish. PR has something similar from Orchies to carrefour de l'Arbre. I think LBL would benefit from a sequence Wanne - Stockeu - Haute Levée - Rosier (via descent of cote de neuville, not via francorchamps ) - Vecquée - Beauregard - Redoute - Forges - Roche au Faucons - descent+flat, finish again on boulevard de Sauvinière.

More or less agree. The old Flanders route had that too, even more clearly. The hardness of a route is not necessarily an issue, the issue is which part of the route should be reinforced: At around 66% or 75% is fine, fully agree on that. Paris-Roubaix and Milan-Sanremo are different cases.

Fully agree on scrapping the St-Nicolas but I'd also scrap the Falcons, just keep the Forges and the Hornay, that is fine. Perhaps replace the Rosiers by Lorcé reputedly harder (Lorcé was once used in the 90's, when roadwork in the Rosiers). Finish on the Sauvenière would be nice. Ans is not Liège, it's North of it. The climb is not the problem, the problem is you have to cross the city before reaching Ans.

5) Make WT points less of an issue, by attributing way more or way less of them: more races with WT points (a bit like the former UCI points) or only for top 3's in big races and stage winners for stage races.

Simpler solution.

TO HELL WITH THE PROTOUR !!!

 

[HSNHSN]

Also less riders per team means you can invite more teams and have more team-leaders in the peloton to spice things up.

This sounds like a very good way to ensure more riders fall during the race, since there will be even more riders who want to be at the front of the peloton at certain points in the race.

This is why less riders per team is necessary, because nowadays the teammates are so good compared with the leaders (there is a real parity in the field compared to the 80s and before : a teammate is nowadays 95% as strong as his leader, it used to be 75/80%) they can rein in a leader who attacks.

We have seen that this year the Movistars and BMCs and other were able to bring back anyone until the foot of St Nicolas, after 255ks of racing ! Even the leaders can't cope with that. Only way they can is if the race exposes the inner strength of each rider and spas the peloton/draft advantage : cobbles or apocalyptic rain...

Maybe add another 100km or so? I agree that the difference between top riders per team seems to have become a lot less than it was (clinic-related?), but I'm not at all sure smaller teams will help to solve this problem. It will just get more random than it already is.

When it comes to altering the routes: I'm not sure if that's really necessary. More or less the same routes have been used for a long time and I seem to be able to remember awesome races on the LBL and FW courses, for instance. (not quite so in AGR, to be honest, but that may just be my memory) I get the impression it's some sort of mentality issue as well. Riders don't want to try something from a longer distance, somehow, and the speed of the pack doesn't seem to be the deciding factor - average speeds in LBL haven't really changed since '98, for instance.

 

[personal]

Maybe because hard races usually provide more action than very easy races?

I was under different impression.
Hard races and stages get raced conservatively and defensively.

 

[el_angliru]

@HSNHSN The average speed isn't a very good measure stick though, because the avg speed is determined mostly by the morning breakaway (sometimes only two or three minor riders while the peloton is having a rest day).

 

[Netserk]

I was under different impression.
Hard races and stages get raced conservatively and defensively.

Like Ronde and Roubaix? Whereas the much easier San Remo is raced much more aggressive?

 

[scholar]

Bring back Bordeaux-Paris.

 

[Ferminal]

G-W and FW are too hard.

 

[Ferminal]

Bring back Bordeaux-Paris.

Yep, with dernies.

 

[veji11]

@HSNHSN The average speed isn't a very good measure stick though, because the avg speed is determined mostly by the morning breakaway (sometimes only two or three minor riders while the peloton is having a rest day).

also because what matters is the max possible speed of the bunch for a while, not how fast it actually goes. If you are a leader and you know that if you attack in La Redoute, other leaders have the ability to have their temmates chase you at 55Ks per, well you don't even try. so the end speed might not be high in the end but it could have been.

That's the thing with teammates, they act as a great deterrent. If you see that a few teams still have 4/5 riders after la Redoute, you know that there is nothing much to be done.

 

[Arnout]

also because what matters is the max possible speed of the bunch for a while, not how fast it actually goes. If you are a leader and you know that if you attack in La Redoute, other leaders have the ability to have their temmates chase you at 55Ks per, well you don't even try. so the end speed might not be high in the end but it could have been.

That's the thing with teammates, they act as a great deterrent. If you see that a few teams still have 4/5 riders after la Redoute, you know that there is nothing much to be done.

The thing with teammates is true, but part of that problem is the biggest teams being ***. Arguably Movistar and BMC were the strongest teams in the race, both with team leaders and a squad in depth. Neither attacked, they just all rode to defend the leaders. If the biggest teams of the race have a negative attitude like that, no amount of profile restructuring will help, especially not when the other teams accept the race dictated by the biggest favorites.

I mean, look at AG2R, they had a few guys up there and they tried to break the status quo with Bardet, Riblon and Pozzovivo. They very nearly succeeded, mostly on their own (with a bit of help from Trek and Europcar). If they would've had help from even 2 or 3 teams, it would've been a very different race. The other teams just decided to sit and wait to get beaten (just like BMC and Movistar incidentally)...

 

[veji11]

The thing with teammates is true, but part of that problem is the biggest teams being ***. Arguably Movistar and BMC were the strongest teams in the race, both with team leaders and a squad in depth. Neither attacked, they just all rode to defend the leaders. If the biggest teams of the race have a negative attitude like that, no amount of profile restructuring will help, especially not when the other teams accept the race dictated by the biggest favorites.

I mean, look at AG2R, they had a few guys up there and they tried to break the status quo with Bardet, Riblon and Pozzovivo. They very nearly succeeded, mostly on their own (with a bit of help from Trek and Europcar). If they would've had help from even 2 or 3 teams, it would've been a very different race. The other teams just decided to sit and wait to get beaten (just like BMC and Movistar incidentally)...

But this tactic made perfect sense : Valverde and Gilbert are among the fastest for a sprintish type of finish, they don't want to go on a big offensive, so they ask their team to make sure that it comes down to the wire : "make sure no one leaves, bring us to St Nicolas/Ans and we will take it from there"... Deprive them of a strong team and the situation changes

 

[Arnout]

But this tactic made perfect sense : Valverde and Gilbert are among the fastest for a sprintish type of finish, they don't want to go on a big offensive, so they ask their team to make sure that it comes down to the wire : "make sure no one leaves, bring us to St Nicolas/Ans and we will take it from there"... Deprive them of a strong team and the situation changes

Well, as they experienced themselves, among the fastest means one can be beaten. As it turned out, they didn't even need to be deprived of their team to get beaten, so obviously something went wrong. That said, I can understand why someone would choose to wait to maximize (Gerrans being a prime example), but if you've shown during the season that you're one of the strongest guys in the race, waiting like he did will just increase randomness in the result, there will always be a guy ready to beat you that you could've beaten easily in a decisive attack.

But my main gripe isn't even with Valverde or Gilbert. It's with teams like Belkin, Lotto, Astana, you name them, who had guys there but were glad to be beaten without even trying to win.