Since we're all wearing timing chips, how about a camera and a timing strip every 10 miles or so, maybe more often on a dragstrip like Texas or Florida. You cross that strip within some prescribed time (ie, 30 people crossing within a few seconds), it flags them all for penalties. Surely one person can review to see who's at the front, and the rest get penalties. Maybe review the last 20 seconds to ensure somebody didn't sprint to the front to be the one who essentially got the time bonus. I think you'd have to ignore the signal from 2-3 people crossing closely as it would take all day to review who overtook who and if they had enough time to drop out of the draft zone, but I think you'd eliminate large packs. I don't know what the limen should be...5 people in close proximity? The only loser I see in this is the person/people who got overtaken by the pack as they approached the timing point, but I think the packs would break up before then. Surely the effort to reform the pack--and break it up again before the next point--would dissuade some cheaters. I think for some, the penalty tents actually make drafting worse in that they know they can draft all day unless they're caught. The old way of not knowing until the end might make people more cautious all day. I say that because the only drafting penalty I ever received was at Placid in '03. I'm not questioning the official, but I never knew I got it until I saw the 4:00 tacked onto my results.

...or does this create the more dangerous situation of daring people to go around the timing strip into oncoming traffic so their number isn't tagged?

Someone mentioned in an earlier thread about using timing mats to catch drafters, and I think it could work. 20 seconds at 25 mph is about 220m. Not many people are going faster than that on flat ground. So place 2 sets of 2 mats about 220m apart. Each set of 2 could be about 5m apart. When a pair of riders crosses the first pair of mats, you can calculate the speed of each and the distance one is behind the other.

If the rider that is further back is inside the draft zone, then another check is done on them when they cross the mats 220m down the road. If he has not made the pass, then he earns a drafting violation.

That could be either because he did not make his pass in the 20 seconds allowed OR because he was passed and did not drop back fast enough. This would catch both scenarios.

It would not catch people in between draft traps, obviously, but it is better than nothing.

You could just automatically add the time penalty. This would not have the added advantage of the official notifying them that they have been caught and breaking up the pack, but the benefit is that this would be more accurate than an official, and it could nail all 30 people in the pack.

I think a couple of these on a course in addition to the draft marshals would be excellent.

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Ed O'Malley
www.VeloVetta.com
Founder of VeloVetta Cycling Shoes
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Yeah not sure about that. Possibly? You do get situations with people legally drafting i.e using the full 25s to overtake, so I wonder if you'd end up with people unfairly getting penalised. Last year I was racing in a 70.3 a few trains, the TOs broke them up, like 15 or so, but only penalised one rider as far as I could see. I got told that's all they can do, one at a time? As soon as the TO was gone, the pack reformed. I was hoping he'd get them all. Why can't he? A GoPro on a motorbike would be great, 1min of footage, he drives off, films the next bunch, then moves on. They review the footage and penalties are added retrospectively. Like you said - The old way of not knowing until the end might make people more cautious all day. In Western Australia, the drafting isn't too bad, people are penalised. It seems to be a small proportion of top level Agers, mostly the stronger runners, weaker riders and a large proportion of MOPers 5hours+ for a 70.3, nothing to lose type of crowd. On Sunday I'm hoping for top 5, should be top 10 at least, so a 5 minute penalty is a disaster, definitely not worth it. As long as the penalties remain at 5mins and chances of getting pinged are low, people will cheat. Increase the penalty to 10mins, ping lots of people and ban athletes who get penalised more than say twice in a season. Drafting will disappear overnight.

Technology.... something like a video would be pretty hard evidence as well. Drones, video cameras at undisclosed areas... etc.

From a practical standpoint it may not be an issue if you have a conspicuous enforcement presence.

I don't know for sure, but someone did mention that this race did not have an issue of this magnitude in the past when there was *some* obvious enforcement.

But to answer your questions

1) The same way as as current practice: officials using their best judgment.
2) Same way as is current practice. When you nail someone, you call out their number. An official has no obligation to let people know who is good.

I wouldn't stress about letting some people "get away with it". I'd just have my moto driver pull up alongside, and I'd start carefully sampling blatant offenders from the peloton one at a time, taking my sweet time, calling out numbers one at a time. I pretty much guarantee the thing would break up pretty quick.

