Anyone have any input on the Global Tri Group’s policing of the race course?
Where I was it seemed like the bike officiating was very lax.
And I “noticed” that there was no appeals process afterwards. I got the red slash and 4 mins in the “sin bin” when I was riding honestly behind a pack that I caught up to right after the turn out of Keene on the second lap. I didn’t feel like putting on the burners to blast through them (and to have them catch up as they always do…) so I rode 4 lengths behind and pulled out a gel flask. All of a sudden I got sucked into the pack on a slight downhill and between laziness, two blockers aside me at that point and a gel flask in my hand I was in the wrong place. Yes, I (guess I) deserved it. But compared to what I saw ealier in the day, mine should have been one of those judgement calls that were waived off…How does an official at an oblique angle see 3 bike lengths instead of 4? (I judge by the shadows between my bike and the the next one.) Also, I was pulled over as one of two in that pack and had to wait another 20 seconds for the first infringer to get written up…
In any event, what do people think of the new system?
I was a spectator and I’ll say there were so many small groups it wasn’t even funny… I ran 13 miles of the bike course and I could believe how much drafting was occuring.
I don’t think I saw any penalties handed out. So far as I could tell, it was basically an honor system race. I thought the drafting was worse than usual, but not a lot.
I don’t think this system is going to work though. I have never seen so much garbage on a triathlon course. Yes, the volunteers cleaned nearly all of it up, but it was a total disaster. People know getting caught littering is, at most, a 10 or 20 second standdown since the penalty means nothing unless they get caught three times. If you are 15 miles from home on the run course, why should you care?
That’s disappointing that there were still packs of drafters and that the officiating was “lax.”
Personally, I was very excited to hear about the rules changes for IM events for several reasons: I think it’s MUCH better to find out about a rules infraction at the time it happens, rather than after the race; it generally leaves a bad taste in anyone’s mouth to find out about a drafting call that they can’t (or don’t want to) remember. The stand down/sin-bin process is much better, in my opinion, because you always know where you are relative to anyone else in the field or your age group; if you cross the line ahead of someone else, it’s said and done, and no time penalty is applied after the fact to convolute the results. The freedom for officials to make judgement calls seems so much more appropriate, especially for the vast majority of us AG’ers. The “appeals process” currently used by USAT doesn’t seem to be too effective; it seems to me that as long as the official correctly identifies the bike or triathlete and can back it up with written evidence from the time of the infraction, that there is very little leeway to really appeal the penalty. Besides, in the recreational basketball league I used to play in, we had questionable calls all the time; there was no appeals process, and we were pretty fine with it. Though there were disagreements at times, every call made by an official had some reasoning behind it. Officiating isn’t perfect, so we dealt with it.
I realize it’s probably impossible to completely eliminate drafting, but I’d be very disappointed if GTG didn’t find a way to better their effort, given some of the reports I’ve heard from IMLP.
With all this 18 year old stuff and girl this and girl that, I keep scrolling down to this thread and thinking it says IMLP & PANTIES & GTG. You people need to stop the corruption of young innocent minds like Mine.
Near the back of the pack where I was I saw the drafting bikes no less than 6 times and a guy beside me got a warning for not passing fast enough. You should have seen the massive pack rolling out of town after the swim where I was. It was quite a group. From what I could see, people were fairly good about it. Maybe it is just the FOP’ers
M~
I’ll agree that there were large “packs” of cyclist on the bike course… but, with that many people coming out of the water in a relativly close period of time, it couldn’t help but happen… I saw one drafting penalty handed out to a guy in a pack in front of me and heard another “warning” shouted to a guy…
I tried my best to stay as “legal” as possible - which was a challenge on the first lap - second lap, things were spread out a bit more…
As far as the litter was concerned - I was really dissapointed at the amount that I saw…
I saw the real front of the pack cyclists on the last small hill before special needs, and I did not see any drafting- the top cyclists actually seemed to be sperated by a few minutes. I’m talking about the top 10-20 guys and pro women. I’m not sure about the next wave, however, because I left the area I was watching from.
Since I was in the back of the race, I did not notice much drafting. I did have a few officials come by, just about the same amount of officials I saw last year when USAT officiated.
Also saw them on the run, on bikes. Seems like Jimmy did a good job of training them.
