Indeed... To me it's like soccer, you can't really miss the yellow/red cards. It's not like there is a "lost in translation" issue there.

In today's day and age, there is no reason that every official should not be wearing a gopro or similar. Not that the video should necessarily be made public to armchair quarterbacks like you and I, but it should exist. USAT has a stringent and outdated policy for it's officials of writing down extensive and verbose description to fully describe what they see so that they have evidence in case of protest, including what kind of bike and kit the person is wearing and where precisely the offense occured. Instead of doing that on the back of a motorcycle, a head-mounted camera would eliminate the need in addition to providing plenty of footage for official's training.

There are always 3 sides to every story.....

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Pink? Maybe. Maybe not. You decide.

are you kidding me? how about going over to Europe and having an american flag on your bib and see how much you get harassed by refs. I was a spotter at IMTX and I can assure you the refs were watching ALL athletes that day as I was with the lead cyclists for the entire race. they didn't pick on anyone and they handed out a ton of drafting penalties. The Marshalls for IM races for the pros are paid by Ironman and are all very knowledgeable of all the rules. These aren't local triathletes volunteering. As for ref's wearing helmet cam's...that is typical of society today. the onus falls on the athlete to NOT cheat or violate rules. NOT on the ref to prove the athlete did. society is full of it's someone else's fault not mine attitudes.

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Kirk Noyes

Downtubes are for Dinosaurs

meh. i don't think course-cutting is much of a big deal on slowtwitch. . .

-mike

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____________________________________
https://lshtm.academia.edu/MikeCallaghan

http://howtobeswiss.blogspot.ch/

I think you may be misinterpreting. I don't think he was saying that refs are targeting Europeans, but rather that Europeans may find 10m to be a little longer in North America than Europe and thus find themselves getting dinged here. I don't necessarily believe this, but I think that is what he is getting at.

re: video, at least in the US, USAT puts the onus on it's officials to gather the evidence in order to defend the penalty in case of protest. This is done with paper and pen on the back of a motorcycle. I hypothesize that in the day and age of gopro cameras that this evidence could be better collected that way. That does not mean that I do not agree with you that the onus should not be on the referee to produce evidence to defend his decisions, however current protocol in USA is that it is.

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Jason Pedersen
RunPd.com - Running as fast I can since '93
@jasonpedersen

Yeah, that's screwed up right there.

Just wanted to make sure this sticks.

Apart from the fact that paying referees doesn't guarantee in any way that they are knowledgable, they are, to the best of my knowledge, not paid by Ironman, but by USAT (which in turn is being paid by the race organizer (WTC in this case)). A USAT referee over the course of a season may be officiating at a few races which may have different formats and may be run by different race organizations, and different rules apply.
As for the regulation regarding drafting I found the following (and it could be more if I include locations outside the US):
Length of the drafting zone (beginning at the leading edge of front wheel)
7m (USAT, non-elite)
10m (USAT, elite, IM age group, ITU non-elite)
12m (ITU elite, IM pro)

or clear space between bikes of
6 bike lengths (IM pro)
5 bike lengths (IM age group)

These are already 5 different definitions! To complicate things further, the time you can take for a pass may be 15s (USAT elite and non-elite), 20s (IM age group, ITU elite and non-elite) or 25s (IM pro), and how quickly an overtaken athlete has to drop out of the drafting zone could be "immediately" (whatever that exactly means, USAT non-elite and elite), 5s (this seems just plain ridiculous, ITU elite and non-elite), 20s (IM age group) or 25s (IM pro). [Note that the wording of the IM rules is not even clear what applies in case of a pro passing an age grouper (or vice versa)].

Assuming the referee has done his homework and knows exactly which rules apply for the race he's currently officiating, now he sits on the back of a motorbike and has to estimate the gap between two (or possibly many more riders), stop the time of passing manoevers and it's obvious that there are a lot of judgment calls to be made (and I think with the pros in the lead group I don't think there are really instances of blatant drafting offences as there are in the age group fields). And if you do have a pack of 10+ age groupers all drafting, how is the referee supposed to hand write the bib number and other details of every athlete after showing each of them the blue card, all on the back of a motor bike?
Don't kid yourself in thinking that for every drafting penalty it can only be the athlete who's at fault. And even so, what harm would it do to have the evidence available? I've been a referee myself at a few races this year (in Switzerland), and I for one would welcome any technology assisting me to assure I'm making the right decisions.
And an instance of a pro like M. Raelert receiving three drafting penalties without realizing any wrongdoing seems so bizarre, that it should (also in the interest of the sport) be resolved.

