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You could see some new faces at your next road race, now that a rule change has forced triathletes to practise their bunch riding
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CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Sport
"Road racing could receive new influx following triathlon rule change"
(10 posts)-
Posted 9 years ago #
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I think many tri guys already train in groups to work on threshold stuff, but a positive move to increase groups on the road.
However - worth a note here. Please do not attend group riding sessions on a TT bike or if possible even a bike with tri-bars (take them off as they give people the jimmies, and they get worried) . If you do have tri bars do not ever use them in a group scenario.
Posted 9 years ago # -
Chap did our 53 mile cycle Pentland Loop yesterday (I have perfected that route map now, unless someone knows how to avoid Penicuick). He had tribars, indeed he was doing his own triathlo having been in the reservoir early doors before the cycle and then added a bit of reverse loop cycling as he had meesed up his strave so had not logged all his distance. He was then presumably going for a run.
Thirteen of us out, we end up spreading out a bit on the A70 as people race (I try not to be last). Fortunately the triathlete's bottom bracket is crocked so I heard him coming when he made his move but was powerless to do anything about it.
Earlier when we were cycling as a group it was not a problem, he took the jibes in good spirit but our route is wide and without vehicles from just after P'cuick pretty much until the A70 (save the odd co-operative delivery truck - few people live out that way it appears)
Posted 9 years ago # -
You guys weren't at the Apple Pie Bakery in Carnwath about 10.30/10'40'ish were you?
Posted 9 years ago # -
@gembo - so long as he wasn't sitting in the group on the bars then it's ok. I've left a group ride before because someone was riding along at 30mph+ on the bars about an inch from the next guy in the chain gang and about 12 inchs from his brakes!
Posted 9 years ago # -
I did a Google image search for 'team time trial' and it does seem like roadies use their aerobars in tight groups? They might not do that if you were to go check out an ERC, Ronde etc. group in a local team TT though?
To me it doesn't seem like tri could ever be as iffy as road racing because there's no huge incentive to place on the bike. i.e. instead of sprinting flat out while bashing elbows with the other guys, people are coasting along undoing their shoes ready for the run. I guess they might stack it trying to undo their shoes though...
Posted 9 years ago # -
The issue is more that in a group, if you're training and an inch from the guy in front, and something happens at the front that causes a slight slowdown, that causes a ripple down the group, and someone on aero bars doesn't (usually) have brakes on those bars, and in the time to grab the brakes on the normal bars is enough to send him into the rider in front.
Quite a few videos online of this exact thing.
The pros, I suspect, are more into the time gains from the aero position, weighed up in favour of the safety benefit.
Posted 9 years ago # -
I did a Google image search for 'team time trial' and it does seem like roadies use their aerobars in tight groups?
Indeed, but that would be a small group of people who you have agreed to and trained to ride with so closely and trust implicitly to sit an inch off your wheel with your hands off the brakes and not to do something sudden and unexpected... Open club training runs are a real mix of experience, ability and opinions as to what's safe and what's not.
Passing in a TTT is done in such a manner that you don't get bunches of teams forming, pass or be passed, and if you're passed that's it, let the safe gap form and accept the other guys were faster. Each team is effectively 1 single hiverider.
Local TTTs seem a real mix of no-aerobars through to full-on super streamlined, disc-wheeled and integrated TT bikes via clip-ons, pointy-hats and deep section rims.
I'm led to believe that due to the oddities of governing rules, a TT bike can be a tri-bike, but a tri-bike cannot necessarily be a legal TT bike. Beyond geometries, weights and component rules, streamline behind-the-saddle water bottles for instance are not allowed "on the road", neither are those in front of the stem with the little drinking straw. Hence the old saying, when is a bike not a bike? When it's a tri-bike.
Posted 9 years ago # -
I did a Google image search for 'team time trial' and it does seem like roadies use their aerobars in tight groups?
Just google team time trial crashes - and as @WC says there are a load of examples of why in a tight group/line of people you don't ride and train with everyday it's a bad idea to be away from your brakes. Indeed even if you are on a full TT bike with brakes at the end of the bars they are not designed to be as grabby as road brakes and so even then could cause a serious accident.
Posted 9 years ago # -
Tri bars are fine for group riding as long as you dont mind leading for the whole of the ride and being aero for the rest of us
Posted 9 years ago #
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