Any footage/photos of Lange drafting?

I’d say about 70% of the AG field deserved to get penalties. Granted, there is a lot of congestion out there, but anytime one person passed me, six or seven immediately followed.

Enforcement was light.

Can we quit it with lang and dreitz? To the best of my knowledge, while they may have violated some mythical spirit of the sport, they didn't actually break any rules.

Pretty sure it actually is against the rules for one athlete to help another.

Section 2.02 d) says that no athlete can intentionally cause the forward progress of another. Thats the closest rules section i can find that's relevant. Considering there isn't even any evidence of illegal drafting, there is nowhere near enough evidence for a sanction. Furthermore, macca colluding with other athletes to drop craig alexander is often referenced on this forum as smart tactics. This isn't any different as best i can tell. As the story goes, that was planned pre-race. I'm not a huge Lange fan, i just think there are way too many posts right now about something relatively minor

Frederik van Lierde also go a penalty on the bike.

Patrick Lange received two warnings for drafting by the referee when he was very close to Dreitz.
Afterwards Lange also claimed on the German news that he wouldn´t have been that strong on the bike without Dreitz.

But it is only fair to mention that the referee was just next to him for some times and it would be his decision to give a penalty or not.

Interview Lange:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YFm5fw0tHZE

Clearly Dreitz went in front of the "chase 1" group including Lange, Gomez, and others... in order to set the pace.

Maybe for himself, maybe in order to help Lange. There is certainly some teamwork play here (Alcohol free beer team).

Anyway, setting the pace is not forbidden. As long as the guys behind follow the distance rule (if any, here 12m).

Pacing is sometimes organized by international federation to favor record attempt, in track run for exemple, or official marathons (not talking of the Nike break 2 attempt) or other sports, which is a clear sign it is compatible wit sports rules.
Even in track endurance cycling (such as Scratch or Point race) where draft value is huge and team work is clearly and explicitely banned, I've seen some, and never any decision for penalty.

Clearly Dreitz team worked with Lange, but the same way some athletes team work for pacing in Kona or other tri, nothing really new, neither forbidden, neither morally or sporttively a problem.

The other members of the groupe also benefit from it.

It was efficient to sideline Sanders and Kienle (if needed).

This was not working together though. This was one guy working for another guy.

There was some borderline-close riding on the feed early in the ride when Lange was behind Gomez. However, most of the shots of that group seemed to show pretty even spacing between all members of the "Dreitz-Express" - certainly can't say Lange was closer than the others.

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ZONE3 - We Last Longer

On that logic it was one guy working for a lot of guys. Everyone got the same advantage in that train as Lange did. Do you penalise them all? Dreitz still got 13th so wasn't like he pulled out at the end of the bike sacrificing his own race or finished nowhere...

 
Yes, clearly Dreitz "working (also) for" Lange, and not "working together" (like turning in front, such as Frodo, Brownlee and Kanute in WC 70.3).

But, as a pacer, with 12m rules checked, so no issue for me.

There is pacers "working for others" in all large track running or marathon competition, or ITU tris. And it is legal. Ands ok sport wise. Not enough familiar if this was frequently seen in Ironman (as clearly there is a lot in ITU).

. Only 6 or 7?? I had groups of 20-30 pass me.

Saw a lot of refs out there but very little penalties being handed out. Lots of people sitting 2-3 bike lengths back and refs sitting right next to those folks doing nothing about it. The refs seemed very selective on who they gave penalties out to. I saw countless times a group of 20 people in which about 15 of them were riding illegally and a ref pulls up to them an either doesn’t give them a card or only gives a card to one of them. Also saw lots of folks riding 3 wide. It was ridiculous. I knew the drafting would be bad but this was way worse than my expectations.

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So working as a team where one guy intentionally drags another the whole bike to keep him fresh for the run is cool with you?

Watch the entire bike coverage. It was so blatant it was freaking disgusting. Dreitz would literally check to see if Lange was with him before making any moves, would slow down the train for Lange to catch up, led lange out for passes, Etc.

I saw the ref warn him not to go any closer, which is actually not something they're supposed to do, twice at least.

Anybody out there who wasn't working with a coordinated teammate did not have a chance. Which basically meant nobody else out there had a chance.

I just listened to the fitter radio interview with Currie. He said that Lange was telling dreitz when to take it easy or speed up.

It is called pacing

With the increasing number of teams (Erdinger, Barhain, BMC, ...) I will not be surprised this become more and more frequent, one of the athlete being designated as the leader for the team, the others pacing in swim / bike / run.

Team strategy replacing friends and foe alliances ?
Logical for a maturating sport ?
This could lead to interesting race strategy, as long as one team does not over dominate the game with big money.

If Sky comes in, it will unbalance the game. Positive could be that we could look Kona race on TV in Europe :-)

Was Drietz wearing a gorilla suit? Tough to do on the bike, I suppose.


https://forum.slowtwitch.com/forum/Slowtwitch_Forums_C1/Triathlon_Forum_F1/Got_a_penalty_because_a_guy_in_a_gorilla_suit_ran_next_to_me._P4597045/?search_string=dq%20pacing%20suit#p4597045

Got any footage or stills?

There was some good footage of the top 5 guys at the 70.3 worlds all stacked up neatly behind one another. Can't find the clip though.

Of the top 10 male and female finishers, which ones did and did not have a chance?

For the record, I'm not actually expecting you to answer that question.

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If only the Uber bikers would have got there train going, then this wouldn't have been discussed or cared about that much!

When has "giving a warning" been a thing? It was my understanding that refs are not to engage athletes for sake of safety. AGs dont get warnings.

I got tagged when I was in the group with the prince on way up to Hawi. There was literally nothing I could do. Why the ref picked me was a mystery.

And last year everyone was applauding the Sebi / Wurf / Sanders train. Wurf even called Sebi "team captain" and said he tried to pave the way for them to win. It's clearly a case of Lange not being loved.

I'm guessing he's fluent in German.

I see a parallel with Tour de France, more specifically the way to handle mountains in TdF.

Few years ago, mountains were handled mostly alone (not really true, but). The climber was a lonely guy, attacking to set alone.
Sky, with Wiggo then Froome then Thomas, generalized the use of trains in mountains (already done before, Amstromg, ...but it was quite a biased train...ahem), because pacing and low speed draft show significant marginal gains.

In ITU tri, it is of course used, with standard draft.

In relatively flat LD tri (including the top, Kona), pacing and "12m drafting" also show marginal gains.
It make sense some teams want to use these gains. They are legals.

Some can argue "it is not fair". Same way some argue on TdF looking at the Sky train "it is not fair".
Well, they bring the money, they have the better riders, and they play together within the rules. They secure the win.
It bring the sport to another level.

Erdinger team clearly organized Lange race to break the 8h barrier : the 101 project.
We heard about the aero. The pacing was also planned.

Dreitz was clearly working for Lange. He took the lead of the group when Starky / Wurf / Amberger went ahead, with the objective to bring Lange with the better possible pacing, and 12m drafted.

It worked perfectly : 7h52

Of course, this is especially efficient because Lange is not an Uberbiker.

Javier Gomez also benefited from the pacing + draft. Some others also.
It might give Barhain team some ideas for next year.