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Slowtwitch Forums: Triathlon Forum:
Dear WTC can you stop all the drafting madness at Clearwater?

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rvander

Nov 12, 07 9:06

Post #126 of 143 (693 views)

Re: Dear WTC can you stop all the drafting madness at Clearwater? [trinow] [In reply to]	Can't Post

I raced in the 30-34 AG at Clearwater and watched athletes throughout the bike come by me in trains of 4-10 drafting like a TDF team TT. Marshals were overwhelmed around me and often only gave out 1 or 2 penalties within a large group, the groups would soften then solidify and rumble down the road when the marshal moved on. I have raced all over North America and my opinion is that the course is too narrow through at least 50% of its total, the AG's are poorly ordered at the start (I spent most of my day overtaking slower AG racers which is dangerous with the locomotive drafting trains coming up from behind) and the topic of drafting needs to be addressed more firmly pre-race in communication with athletes and on the course with more marshals to keep it fair.

I dont feel that I personally was part of a "fair" World Championship.

-Ryan

trinow

Nov 12, 07 9:59

Post #127 of 143 (665 views)

Re: Dear WTC can you stop all the drafting madness at Clearwater? [rvander] [In reply to]	Can't Post

In Reply To:

Tom Z, you posted on a regular basis leading up to the race about this issue and how it was going to be taken care of. Are the posters full of crap saying that nothing changed? I was not there, so a response from the race would be appropriate.

trexleradam

Nov 12, 07 10:20

Post #128 of 143 (649 views)

Re: Dear WTC can you stop all the drafting madness at Clearwater? [trinow] [In reply to]	Can't Post

Hi there,
I think all the suggestions about writing to WTC are right on.
I have to say I was pretty depressed, and even psyched out by h20fun's comments before the race but decided I'd ride my own race anyways (then flatted and had an asthma attack on the run...nice day).
And I as well saw lots of packs on the bike. I think the main point here is that it can take a minute to figure out if a small increase in tempo will let you go faster than the leader of the paceline, or if it's better to just softpedal out of it, but my conscience is clear after making both circumstances.
However, I think the bigger issue is mostly getting lost: this race course didn't feel safe. Because, I have to say it, I have no confidence in the drafting abilities of 20 guys in tribars. Even if 19 are good, it only takes one muppet, and trust me, nowhere near 95% of the racers have the experience needed to do this safely.
And another thing: I talked to a guy in the airport who'd been hit by a 91 year old driver who'd threaded his way onto the course, and he said there were at least 6 other people injured by car incursions. I know I almost got hit by one or two cars, and had to brake twice in places where officials let people cross for too long.
I for one really like the idea of a safe, fast course where I can really hammer alone and see what I can do, but I'm concerned that this course is neither safe nor fast.

trexleradam

Nov 12, 07 10:22

Post #129 of 143 (644 views)

Re: Dear WTC can you stop all the drafting madness at Clearwater? [trexleradam] [In reply to]	Can't Post

One more thought: what about mixed age group waves? You'd lose the sense of who was around you on the run for competitive purposes, but isn't this basically an individual TT sport anyway?

jthurd

Nov 12, 07 10:27

Post #130 of 143 (641 views)

Re: Dear WTC can you stop all the drafting madness at Clearwater? [Tai] [In reply to]	Can't Post

In Reply To:

not sure if i did the right thing but not sure what else could have been done. on the crash topic, there were three crashes that involved people I knew personally... A pro friend in the top 10 got clipped by a car, another friend was in a crash caused by trying to slide around a large group of riders and being forced into a traffic cone (best part is that as he lay there a bit out of it with a broken clavicle another rider who went down asked him if they could take his front wheel and before he could figure out what was going on they swapped it and rode off with it...), and another guy who said he had been pushed in a big group and went down hard... these were just people that I knew

