Zero lead motos in Roth

the camera motos stayed far behind the riders, to the side in free lane (roads were closed)

Magnus said that he could bike faster because the road was more open and the motos didnt block at turns etc

Confirmed. When Rfy flew past me, the motorcycle followed. Same for Norden and Sodaro; motorcycles trailing each time.

Being on the course MOST of the day and seeing all of the leaders from the side of road 8 different times I can say this about the Moto's on course. The only difference the lack of Moto's on the course made was the following.


- Increased safety ( the whole point)
- More drafting in the mens field (in the back because of lack of refs)


Lead moto was NEVER directly in front of the lead riders and there was ZERO wind on the day during the bike.

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E-DUB
Chief Janitor @Slowtwitch
Life is short. Dont be mad all the time.

Thanks for the replies! It looked from the coverage that there were at least a few spots where riders were benefitting from motos; but it sounds like that was very much the exception. I definitely prefer the “Ryf and Ditlev are major bad asses” explanation.

thanks for your point of view.
would be interesting to hear what patrick and joe have to say to this,
do they say we are not as good cyclists as we thought we are, or are they saying it did not work.
lange was 6 min faster this year ditlev 4 min faster on the bike and you could say a few min of lange you can account that he was with kanute on the bike this year while last year he says he was alone on the bike .
interestingly both haug and langbridge were 5,45 min slower on the bike this year compared to 2022
obviously very small samples with no real meaning , but it is a bit surprising that both haug and langbridge went slower on a day with no wind and kind of perfect bike conditions.

as for the drafting they should not take out race referees and as for camera work i think they can have one or two more for the third group . its not so much the number of the motorbikes, esepically in lap 1 on a course like roth , but a fair spread of them and that they all behave in a consistent way.

what did the photographers say, did they get the pics they wanted or are they unhappy.

I expect Skipper will share his experience in the Mockery podcast due out today. Pre-cap: https://podcasts.apple.com/...mockery/id1591308571
Bear in mind that Ditlev had Laidlow encouraging his motivation (from behind) and then leading that pair for much of the second lap: those two aspects alone (along with him just being one year stronger/confident - remember in 2022 Roth was only his second full distance after being outsprinted by Hoff in Texas) can account for the increase in speed.
As you say, Lange and Kanute had one another for company. Last year Lange was coming back from injury iirc.
As for the chasers, Skipper, Dreitz, Lindars, Frommhold and Weiss were in a train of varying length during the ride, and Skipper and Dreitz cycled the same speed as Kanute/Lange. Would they expect to be that many minutes down on Ditlev/Laidlow? I guess not. But them's the facts.
In 2022 Haug rode far better at Roth than her rides at 70.3 Lanzarote (thrashed by Matthews) and at St George (thrashed by Ryf and Matthews) would have suggested. Conversely this year she has ridden way above her 2022 standard in Lanzarote (full) and Ibiza (first class), but at Roth that cycling strength just seemed to 'not be there' (so 6 minutes down on last year - same 178km route). Shades of IMWC St George last year when Ryf left her 15 minutes adrift. Langridge is too unpredictable to be of much use as a comparator.