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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [gholmes] [ In reply to ]
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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [styrrell] [ In reply to ]
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I think you touched on the key words, competitive advantage. Remember, I think it was New York Tri or something a few years ago. The first pro's ran the wrong part of the run course. Technically by the rules it seemed they should have been DQ'ed. I took this position and got my ass handed to me by Charlie. He told me he made the call to not DQ them since he determined they got no competitive advantage. So, looks like the USAT rules were not as black and white as I have been told to believe.

What would I have done as an official on the helmet numbers. Great real life question. Since the head official makes these calls, I would have done nothing. But, I am still not 100% clear when USAT follows the rules by the book or when they throw in the competitive advantage. I know in my USAT marshall training, we were told to give out drafting calls, no warning. But from the WTC training from Jimmy, he made a big point to warn folks since he does not like to see tons of calls made unless it is needed. So, I have gotten very mixed messages over the years as to what they organizations really want to do about rule calling.

I have said that folks that draft piss me off. (Or cut the course or any of the other rule breaking I have seen over the years, littering included, which I am guilty of having done in the past). In a race this season, the guy who beat me drafted and I was not happy, and this was just a local race. But, the series had a 250 free entry into next year so there was real money on the table. He ended up winning the series over me. Am I happy he "cheated" to get the win? Nope, but I can say I did not draft at any race, just did the best I could.

Now that I am hurt and am wondering if I will ever race again, it really has me spending a lot of time thinking how much does some of this stuff mean at the end of the day. Is it worth getting folks upset by saying racers, officials and RD's should follow and enforce their rules? I guess I am just trying to pick my battles a little better. :o)

Dave

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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [gholmes] [ In reply to ]
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I'm impressed with the videos you have posted. I would have loved to have a videocamera mounted to my bike so I could remember the day. Always heard about the big drafting packs, but I am in the back of the race so I never really get to see the big packs. The swim video was great. lets me show my co-workers what the race was like. Thanks for posting them. again, very impressive.

Mr Steve
Ironman IMFL 2009
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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [mrevets] [ In reply to ]
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After getting out of the water in 56 minutes, I found myself in one of most discouraging situations I have ever encountered in Triathlon. Prior to IMF, I had asked many fellow athletes how to manage the problems of drafting packs. Many were very honest and told me they were inevitable, others simply reminded me of the rules. I have always cherished the individual effort of Triathlon so considering using a pack to aid my bike split was never an option. I also believed many people felt that way as well. I can tell all of you- I will never do IMF again because of this problem. Getting caught up in groups can be problematic on such a course as Florida but there are specific rules around overtaken, drafting, and 7 meters. If you follow them, while frustrating at times, everyone can ride honest! But it seemed 90% of the athletes who passed me and even race management were less interested in preserving the sports integrity. With the head wind rocking the first 40+ miles out, packs were a huge advantage and people were blatantly cheating. Im not talking 2-3 meters but 1-2 feet from each other. Softpedaling while hammering 25 mph in 15 mph headwind...seriously? I biked an honest 5:30 and felt every bit of that on the run. Thats what makes up an Ironman. I never intended to save 40% energy letting a pack pull me over 112 miles only to do my best Ryan Hall impression. Call it strategy, course management, or skill and you're lying to yourself and this sport. I know that my respectable sub 11 hour 1st IM does not have an asterisk beside it. Does yours?
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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [ES10Ziggy] [ In reply to ]
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I raced IMFL as Pro. After a very bad season with a very bad pirirormis syndrome i did the race just to have a nice race before the winter training. I didn´t do much biking during the last 3 month so i expected to get caught by a few AG...
I had a bad swim (googles knocked off by wave) and did a 1:04 swim. That left me all by myself for the first 150km on the bike and did a 4:53h bike. I got caught by a couple of AG groups of 4-8 rides blasting past me...they rode within 2-3m of each other. On the small loop I meet a group with 30-40 riders and they looked as they were in a road race. When i friend got past by that group it was a crash with 3-4 riders involved. A group crash in a IM!

So i can say that many of the FOP AG did draft, not only the MOP in the movie.

Sorry for the bad spelling, just got back to Sweden. Been up for 24h with a jet lag...
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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [Jocke] [ In reply to ]
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Just setup spotters on the course, call out drafters over a 2way between 2 points, at several sections on the bike. 1st time 10 min, 2nd time +20 more, 3rd time DQ.
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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [snoots] [ In reply to ]
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the rest are all people who were potentially just as frustrated by the congestion as the next guy.