I was disappointed in two things at clearwater.
One:
the AG waves- from a safety perspective, why would you put many of the fastest athletes behind everyone in the entire race? 30yo and under last?
Two:
Having the faster AGs behind the slower one is fine IF, there is room to pass. This is not possible at clearwater. There was exactly one lane- cones to the left, and a curb to the right. No shoulder.
I raced Kona this year and in my opinion the biggest difference is you have a whole highway lane, plus at LEAST 6-8ft of shoulder. It is nearly impossible to say that there is not enough room to get around. If an official came and told you to spread out, there was somewhere to go. A mass swim additionally helps spread things out. This weekend I got on the bike as and was passing people going 5-10mph faster. It was completely not safe given the course. I was at the 20mi mark (timing mat) at 45 minutes, nobody was drafting off or with me. Sure enough a woman in a tight section of the course swerved right in front of my wheel- She was going close to 18mph, I was going close to 30. I have raced tri's and road (2's) many years, this is the first time I've hit the pavement really hard. From what I understand there were many (15+) other accidents on the course, I know of at least 2 who were hit by cars. This is unacceptable. I think Florida is beautiful, but we are racing in one of the most densely populated parts of the country (retirement community to boot) in one narrow lane, with a wave order that exacerbated risk. Until the ride venue changes I will almost certainly not be back. Drafting is cheating, and defeats the purpose of racing long course- you against the elements. I do blame the athletes, but more than athletes I blame race organization.

JH ( Limping to a 4:09)

ps.
On a side note, once my left side was hamburger and I slowed to ~23/24mph I drug 20-30 people strung out behind me the last 15 miles. Given my condition I just laughed. what a disappointment.
Bruss Blog /
USAT Trade Team / Powerbar / Davis Wheelworks

(This post was edited by jthurd on Nov 12, 07 18:11)

trinow

Nov 12, 07 10:34

Post #131 of 143 (629 views)

Re: Dear WTC can you stop all the drafting madness at Clearwater? [trexleradam] [In reply to]	Can't Post

In Reply To:

Hi there,
Even if 19 are good, it only takes one muppet, and trust me, nowhere near 95% of the racers have the experience needed to do this safely.

totally agree. Why does cycling have its rules? They recognize that even pros are not skilled enough to ride in a pack on aero bars.

h2ofun

Nov 12, 07 10:40

Post #132 of 143 (616 views)

Re: Dear WTC can you stop all the drafting madness at Clearwater? [jthurd] [In reply to]	Can't Post

Justin, glad to hear you were not hurt more. Yes, I see these little comments about folks getting hit by cars, going
threw windows, but just little comments. Assuming they are real, I do not understand why this safety issue is
not the number thing folks are talking about. Drafting is one thing, but it probably will not kill you. But,
based on the conditions you state, wow.

I remember hearing the last year they were going to fix the drafting issue, and the roads being too narrow.

Dave
http://www.linkedin.com/in/davidedwardcampbell

Fleck

Nov 12, 07 10:50

Post #133 of 143 (606 views)

Re: Dear WTC can you stop all the drafting madness at Clearwater? [jthurd] [In reply to]	Can't Post

Again, key Ironman contacts are below. Send them a note:

http://www.ironman.com/corporate/contacts

Venting here will only go so far( well, not that far at all really)

Steve Fleck
http://www.nineteenwetsuits.com
http://stevefleck.blogspot.com
http://twitter.com/stevefleck

nfreeman

Nov 12, 07 11:07

Post #134 of 143 (590 views)

Re: Dear WTC can you stop all the drafting madness at Clearwater? [trinow] [In reply to]	Can't Post

My clearwater thoughts:
a) it was not possible to not-draft at that race. Too little space to pass or be passed safely. If you tried to ride off the back of the pack, the next pack was on you instantly.
b) There are sports that are "ref" sports (baseball) and sports that are "self policing" sports (sailing, where there is a formal competitor vs competitor protest policy, and no refs). Triathlon has decided it is a "ref" sport. as such, its not the competitors job to self police. However, there just arent enough refs. But putting marshalls out there, and then telling people that they need to not cheat even though refs are out there isnt going to work- we are a ref sport.