It doesn't have to be comprehensive and perfect to be effective.

Here's what I see for the future.

I would expect there will be on-board readouts of each racer’s times and splits given with comparison to key competitors and overall leaders through use of race chips and radio frequencies. Race chips will further evolve to provide full race tracking to ensure no one slipped off into the woods or a pub for a break, then mysteriously gain some superior results by accidently losing a timing chip. Chips will be incorporated in race specific wrist bands so no one loses a chip by accident strapped on their ankle. And drafting penalties will be applied to racers through chip assisted technology. Penalties would be calculated based on a ratio of drafting speed to average non-drafting speed. There would be an additional 10% time assessment too. Chips will track each competitor in relative position to other competitors in the no-draft zone area and time duration to determine penalties. Finally, there would be an on-board dashboard for each racer. If green shown, all good. However, there would be a yellow light warning when in the passing zone with a countdown to time limitation to complete a pass that would turn red showing drafting violation for not breaking off appropriately.

And a bit more in the future I see bikes could be equipped with AI dash boards that provide directions of the course in real time. We could use individually designed bio-marker readers to know when to optimally drink, what to eat, when to rest or when to recover more from races and workouts or when to work out harder; all for the sake of smarter training. Pipe dream? Hell, who ever thought there'd be a 100K IM triathletes in a year vying for 2K KQ spots?


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I thought about this over a decade ago and I came up with what I though would be mostly fair, and most certainly a deterrent to others watching what was going on.

You need at least two Marshalls for this, you ride behind the group for a couple minutes and note if there were any lead changes during that time, and if so did the leader drop to the back in time and hold the proper bike lengths to stay legal. Then you pull the entire pack over to the side of the road, Marshall in front, other in back. If the lead did not change, let that guy go.

If not then you mark each number down to serve a penalty at the next stop, however they do it. Called in, or by actually marking the number. You do this one at a time and send them off one at a time. I can guarantee you that particular group will not form again, and the stronger riders will be able to take their pace and move forward in the race.

Do that to whole packs and the word will be out very quickly that not only are you not protected by large numbers, but if you are even around them it is quite possible you will get swept up in the pullover. I know for me if this happened and I knew this could happen, I would be putting on my brakes to let them go by as quick as possible, and just hope for that 10 seconds I wasn't mistaken for someone actually riding in the group. That is where watching for a couple minutes from behind would help to sort folks out. From watching the fwy footage of this weeks race, it would have been easy to catch a bunch of these, 2 marshals could have done a lot of damage to peoples times this way too...

Yet you'd be giving a de facto penalty to the one rider you let go only after stopping him/her in the middle of the race.

Perhaps having marshals on the course in the beginning and being proactive by breaking up packs early with harsh penalties might encourage a fair course.

Yet you'd be giving a de facto penalty to the one rider you let go only after stopping him/her in the middle of the race. //

So you are the guy riding 350 watts and pulling 30 people, do you A" want the Marshalls to do nothing, or cherry pick a rider or two" or B" get all the MF'ers into the penalty tent and lose a few seconds in the process"??


If you are looking for a perfect solution, you will be looking for a very long time. I propose a solution to get the most bang for the buck regarding Marshalls and their actual effect in policing and deterring...

That is kind of what I was thinking. And the annoyance to the lead rider is minimal. I think in 60-90 seconds you could observe and then knock out 30+ riders. Technology could get the motos to the right places quickly.

Monty, how fast do e-bikes go these days? Maybe what you are proposing with guys on ebikes that move fast enough and pulling them all over

So your "solution" is to penalize an innocent person because some other people will get caught.

I'm not looking for a perfect solution to anything. I'm responding to your fairly ridiculous proposition.

SO you answer my question to you with a comment about me being ridiculous. You obviously don't have anything to add to a solution, why are you even on this thread anyway?

