As I understand it, there is nothing in the rule book that says slotting into a pace line is not allowed.
But we still hear broadcasts or podcasts. Talking about having to make a big effort to move past every athlete in a pace line if they want to just move up. Burning matches by spending minutes above race power.
With race ranger. It is super easy to understand this logic is wrong.
Red flashing within the 12m draft zone.
Blue warning zone from 12m to 14m.
Orange from 14-17m.
Say we have 3 athletes A - B - C spaced with the orange light.
C want to move up. So moves out, pulls alongside B, Then gets his wheel just ahead. He is still Orange to A, so no requirement to pass them. But since C wheel is head of B. It is now their requirement to drop back to Blue or Orange to C. So the new order is A - C - B. All well within the rules.
Even if A - B was a Blue light to start. This same logic applies. C just has to get their wheel ahead of B without going Red to A. Then B has to drop back. So the move has been made fairly.
Rules:
(c) Athletes must remain outside of the draft zone (6 bike lengths between bikes) except when passing. Failure to do so will result in a drafting violation (5:00 Minute Time Penalty)
(d) A āpassā occurs when the overtaking athleteās front wheel passes the leading edge of the front wheel of the athlete being overtaken;
It may well be slightly easier now with RR because you have a series of colors telling you exactly how far you are between riders.
Without it though, youāre going to assume that every person in the pace line is exactly 12m behind the person in front. Therefore as soon as you get your wheel in front of the rider in front of you, you have now entered the draft zone of the next rider and are required to make the pass.
Donāt forget that when you enter the zone you canāt just back out of it again (even though Iām sure we see this happening fairly often with RR). So youāve got to be quite sure that youāre not going to be before pulling this stunt.
Not to mention, in your example if Iām person āBā in the pace line, following āAā at what I assume to be border line legal distance, and all of a sudden āCā pops in front and pulls in disrupting the flow of the entire group by forcing everyone to slow, heās not going to be making many friends. Itās a dick move which ever way you look at it.
I get your point and you arenāt necessarily wrong. But in reality, if C is passing B, thereās a very good chance B will ride into Aās draft. Have you ever passed someone and then once you are ahead of their front wheel, slowed down? Or decelerated even a little? While itās possible to do and stay legal, the chance and risk you take doing this is very high that you run into Aās draft. Also is a great way to not make friends out there.
And I wonder how RR does with 2 riders riding abreast (4-6 feet apart)? Can it tell if the person closer to the middle if the road is closer to the rider in the front? Letās assume all riders not passing are right on the right side of the road.
I am yet to race with race ranger. But must people I have talked to say they aim to stay in the Orange. Holding Blue is just too risky of slipping into the red by mistake, like you say.
So thatās at lest 2m to match the speed of athlete A once the front wheel of C is ahead of B.
Sticking in a pace line is not the heroic way to ride, but as Lange proved in the WC it is likely the smartest.
Even if this all worked out (a lot of luck) and the Race Ranger new showed a drafting infringement, I would still worry about a heavy handed official giving you a drafting penalty anyway. For so long the de facto rule has been slotting in=drafting.
Not sure I agree, there is a lot of luck involved. Lights should make it pretty clear-cut on paper. But do agree it comes down to the refās decision.
Suppose that raises the question should Refs have to carry a chest or helmet mounted action cam?
There has been a few high profile penalties in recent year. Should it be possible to request to view post race footage, possibly even get the penalty time taken away from finish time. Daniel BƦkkegƄrd seemed sceptical of his Kona pens and remember back to the Lionel Sanders white line DQ.
Americans have been pushing for police to wear body cams for more than a decade. Seems like a good idea, accountability to those with power, equal justice under the law, less discretion and responsible use of force. The pushback is immense. They cost too much, police are in such danger already, taxpayer dollars, etc. But it all is dressing on the real issue: Holding people accountable who have for a long time been able to use their power at their own discretion is an uphill battle.
You can map that to a much less consequential case here. Refs love power and feeling important. They hate when people second guess their decisions. Cameras may prove that they miss a lot of calls and make a lot of bad calls. Canāt have that
Is it not as simple as āif Blue (or even Orange) no slotting inā ?
If an athlete does not want someone to slot in, simply maintain Blue or the ability to get Blue quickly. If I am Orange and see someone is going to pass me, simply become Blue. Itās basically up to the person being passed if he will allow the other athlete to slot in.
Athletes that are riding Orange should not be penalized by the risk of someone slotting in. Athletes should be encouraged to ride Orange
Canāt say I agree with your read. The reality is (as Pat Lemieux wouldāve started) that triathlon refs are amateurs and far from tying their sense of self worth to being unaccountable for the cards they show to a few men in lycra. Itās not a significant thing they do in life, thereās just way too little work in the market for that to be true.
Well, athletes donāt have a ārightā to block slotting in by holding blue, itās just a side effect of draft zone rules.
So to avoid thatā¦If rider B gets told to drop back and allow C in, perhaps say Cās RR goes red when Bās front wheel passes Cās then you have pragmatically achieved the goal ā¦?