If by frustrated you mean "so upset that they just sat up and coasted" then yes I would agree.
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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [Toby Tri] [ In reply to ]
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I agree too...It looks like too little road, there are a lot of people sitting up and only a few real drafters.

jaretj
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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [Tricky Dick] [ In reply to ]
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Well, here is IMC 2009...It's one of the pelotons I saw and a small one. There are no reasons to see drafting there, but you do anyway. Heck, Embrun in the Alps is also a big draft fest. There is drafting because people don't care.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2tMtXX8IKGI
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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [Deej] [ In reply to ]
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Yep I hoped to have had the new 1080p go pro but as of ironman week they had not shipped.
Mine are standard def 170 degrees. the new ones should be better and some future accesories will help.
The helmet camera was by vhold called contour HD 720 p they have a 1080 p version coming out this month as well.
I've had mine since april used one at nol70.3 first,
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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [FJB] [ In reply to ]
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In Reply To:
the rest are all people who were potentially just as frustrated by the congestion as the next guy.

If by frustrated you mean "so upset that they just sat up and coasted" then yes I would agree.
nope didn't happen you might find one person in that pack maybe showed frustration but they were smiling takeing it easy back there I saw it live in addition to takeing the video.
there was no frustration from the guys I saw and the same group passed me again just short time later..
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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [jaretj] [ In reply to ]
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In Reply To:
I agree too...It looks like too little road, there are a lot of people sitting up and only a few real drafters.

jaretj
I'm telling you they weren't I was there witnessed it in person while taking video. there was no sitting up out of frustration. they sat up because they were in the draft and
did not have to work against the wind. I know I was passed again by the same group after the aid station after I passed them...
if they weren't drafting they were blocking just as bad they mad no effort to even go through. I went through them twice but they caught me again because when I got in the wind I couldn't stay away. Just ask the 2 or 3 guys who were up front trying they were with these guys longer than I was.
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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [devashish_paul] [ In reply to ]
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In Reply To:
All you guys talking about legalizing drafting....why don't you just go sign up for a marathon or a 10K if you don't care about the bike.

Seriously, if you allow drafting, I'm going to laugh all the way to the bank since I am an above average runner for a 44 year old guy. A draft legal race favours, me, but that's not what its about. I'll just get some of my best buddies to sign up for every IM with me and tow me to T2 without ever putting my nose in the wind and uncork a 3:10 marathon at every IM after he pulls me to a 5:00 ride on a course like LP. That's bullshit.

Its about guys playing or not playing in the rules.

Like I said, when there is some early congestion, it is possible for honest guys to momentarily get caught in a group just because of the sheer density of folks on the road.

But after a short time, there is no excuse.
  • Courses don't cause drafting or packs
  • Lack of marshalling does not cause drafting or draft packs
  • People who choose to not play within the rules cause them
Ditto Dev...no excuse no one to blame but those who are drafting.
I'm about to post a video and Transition distribution by the minute and its going to show that pretty much the 5 to 7 minute surrounding my exit time(1:26 and change) the most athletes
hit the bike. Its also going to show there was plenty of room as I'm passing a ton of riders. The video will be 8 times speed to condense 56 minutes into 7(20.5 miles at my average speed at that part of the course) So much for the argument too many coming out of the swim at same time and you can't help drafting.. Pretty much after the first half mile or so its wide open for the most part
where I was and considering an average of 63 to 64 per minute were coming out for that 5 to 7 minute period it couldn't have gotten any worse... a previous poster said 400 and high 300's
for I think 1:05, 1:10 etc but that was swim exit... I added in transition times and that shifted things quite a bit..
What you have is a built in valve to cut the arrival of bikes on the course down from the arrival of swimmers..
Between wetsuit stripping,narrow run through the tunnel to pick up the bags and then a long narrow runway to the change building(convention center) and back out to the far end of the bike rack (again a narrow path) it acts like a valve or pinch point to reduce the outflow of bikes.. amazing....

I'll be posting that video in a bit.
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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [gholmes] [ In reply to ]
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Is this still an issue?
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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [gholmes] [ In reply to ]
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If by frustrated you mean "so upset that they just sat up and coasted" then yes I would agree.[/reply]
nope didn't happen you might find one person in that pack maybe showed frustration but they were smiling takeing it easy back there I saw it live in addition to takeing the video.
there was no frustration from the guys I saw and the same group passed me again just short time later.


