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lets look to the future
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by rigshard on August 31, 2003
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Have the American age-groupers accepted the drafting style of racing or is their claim still that it is not real triathlon? It seems that the rest of the world has accepted and are focusing on optimizing this change and yet the American's are still holding onto the past instead of learning that change had to take place to have a future.
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Anonymous post on August 31, 2003
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It's a liability issue. In the US at least 95% of the races cannot have the roads closed to traffic, they get the curb lane and maybe one half of one lane and that is it. You cannot get a permit to close roads and if you do the cost is ridiculous. Euro's are bike racers, Americans are not. If you went to drafting races here you would limit the fields to only the chosen few, make it way to expensive for most of us because of increased insurance costs and kill the sport here. For almost everyone in the states the sport is a fun diversion, not a cutthroat sprint down a mountain at 60mph.
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by rigshard on August 31, 2003
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Thanks for your feedback but I actually wasn't referring to the age-groupers drafting but accepting the professional racing as drafting.
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Anonymous post on August 31, 2003
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My poor reading skills. I just think that the very large majority of age group athletes could care less about the pro division except that it gives us something to read on du.com and all the other e-mags that reprint the press releases from ITU, Mdot, Dannon, etc. If it wasn't for the pro races, god forbid, they'd have to cover the age groupers. As long as the pros don't impede on the rest of us being able to race, I personally don't care if you guys just go around a 400 meter track 1000 times.
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Anonymous post on September 1, 2003
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Many pros would like to thank you for your support.
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by trikai on September 1, 2003
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just on the topic that draft legal racing is or is not real triathlon, you have to ask the question what was triathlon originally? well, i think it was a swim, run, swim, run and then a bike...whatever it was it wasn't swim, bike, run...so both lose. in my opinion the question is more on the subject of which athletes are the best triathletes, itu or non-drafting? i think of course both are great athletes but they have there differences. in itu you have to be a great swimmer and a great runner to compete at the world cup level, but just because the bike is draft-legal doesn't mean we sit in on the bike for 6 laps. would you say that cycling road races are easy? there are attacks and gaps that have to be bridged. its all about being in good position. i personally race itu but non-drafting races are a large part of my schedule since im not a great itu racer. in non-drafting, the swim and the run aren't large factors like the bike is. getting out of the water a minute down can be made up on the bike and large parts of time can be put on there also making the run not as important relatively speaking. in all, both are tough races to compete competitively in. they're different races therefor they can't always be compared. but on another note...someone did say that an ironman could beat an itu athlete straight up..im sure this has been discussed but if im not mistaken the top 8 men at lifetime were itu athletes.
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Anonymous post on September 2, 2003
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Why should we support you. When was the last time you returned to one of those local tris or dus that helped you get started on your way to pro. Do you go back to the YMCA tri in your town just to race and say thank you for your support getting me started or do you just go to the glitz filled races now??? It works both ways.
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by kemptonslim on September 2, 2003
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To the poster who argues that we can't have draft-legal age-group dus and tris in the U.S. because we can't close the roads: We don't close the roads for most domestic bike road races, either, and yet those are miraculously mostly safe "draft-legal" events. The closest most USCF races come to "closed" roads is rolling enclosure. Safety of the riders--e.g. squirrelly riders taking each other down--is probably a stronger argument for banning drafting in tris and dus. Even so, we have thousands of "draft-legal" club rides, centuries and other mass cycling events in this country, despite the relatively minor dangers of unskilled cyclists riding in packs. So those aren't good arguments against draft-legal races. If we want to decide as a nation not to allow drafting in our age-group tris and dus, fine. Just don't be offering easily rebuttable arguments against it. I for one would love to have the opportunity to ride in a draft-legal du, just to see what it was like.
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by PennyS on September 2, 2003
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Dear Anon 9/2/03, who put that firecracker up your butt? Ponder this, who needs support more, the typical pro tri/du gal who is striving to make the worlds or olympic team so she can represent her country in an open category and might just break even if she is lucky after her winnings and sponsorship are wiped out by travel and expenses, or the dentist from Ohio who makes $250K per year, shows up at the races in his 745I and sucks up sponsorship from a half a dozen sources.
I think the USAT should consider a rule that would prohibit the wearing of corporate logos in dus and tris by other than pros. If you want to be sponsored, you need to be a pro. Too many "sponsors" get away with putting their money where it will not benefit the sport. And to you age-groupers...if you're good enough to be "sponsored", you're good enough to race pro.
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by PennyS on September 2, 2003
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Jon is absolutely right. However, one minor thing would need to be changed before we could have "safe" draft-legal races. We would need to eliminate "squirrely" riders, and that could easily be accomplished by banning aero bars. Most du/tri geeks who can't ride in a straight line, weave back and forth because of their aero bars. Aero bars shift do much weight onto the front wheel that any slight movement of the rider is amplified. It takes far more skill and practice to ride straight with aero bars than it does to graft safely.
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