# Tour of CA - stage 1



## singlespeed.org (Feb 14, 2006)

I biked up part of Tam to see the peloton come through for today's stage. Always cool. 

I just read on Velonews about how the stage ended. Of course I'd like to see the locals do well. But this nullifying the final laps (at about 9km to go - well outside the standard 1km to go) because of a crash seems to be playing favoritism (being that Levi is the one who benefits most).

Wadayathink?


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## mytorelli (Dec 19, 2004)

ehh.. I don't know, the last circuits are going to be sketchy, therefore I don't think they are racer friendly, just spectator friendly. If I were a racer, I would hate to do those last few km. because of how people would act. 

But if you nutralize it then it wouldnt be as spectator friendly

You know what I mean?


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## johngfoster (Jan 14, 2005)

I'm on the fence on this one. It somehow doesn't seem quite fair, but then I also see the "spirit of the law" coming into play here.

I don't know. I'll have to see how the race pans out. If this keeps up, I'm for sure against it.


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## thesupervisor (Jan 29, 2007)

The fairness of the ruling is in question with me, but as far as the circuit goes: here is my opinion it is another discipline of cycling and there for belongs in more races. Yes it is spectator friendly and that will bring in more people to watch. maybe the more people that get intrested and watch will lower the amount of tv commercials that OLN has to air.

another note here is how S#$T% is there tv coverage. freaking unbelivably horrid, and I would like to see speakers over the teletron with the in race voice overs from roll and crew. oh yeah and less balloon handouts to the kids those damn things blowing into my face allday really was pushing my annoyance factor up lol


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## 8Trak (Jul 28, 2006)

Let me preface this with the fact that I don't know the in's and out's of road racing rules and etiquette... But I agree with singlespeed.org. The ruling seems a bit unfair to Ben Jacques-Maynes (who would have held the leaders jersey if the original times stood). Do you think if the crash had happened in the back of the pack, they'd would have given them the same time? I understand the spirit of the ruling, but there's got to be a cutoff somewhere, and evidently it's usually 3km.

-Dave


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## velocipede (Feb 10, 2005)

I was at the finish and listen to a couple of interviewed racers say that the circuit was top-notch. As I understand, the time cut-off for a major crash happens within the last 3km. This was a somewhat unusual crash. the crash happened at the very front of the pack and an estimated 40 riders (out of 140+) escaped the crash. Due to the circumstances, i don't think anyone was willing to argue with the coms or refs or whoever makes the discision. I do think Jaques-Maynes was robbed, but I think the decision was appropriate.

What a freakin' great finish by the way!


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## johnny99 (Apr 2, 2004)

Of course, with popular favorites like Leipheimer, Hincapie, Basso, and Zabriskie all involved in the crash, the race officials had to be thinking about sponsor dollars. If those guys all lost a minute, the other teams would never let them get back into podium contention.


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## Francis Cebedo (Aug 1, 2001)

Animated photo here. Wow, what carnage.

This is one of the two things I hate about road racing.

http://gallery.roadbikereview.com/showphoto.php?photo=14166&cat=567

francois


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## velocipede (Feb 10, 2005)

Zabriske crashed out on the way into Occidental, not in the big pile up in Santa Rosa... but I hear your point. Still I think it was more of a hometown hero thing than a sponsor dollar thing.... if it was a "thing" at all.


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## singlespeed.org (Feb 14, 2006)

francois said:


> Animated photo here. Wow, what carnage.


Looks like a Quick Step rider was the first down - if he really was a quick step, shouldn't he have gotten out of the way? Should we start calling them Slow Step? Or Quick Fall?  

Yeah, crashing is not one of the fun parts of road racing.


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## velocipede (Feb 10, 2005)

singlespeed.org said:


> Looks like a Quick Step rider was the first down - if he really was a quick step, shouldn't he have gotten out of the way? Should we start calling them Slow Step? Or Quick Fall?
> 
> Yeah, crashing is not one of the fun parts of road racing.


That's what they get for dumping Time! 

edit: If you look at the crash sequence on Velonews, it was clearly a T-Mobile wheel-toucher that sparked the reaction.


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