I was actually agreeing with you.
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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [FJB] [ In reply to ]
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In Reply To:
If by frustrated you mean "so upset that they just sat up and coasted" then yes I would agree.

nope didn't happen you might find one person in that pack maybe showed frustration but they were smiling takeing it easy back there I saw it live in addition to takeing the video.
there was no frustration from the guys I saw and the same group passed me again just short time later.


I was actually agreeing with you.[/reply] My bad been spending so much time on the videos and trying to read all the posts and its been difficult to keep up with who's saying what.
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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [ES10Ziggy] [ In reply to ]
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I jst did Clearwater and was amazed at the drafting - I have never seen anything like that before. I always thought when I do my first Ironman, it's gong to be when I am in shape enough to give qualifying for Hawaii a shot and I would do Florida. After seeing the drafting, I am probably going to switch to Lake Placid. I would be really pissed if I missed a slot for Hawaii because I raced fair and other people were drafting the whole time.
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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [gholmes] [ In reply to ]
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I think it's hilarious....they are all riding Aero bikes, aero helmets yet sitting up in their base bars....if your gonna cheat and draft you may as well take advantage of it and cross the yellow line to pass everyone.
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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [gholmes] [ In reply to ]
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I was not there so I will have to defer to your interpretation. I would not have the awareness of what is around me that you have. You are able to look around and see everything for yourself where I'm looking at only one angle.

The camera provides a bit of tunnel vision that obviously cannot tell the whole story to me. I do agree that people are much closer than they should be.

jaretj
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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [jaretj] [ In reply to ]
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In Reply To:
I was not there so I will have to defer to your interpretation. I would not have the awareness of what is around me that you have. You are able to look around and see everything for yourself where I'm looking at only one angle.

The camera provides a bit of tunnel vision that obviously cannot tell the whole story to me. I do agree that people are much closer than they should be.

jaretj
the camera was 170 degree wide angle lense so distorts things some but the argument was it was impossible not to draft and road was packed with cyclists.
I'm just not one of those types that can dig down in aero for 5 plus hours and stay focused on myself. And this wasn't my first ironman race or triathlon so I'm not new to any of this been racing for 24 years doing ironman races since 1991 and quite a few of them.
I AM very observant when racing just way I am. I get made fun of all the time from my team mates(terrapin racing) because I remember so many things from a race including where other people I know were when I saw them how far ahead or behind at turns. But I can almost after a race give in some detail almost every mile of my race just from memory...
thats why I don't post race reports because before I know it its 100 pages long because I remember pretty much every minute and have a very bad filter..
The video is just icing on the cake now I can remember more I guess.
I'm constantly keeping an eye on things.. I wear a mirror for safety but also keep in view folks trying to hang on my wheel as well as others coming up fast to pass and working to stay out of their way even signaling them with my left hand go ahead say when I'm passing a group. Just the way I am. thats why I remembered the mile mark (34.5) when I took the helmet cam video..
Trust me (or not I don't care) but there was plenty of room around me going up 79 more so than last years race where there were packs spread across the road so things this year were an improvement. Even the packs I saw on 20 were smaller than last years which prompted me to finally do this after 10 years of watching it happen.
Last edited by: gholmes: Nov 16, 09 12:23
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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [gholmes] [ In reply to ]
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gholmes, good for you doing the video. Far more people seem to support your objection to drafting than not. I have tried to keep up with this thread, but I am not sure I have read every single post. Given that, pardon me for suggesting something here that may have already been mentioned.

How about WTC putting about 5-10 cyclists out on the course with cameras front and rear with enough definition to pick out race numbers? Put them out there like 'unmarked police cars' and tell everyone they will be on course in addition to the marshals on motos. Give the rider a boom mike to call out numbers as well so there will be no mistake. That way, the guy could ride along in stealth mode as long as needed with a pack and gather evidence. After the race, penalize all of them 30 minutes or even an hour. Some amount that is so egregious there is no way they can make up the time drafting.

These guys could be just more or less sitting there at an aid station acting like they are exchanging bottles or something and then take off when a pack comes through to take down numbers.

Would it work?

Greg

If you are a Canuck that engages in gratuitous bashing of the US, you are probably on my Iggy List. So, save your self a bunch of typing a response unless you also feel the need to gratuitously bash me. If so, have fun.
"Don't underestimate Joe's ability to f___ things up" - Barack Obama, 2020
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Re: Helmet cam video ironman florida pelotons [Jimtraci] [ In reply to ]
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I've done Florida the last 4 years. This year I saw more marshals, less drafting, and people in every penalty tent. No, it wasn't perfect, but I found it easier to ride clean this year than any year before. I applaud every step in the right direction. Thank you, Jimmy.
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