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Achim Traut

I have no facts on the case, but sounds like to me that perhaps they gave him one penalty and tried to get him to pull over to a tent 3 times maybe? 3 different drafting penalties sounds fishy to me, that would mean each time he would have had to sit the tent and jump on some slower riders, and then do it again for a 3rd time!!

I think perhaps he was just not clued to the fact that you had to pull over, or more importantly, that he had to pull over for a stop, and maybe that happened 3 times? Guessing this also since he did in fact cross the line first, so he definitely did not serve 3 separate box stays. No one is that much better than everyone else..

What is also strange is that MR has usually come across as a very nice guy in interviews... I know it's not saying much but still kinda weird.

Same guy that also swore black and blue he did not go the wrong way at Challenge Dubai this year despite all the others that did so admitted so...even though they unwittingly cut the course, they acknowledged it, yet MR continued to protest his innocence, then threw a tanty on the way out of the hearing.

Remember what they said about all those 'nice guy' cyclists that turned out to have been dopers... Even nice guys can say one thing and do another and this is pretty hard to believe he knew absolutely nothing about being given 3 cards even if he didn't agree.

This is 100% True. I was there. kicking chairs over and the likes

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Kirk Noyes

Downtubes are for Dinosaurs

Those sentences don't make sense.

Yes, the athletes are required to obey the rules. BUT, if the ref accuses an athlete of a violation and hands out the punishment at the same time (a bit Judge Dredd style), why on earth shouldn't the ref be required to prove it? That's how every criminal justice system worth its salt works. You accuse, you prove it.

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Greetings from the German Wine Route,
Roland

If only this were the criminal justice system.

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Favorite Gear: Dimond | Cadex | Desoto Sport | Hoka One One

The pros still use the pro rules and the AG'ers use the AG rules. It can make some apples and oranges out there though.

This has been an issue numerous times with the female pros getting commingled with the fast AG men. I think there was some mini uproar in the recent past when a WPro got a drafting/blocking penalty or two riding with the AG men. Her complaint, and probably rightfully so, was that it was extremely difficult for her to ride within the rules since the drafting/blocking/passing rules were different to everyone around her. That stated, I can't recall why she was stuck riding around a group of fast AG men instead of her WPro counterparts. Either she wasn't the best of swimmers or the wave spacing was too close.

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Favorite Gear: Dimond | Cadex | Desoto Sport | Hoka One One

Is there no official statement from WTC on this yet?

When do they ever issue an official statement about issuing penalties?

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Favorite Gear: Dimond | Cadex | Desoto Sport | Hoka One One

WTC generally does not issue a statement (and rarely responds on social media) to pro penalty issues.

Just by chance I ran into Michael at the Bellagio on Monday. Obviously, I didn't want to press the DQ issue but he told me "it was a misunderstanding".....and I let it go. He appeared to a very nice guy, chatted for a few minutes, and was very accommodating with my picture requests. Just a brief add to the thread.

After speaking with the official, I can second this. When he told Michael he was DQ'd at T2, Michael was confused and blamed it on language barrier.

Also, I never saw a thing on the course, and the official was even a little washy on information about 3 blue cards, but I saw a video posted online and Raelart was totally alone at one section of the bike. Just over 2 hours on the bike and 3 blue cards... I would just assume he was on the back wheel of Dye the entire time. Which leads me to think that he was DQ'd for a blue card and missing the first tent. That's just my .02

Honest question, if he really had a basis for challenging a DQ (no idea if he did or did not), wouldn't he have to finish the race? Get the feeling the manner in which he crossed first rubs some people the wrong way, but he had to finish it, right?

My understanding is position fouls are final and as such there are no protests or appeals.

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Race Reports, etc -- Bob's Bikes

I'm with Chris... he had to cross to get a time and then contest. You can't contest at T2, it takes too long.

But CW is also right, he had no leg to stand on. Officials knew that when he was on the run and didn't understand why he continued to race.