You scenario is not really practical as you have forgotten the two meters of the passing bike. No one just gets an inch ahead because you need a full bike lenght+ to be able to move over. And no the passed rider does not have to slow down immediately, think they have 30 to 45 seconds to back out.
So if you are passing a rider at 14+ meters, you have to get your 2 meter bike ahead of them and now you are most likely in the forward draft zone. This is what happens in practicality every long train situation. The only way you get to slot in is if someone is 17+ meters and even that gets dicey if you have some good momentum going forward.
I think the bigger point though is that the rule is poorly written.
Obviously thereās a point at which you canāt slot in. Whether you set that distance at 12.01m or you set that distance at 14 or 16 or even 20 - thereās obviously a distance where you shouldnāt be able to slot in.
On the other side, thereās clearly a distance where you can and should be able to cover a gap that has just been opened. Is that at 15m? 20m? 25m? 50m? (obviously I think we agree that at 50m, its no longer slotting in and youāre now filling a gap that was opened, but I trust you see my point - at some point it stops being slotting in and youāre in the clear)
In the past, it was left to the discretion of the referee - but with RR, IM can now be prescriptive in how they want athletes to behave. Set 2 distances and assign them colour codes.
Closer than x and youāre drafting
Between x and y and you canāt slot in
Past y and you can slot in
If an athlete wants to take the risk and the athlete in front of them is close to distance y, then thatās on them and they take the risk of RR flagging them for the ref to see
100% disagree with that statement and actually find it pretty offensive. For years I spent most weekends over summer getting up at 4am, driving over 100 miles (sometimes going the day before and camping) to volunteer my time. I prided myself that it was about 3 years before I actually had to give anyone a penalty, the prior situations Iād managed to handle by proactive warnings/whistling or a pause while they corrected things. I, along with my fellow refs got all manner of abuse shouted at us during the race, but almost always sheepish apologies once the red mist had worn off.
I love triathlon, which is why I gave my time to reffing/give to volunteering.
As for the powertrip - you are so far off base. I used to have equal numbers of people complaining the drafting penalty they had was totally unfair, and people complaining that person X was blatanlty drafting and hadnāt been penalised.
And yes, Iāve been head ref (transition based) and also on a bike. So seen both sides. Now is every ref perfect? In terms of judgement and communication skills. Shit, no, and I wonāt claim I am in either respect. But I do absolutely strive to uphold the spirit of the race. As such, I will be tighter with the rules/ less warnings for those at the pointy end, will be a cold day in hell before I DQ a first timer riding with their mate on MTBs at the back of the field.
Back to the OP. If there is a line of riders all at the min gap +1cm, ie all legal in a line and you are at the back, then yes, in practice the only legal way to move up is to steadily (but swiftly) move through the field as once you enter a draft zone you need to complete the pass. If you do say overtake the 4th in line then slow not entering the 3rd draft, forcing the former 4th person to have to slow, that would cause a ripple effect all the way back and just mess with others races more than you get any benefit. Of course in reality then sit at the back, when thereās a 180, a hill, feed station and that line breaks up, and thatās the time to make the move enjoy demonstrating your uber biker skills, and pass through.
Is the rule well written / badly written? I donāt think there is a perfect rule. As rule that on paper works better is harder to explain, understand and enforce. As above by @timbasile - thatās 3 measurements that are needed. Not just one. So then you become totally reliant on technology to enforce that rule. And I personally for the good of the sport of triathlon donāt want rules that become even more prohibitive for the affordability/sustainability of our sport. What Iād like is 95% of people to understand the intent, and recognising itās a bit of weekend fun inherently try to do the right thing. Also for those 95% to recognise there are always going to be the 5% and not let others actions take from their enjoyment - big picture we all get the same finishers medal, if they draft to finish 2 mins quicker then they just got less value from their entry fee. In the pro field, well thatās why we have race ranger.
Isnāt this what we have now?? Adding more different distances just makes things more confusing. The way it is now with the RR it has become a lot simpler and folks know what the need to do and whenā¦Not sure what you are proposing to add hereā¦
We know what distance x is, so we can define it as 12m. This is easy.
The problem is that distance y is left up to the refereeās discretion. Its not that y doesnāt exist, its that we donāt currently know what value to assign to y - which has knock on effects on race dynamics in the chain. And with RR, you can now be more scientific about how you want to enforce this
If an athlete slots in at 12.00M, then this is clearly defined as slotting in and is disallowed, because in order to pass one athlete cleanly, you now enter the next athleteās draft zone.
What about 15m? Most refs would probably give a drafting penalty for this.
Ok, what about 20m? 25m? Clearly at some point thereās now a gap thatās opened and thereās an opportunity for an athlete to move up the chain without risking a drafting penalty. I suppose the logical answer here is that it has to be less than 2 times our x value + the bike (so less than 26m) since you can now fit a whole athlete and their draft zone behind the next guy.
But where IM wants to assign this value is another question - theyād logically want to minimize churn in the chain. But would they want to allow (under certain conditions) an athlete to move up for strategical reasons? Possibly. But at least now we have RR for most WCs, you can be more precise about how you define this