USAT has had 20 years to develop their officials - GTG has had 2 months. I’m sure that they will continue to improve. Z
I was in the front of the bike race (top 30) for the first loop of the bike and the motos where there in the front 30 places controlling. I sure notice the huge packs of 20-30 riders not only 1 or 2 but at least a dozen in the out and back section (Haselton), after doing this race 4 times nothing has really changed over the years… no breaks up in the pack by the officials.
I just don’t care anymore I do my own race not focusing on others, I used to spend a lot of energy screaming “cheaters, blablahblah” to these packs and thinking “Man this is not fair those guys will catch me up and grab that last kona slot I’m shooting for”… Well I just stopped it’s something that I can’t control. I just hope that these people don’t improve their swim because then I will be the middle of these packs myself.
I also understand that race organization can’t have 50 motos controlling everyone. This is just I guess but they tend to have the motos between 1st to 60th position where most of the kona slot battles happened.
I was the lackey-volunteer manning the penalty box/“sin bin” at IMLP (there goes any anonimity with this disclosure) – believe it or not, more penalties were doled out at LP than CDA. The timing folks told me CDA had about 1/2 a dozen drafting penalties. At LP, there were nearly 2 dozen.
Nevertheless, I think the officiating was a little inconsistent.
just a correction of the fact - you can’t blame USAT for drafting at IM races since the races are no longer even sanctioned by USAT and WTC provides its own rules and officials
saw many packs of 20-30 at IMLP as well … incl a group of top age groupers working a nice piceline of 3 on loop 1 of the bike and then even 5 of them on loop 2 …
the problem of stand downs is that you can’t really pull over a pack …
I was just being sarcastic because of the way it
all unfolded and the comments on Officating when
WTC and USAT basically split.
I know all about the situation first hand. I raced
IM CDA and witnessed first hand and also I
also Officiate quite often at races.
In time GTG will get better. I would rather race
knowing that the Officials call a tough race. Nothing
worse than racing and having cheaters on the course.
But again, they have to live with the fact that they
cheat. not me.
I’m surprised you saw any officials on the run. I was spectating for most of the run at the same place (in front of The Prague on 73… 2.5 miles out) and saw ZERO officials. Also saw a lot of abandoned equipment/littering well past the aid station, outside assistance, and pacing. Heck, Jon admitted in the ‘walk-a-thon’ thread that he paced his wife most of the run. See ‘Race Conduct’ 3.4.a.
If Jimmy did a good training them, they should do a better job of making themselves visible on the run. The only people I saw on bikes during the run were those pacing loved ones/friends and a couple of medics.
I know it’s only the second race for GTG, but I’m hoping they learn from CDA and LP.
Well, the searchable results are now up, and I dont see any penalties. I would think that at least the drafting penalties would be listed, since those are the ones that are being called on intent, and mean a visit to the “sin bin”. Maybe it’s like going to confession - it’s between the athlete and the official, and it’s up to the athlete whether they want to mention their sin in public?
i personally thought that the GTG officials were a million times better than any officials ive seen before. my reasoning:
they used common sense. with 2000 people on a course drafting is unavoidable at times, such as going uphills. people tend to bunch up. lets face it, theres no drafting effect, and no one is intentionally trying to get a draft up a hill. plus in order to avoid drafting up a hill youd have to slow down even more which would make it harder to get back up to speed. i saw this happen and the officials were cognizant of it and let the racers know it was ok. when the ‘group’ got to the top, they spread out immediately and the official hung around to make sure this happened.
i dont know about you but ive been racing for 10 years now and still cant tell what 3 bike lengths is supposed to look like. the officials were giving the thumbs up to people when they saw them, to let them know they were ok.
i found the officials attitudes on the course to be surprisingly pleasant. i cant say this of most of the officials ive seen before. they were encouraging to the competitors, all the while, still doing their job.
yeah, there were freaking packs and it irritated me, especially on the second loop when they flew by me. its not fair and its cheating. and im sure people got nailed as i saw plenty of slashes across their race numbers.
it seems people on this site want perfection, seems to me its hard to attain. i personally think GTG is a serious improvement that will only get better and i welcome the change. as jimmy ricitello said at the prerace meeting, ‘they are there for us, to race fairly and safely’…
I thought the officiating was very good at times. Particularly on the 1st lap of the bike the officials were very visible around me and I personally saw 3 drafting penalties handed out (and all very deserved). I think GTG is on the right track. Of course I also saw some large packs, but with 2000 people I don’t know how you completely prevent that, other than limiting participation to 1500 or less.