c) my proposals for fixing, especially clearwater:
1) we need a ton more aggressive marshalls. and those marshalls need to be able to give "peloton wide" penalties to an entire group. Probably would need to be served "on the spot" and woudl require a much wider course to do safely. (and would probably involve trucks to mark the front and back of the penalty group, and police style "you all pull over right now" kind of tactics.
2) we need a lot more width to the courses, and we need a stagger-drafting rule to use that width. It just wasnt possible to ride such a narrow course legally, let alone safely.
3) we need much bigger gaps between waves- clearwater was starting a wave every 5 minutes. Why not a wave every 30 minutes? The further you can keep the big mens age groups apart, the better. Even with waves every 30 mins, clearwater is still a "shorter" race, since there arent those 8 hour stragglers
4) courses need to be a lot harder- clearwater is just a silly place for worlds. Put it somewhere warm and hilly (st croix?)
5) as an aside, having clearwater so close in time to kona is silly. its impossible to do both races well. How about making clearwater the first spring race? Use the st croix race as worlds! St croix is at least as hard a course as kona....(scaled to distance).

N

--------------------------
Proud member of the Guru Cartel, EH!

trinow

Nov 12, 07 11:32

Post #135 of 143 (561 views)

Re: Dear WTC can you stop all the drafting madness at Clearwater? [Fleck] [In reply to]	Can't Post

In Reply To:

Again, key Ironman contacts are below. Send them a note:

http://www.ironman.com/corporate/contacts

Venting here will only go so far( well, not that far at all really)

if you really want a change and piss them off, call the real owners of the WTC at st lukes cataract and dr gill...1.800.544.0000...a few thousand phone calls will get the owners attention.

(This post was edited by trinow on Nov 12, 07 12:50)

Oprah

Nov 12, 07 11:39

Post #136 of 143 (543 views)

Re: Dear WTC can you stop all the drafting madness at Clearwater? [nfreeman] [In reply to]	Can't Post

I'm just going to go ahead and be the devil's advocate to your suggestions. Your suggestions are great and make a lot of sense in a perfect world, but not in our current world.

1) we need a ton more aggressive marshalls. and those marshalls need to be able to give "peloton wide" penalties to an entire group. Probably would need to be served "on the spot" and woudl require a much wider course to do safely. (and would probably involve trucks to mark the front and back of the penalty group, and police style "you all pull over right now" kind of tactics.
----People don't realize that having marshalls (motorcycles, trucks (?)) all over the course is a huge safety issue. Motorcycles close to competitors can cause a lot of accidents (ie, Badmann in Hawaii). Having a stand down rule with age-groupers could also set the stage for a lot of accidents. Also, do you know what they pay these pay marshalls? Not much.

2) we need a lot more width to the courses, and we need a stagger-drafting rule to use that width. It just wasnt possible to ride such a narrow course legally, let alone safely.
----Putting on an event of this magnitude and getting cities approval is very hard. It would be great to shut down all lanes of traffice and get a lot more width, but that's not going to happen in most major metropolitan areas.

3) we need much bigger gaps between waves- clearwater was starting a wave every 5 minutes. Why not a wave every 30 minutes? The further you can keep the big mens age groups apart, the better. Even with waves every 30 mins, clearwater is still a "shorter" race, since there arent those 8 hour stragglers
----Again, try telling the city that the race will be extended by another couple of hours (and oh yeah, don't forget we're shutting down all the roads so we can get more width)

4) courses need to be a lot harder- clearwater is just a silly place for worlds. Put it somewhere warm and hilly (st croix?)
----Definitely agree it should be harder, but for most people who actually want to compete in a "World Championship" Clearwater is certainly an affordable and easy to get destination. St. Croix certainly is not.

I'm not saying in the least that Clearwater is the best they can do, just trying to point out that its easy for most of to say, "why don't they just do this? That's a no-brainer." There are a lot of behind the scenes theatrics that go on to pull something like this off. I would love to see a harder course with less competitors, but the fact is, this is a money making sport. You think they're going to shut down an entire city and try to convince the tourism industry of that city that its a good idea for 500 competitors?

sig

Nov 12, 07 11:44

Post #137 of 143 (529 views)

Re: Dear WTC can you stop all the drafting madness at Clearwater? [nfreeman] [In reply to]	Can't Post

"5) as an aside, having clearwater so close in time to kona is silly. its impossible to do both races well."