I actually got this idea from the base police in camp pendelton on our weekly Wednesday ride. We would roll though 60 to 100 riders in a big pack, they wanted single file. They would yell at us with a bull horn, sometimes pull a few over, but not until they pulled the entire group over, took ID's and names down, did the pack riding turn into a very long pace line. For years and years we had flouted that rule of theirs, and there really was no consequence. It all change that day when the entire pack was pulled over and let go one at a time, after being recorded.

Just seems to me that could be duplicated in triathlon, and it wouldn't have to be for very long before word got out and "most" people rode by the rules, instead of most doing the exact opposite...

But you may continue to snipe at me and solutions I provide if it makes you feel important to the discussion..

Pointing out that YOU want to punish an innocent person isn't contributing? It IS a ridiculous solution to the problem. Nobody is saying there is a perfect answer, but answers that have HUGE glaring flaws in them deserve to be scrutinized as such. I didn't say I had a better answer, but that doesn't make yours any better.

well it seems most answered without answering your question, not sure if that's a reading comprehension fail or not, I'll go with it is.

You basically would have to drive up next to people and show them the blue card then tell them to go to the next penalty tent.
maybe you can yell at 2 or 3 at a time in a big pack. I think if you yell at more than that you cause a crash. Let's face it, some moron triathlete is going to go all over the road trying to get off his aerobars when he/she gets dinged. it's also hard to hear what the official is yelling when you've got certain aero helmets on. They apparently don't want your autograph.......ask me how I know ;-)

I think you start at the back, choose the L or RT side of the pack, pick off a few in the back for drafting. Then you move to the front of the group and pick off the people in the 2nd & 3rd row. This hopefully will have made some room in back for the inevitable slowing that will occur when you start handing out penalties in the front of a 30+ pack.

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Brian Stover USAT LII
Accelerate3 Coaching
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HUGE glaring flaws, ok..Maybe everyone else reading this thread can answer my question about my scenario. You are the guy pulling 30 people behind you and cannot shake them. Do you willing give up 30 seconds to get them"all" off your wheel and you get a good head start on them getting let go one at a time, and then to spend their 4 minutes in the penalty tent later on the course. Or do you just want the Marshall to pick one at at time, or try to write down numbers for later for penalties while they continue to ride your wheel??

I thought it a pretty simple question, I know what I would want to happen if I'm that front rider. I would certainly loose a lot more than 30 seconds to all those just sitting on, and probably a lot more because it changed the way I rode the race(erratic). Just look at CPT and a few other guys race reports that were that strong guy out there, not a pretty pace was to be had by a one of them. I think I know what they would choose too. It is a ridiculous suggestion???

It starts with the swim. IMTX wasn't a real rolling start. At IMSA they do a way better job. So first thing: have less people in the water in a short time period.
After that you need referees. It is easy to marshal a race well but Marshal's should be on course at the beginning of the bike. When packs have formed it becomes difficult: hard to marshal and hard to my draft if you arent't a great cyclist.
Sam

they should require everyone to wear an electric dog collar and if you're in the drafting zone of another for 60 seconds you get shocked until you clear the zone or fall off your bike. :)

From my roadie TT- perspective there is not a single "innocent" person in those traffic-cam pelotons.

From my roadie TT- perspective there is not a single "innocent" person in those traffic-cam pelotons. //


That was also my observation, I only threw in the lone front rider scenario just in case. And that is why I said for the Marshalls to watch for a minute or two just to be sure it was the same guy on the front. But you are right, really arguing about a guy that doesn't exist that often.

In his hypothetical scenario there is though. I also realize there's not a single person pulling the entire group the entire time, but I'm responding to what was posted.

The notion that the guy in front would be thankful that he got stopped so he could get rid of people sucking his wheel is laughable. I highly doubt you'd ever have somebody happy to be stopped in the middle of a race without having actually broken a rule. Kona spots are decided by less time than that sometimes.

Oh, I agree with you that he wouldn't be happy. But given that the leader rider also benefits significantly in a drafting situation (~2%) I'm not sure I'd listen long to any complaining about Kona qualification margins.

Hello ajthomas and All,


Paintball guns with a bump stock. Different colors for different penalties.


All athletes must use protective eye wear.


The offender knows he has been tagged and the penalty is visible for all to see.

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Cheers, Neal

+1 mph Faster