Yeah, burn on you @rrheisler and your so called “reporting”! LOL!
what you could however do is to just outline the pros and cons you see so far , without coming to a conclusions and outline what has been done and what further should could or will be done be done to gather more facts .
finishing up with the good old sentence , more investigations are needed at this stage.
it would be interesting to know is there actually any real investigation happening .
i guess your job is not to find a result but to report on the process
The only thing concrete I have is what the security measures are for your typical IM event in North America.
There’s no “there” there yet beyond people speculating what happened to their bikes. As others have mentioned, there are too many other plausible explanations for us to lend credence to the theory of tampering until there’s actual evidence of tampering.
If that means we’re later to this story, so be it.
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Never let facts get in the way!
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Feels are def not a substitute for facts. But I’m also not sure what facts we’re expecting to get here unless there were cameras on the area. Eyewitness testimony I guess?
There’s supposedly a camera on one of the hotels that shoots a timelapse that Ironman uses for their videos. The camera sees the entire transition. It may not have the resolution to make out “small events”.
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I can recall at least a half dozen events of tampering over the years, two of them to me. And in one of them I know the guy that did it, just can not prove it. Without actual video and good eye witness testimony not sure how one “proves” it was tampering and who did it. Not an easy thing.
One of my cases a guy comes barging in minutes before the start and crams his bike onto a rack in the front where there is literally no room. A first come first served type of set up and me and another guy politely tell him to get to the open back racks. He gets belligerent and words are said and I finally get him to move his bike that is basically laid against others and blocking them in. He says dont worry I’m a fast swimmer and it will be gone before you all’s…
Anyway as I get on my bike and ride the race it is very difficult and ii have a bad day. At some point I get off my bike as I really feel something is wrong, and low and hehold my back brake has been tightened to where both pads are rubbing on the wheel…OF course the guy did this, but can I prove it?? No of course not and in the context of the race I was not willing to go the full on police route, looking for footage that may or may not be around…
Just like he cannot know what happened the the two back tires of his car, two slow leaks to completely flat is quite a coincidence…
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how many complaints do you have
are they all from the same age group
did most of them have double puncture and seat post issues
that would be stuff i am interested in.
My 2 cents on this…
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This could be a textbook stats 101 problem. What is the likelihood of bikes in transition having some kind of “tampered mechanical”? vs. Are the numbers of “tampered mechanicals” significantly different from this baseline? The challenge of course is getting hold of reliable data, but as far as the anayses (hypothesis testing, confidence intervals, etc.), it’s very straightforward to come out with a decision.
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Bikes were sabotaged, or they weren’t. If they were sabotaged, writing a piece on it (whether it be about the process, security, athlete interviews, sportmanship (lack of), etc. etc.) would be an interesting read. Putting it out there even if not definitive would still get get clicks and eyeballs. At the very least, it puts the saboteurs “on notice” that they’re shitty behavior can get caught… and maybe they don’t do it again. But being silent let’s them think they can get away with it … at a future event.
I’ve gotten more flats and brake issues in training than I ever have in a race, but if my heavy ass flatted during a race I wouldn’t be looking towards sabotage.
Double flats? easy stuff right there. I really need to switch to Tubless I guess.
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deflating tires and loosening seat posts seem to be overly complicated if you want to mess with someone’s race
just yoink their sram batteries
Although easy, this isn’t exactly a quiet operation. A very loud , PSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS. As much as the topic makes for an exciting off season topic, i just don’t see this being anything intentional. But, i absolutely think tampering happens. Some people cheat by whatever means possible.
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If in sailing, rules dictate you need to pedal-winch the sail trim (this is not propulsion power) why do we allow batteries on a bicycle…
As you say, because this is not propulsion power
Maybe we’ll see tiny solar-powered cooling fans on Magnus’ hat in Kona 2026
Or a cartoon propellor pointing up with a neck strap to be a bit lighter on the run
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Sailing is so pure, I’m sure we’ll never see people riding bikes on sailboats to power the hydraulics
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Technically in boat racing it’s not propulsive either
if you think there’s never any cheating or sabotage in sailboat racing…
you must not have been around sailboat racing very long
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If they keep score, have bragging rights, or give prize money no matter the sport there will be cheating.
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I tempered with a mates bike in transition once…
About 30 years or so ago there used to be a group of us age group types who would spend the whole summer in Penticton training lots and partying even more. This one year one of our group started dating some stripper type who was in town doing her first Ironman. (She ended up “doing” a few ironmen but that is a different story). It became a running joke with us but it wasn’t a total surprise as he was always a total ladies man.
Anyway, we were always pranking each other so I went to the local second hand book store and bought a few girlie magazines and then cut out a bunch of naked girl pictures. After he had checked his bike on Race morning (Ironman Canada) and had gone down to the lake to warm up I went over to his bike and started taping the pictures to his top tube,down tube and waterbottles. before heading to the lake to start the swim.
He reckons it took him about 5k to notice the first picture and then the whole ride he went from cursing me to laughing out loud every time he found a new picture. When he saw me on the run he just raised his hands and clapped in appreciation that he was got good.
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