Not exactly true. The first place female age grouper, Caroline Smith, did 2007 Kona in a PR of 10:29 and finished 15th overall female in Clearwater.

Bob Sigerson

nfreeman

Nov 12, 07 11:48

Post #138 of 143 (524 views)

Re: Dear WTC can you stop all the drafting madness at Clearwater? [Oprah] [In reply to]	Can't Post

My question then is "why have this in an urban area"?

So many of the great races (placid, kona, CA HIM, st croix, etc) are out in the boonies...this race is basically through a stripmall on a very busy road- the width/traffic questions all trace back to this...if you are going to have it near a city , why not have it way out in the backwater somewhere so there is plenty of road access (this is exactly what cancun does btw, and it works- you could force stagger drafting because they get 2x lanes of roads closed because the course is BEHIND the big resorts on tiny roads)

--------------------------
Proud member of the Guru Cartel, EH!

TriGuyNV

Nov 12, 07 11:49

Post #139 of 143 (520 views)

Re: Dear WTC can you stop all the drafting madness at Clearwater? [Oprah] [In reply to]	Can't Post

How can anybody expect a lack of density by competitive athletes who qualified on a flat course?

Now, don't get me wrong, a flat course is fun and everybody loves to set a PR, but you can't have everything. If don't want a dense peloton, then you need something to break it up. If people are normally separated by a few minutes or seconds, don't you believe they might be cycling at about the same speed?

Just enjoy the ride or move the race. I don't fault the race officials.

Oprah

Nov 12, 07 11:52

Post #140 of 143 (514 views)

Re: Dear WTC can you stop all the drafting madness at Clearwater? [nfreeman] [In reply to]	Can't Post

Agreed. I'm not in the organization for this race, by they way! The way you were addressing me as "you could have it here, etc" made me think you thought I was involved. I was trying to present a different side. Anyways, I guess it depends on how they want to market it. To market it as a World Championships is a bit of a joke. Maybe it should be viewed as more of a end of season race that you have to qualify for (but its not that hard to qualify for) and the course is fast, so expect a pr. Everyone loves a pr. Its easy to get to and doesn't cost an arm and an leg. If they are looking to make this the Kona of 70.3, then they have it all wrong.

TriGuyNV

Nov 12, 07 12:26

Post #141 of 143 (490 views)

Re: Dear WTC can you stop all the drafting madness at Clearwater? [Oprah] [In reply to]	Can't Post

Kona has drafting but they do assess lots of penalties. Don't be fooled, there's plenty of drafting going on at Kona, not of the same magnitude as Clearwater, but Kona has the ascent up to Hawi, whereas Clearwater simply has the causeways.

swimbandit

Nov 14, 07 14:58

Post #142 of 143 (413 views)

Re: Dear WTC can you stop all the drafting madness at Clearwater? [sc3826] [In reply to]	Can't Post

I would agree with you except if you were one of the last age groups to go off, it was next to impossible NOT to draft because of packed road conditions, especially with about 15 miles left on the bike. I went off in the last wave, so the entire bike course was spent catching and passing all the other athletes that had gone off in earlier waves. I hate drafting, but it simply became inevitable out there around mile 33 - after the bay bridge. The riders only had a single lane and there were way too many cyclists congested together to allow a smooth flow of faster cyclists on the left and slower cyclists on the right. I had to slow down to 21-22mph in several parts simply b/c there was no room to maneuver around the crowds. It was unfortunate, but you simply couldn't fight it.

LazyEP

Nov 14, 07 18:10

Post #143 of 143 (376 views)

Re: Dear WTC can you stop all the drafting madness at Clearwater? [iron3fit] [In reply to]	Can't Post

All this sound & fury signifies nothing...

A full-page ad in Triathlete runs about $9K & $3.5K in Inside Triathlon. Everyone put their money where the mouths are & take out a full page ad asking Ironman to clean up its act at Clearwater. The cost of the ad will just be the beginning of the media coverage. Use them to exert some pressure. Sign it "concerned ST'ers" & let's see what happens.
Sean Phelps
"It's not the age sweetheart. It's the mileage."
Dr. Henry "Indiana" Jones, Jr.

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