Tag: Racing

Motorized Doping – Both Sides of the Story

It’s the buzz right now in cycling… did Fabian Cancellara use “motorized doping” to win Paris-Roubaix and Tour of Flanders this year?  Since this is PROBIKEWRENCH.COM… let’s discuss this interesting piece of technological buzz.  First things first…  let’s explain what we mean when we use the term “motorized doping.”

The phrase “motorized doping” refers to the a bike racer’s use of a bicycle with an internal electric-assist motor to gain an advantage over the competition.  There’s a video on YouTube with over 1.5 million views that shows how a motorized system (in this case, the Gruber Assist) works and, in a roundabout way, shows “video proof” of strange hand movements and their accompanied accelerations by Fabian Cancellara during his two Classics’ wins this year.  It doesn’t outright say that Cancellara used the system, but it does an amazing job of creating that assumption.  Here’s the video:

You’ve seen the “evidence,” now take a look at this great read by freelance cycling journalist Jered Gruber in regards to his photo documentation and personal handling of Cancellara’s bike during his reporting following the Spring Classics.  He does a great job explaining what he observed, and also why the mechanical assist system would not technically work in Fabian Cancellara’s race-winning Specialized Roubaix.  Here’s the link to the article:

http://www.velonation.com/News/ID/4415/Fabian-Cancellaras-so-called-motorized-doping-debunked.aspx

It’s a pretty convincing read, but the video can be persuasive, as well.  It really depends on who you pull for in this certain situation.  If you’re a Cancellara fan, you have to wish that this had never been brought up and you believe what you’ve seen… including his many amazing time trial performances and winning a TdF stage solo from a 1k attack while in the Maillot Jaune.  If you’re a conspiracy theorist, and you still think there was a second gunman on the grassy knoll, then you may believe the Italian-produced YouTube clip in its entirety.

As of right now, the UCI is not pursuing Cancellara for any charges or accusations related to motorized doping, however… they do see this as a possible form of sporting fraud and are taking measures to address the fact that this technology be found in competition bikes.  Roundtable meetings with all of the major manufacturers representatives are being scheduled, as we speak, to figure out how to check bikes for this and hopefully squash this form of cheating before it becomes rampant.

I have a sneaking suspicion that, due to lack of testing and UCI/USA Cycling rules being checked for in domestic races, “motorized doping” will make its way to the US domestic and amateur scene before long.  People will do whatever they can to sneak in under the radar and get a win.  Mark my words… someone will get caught trying to slip this one by race officials soon.

Athens/Roswell Recap, Part 2

On Sunday morning after Twilight, we departed the Hotel Indigo in Athens en route to Roswell, GA, for the Roswell Criterium.  After an hour fifteen in the caravan with the rest of Mavic‘s volunteer mechanic crew, we made it to the race course.  It was easy to find.  The traditional race course is only half an hour from my house and I had raced the criterium for the past 5 years.  You could say I was kind of familiar with the area…

We set up the pit area alongside Roswell Bicycles and I visited with my boss, Kevin, and one of my co-workers, Doug, who had set up the Out Spokin’ Sprinter Van and tent for the tailgate party.  They had the gas grill out and were already into “party mode” after their morning ride around Roswell/Alpharetta.

At the persuasion of most of my Mavic buddies, I signed up for the Cat 4/5 race.  I wasn’t going to do it unless I had enough cash in my pocket to sign up.  Race day entry was $50 (which is ridiculous, in my opinion), and I had $53… so I was in.  I worked a few races, then warmed up for my 1:55pm start.

If you’ve never raced Roswell, then you don’t know about the “race to the start.”  Staging area for this race is beyond the 250m mark behind the finish line.  Once the gate opens, you have to get clipped in and make a mad dash to the start to get the best position possible.  It’s pretty crazy, but necessary to get in the first two rows, or you’ll have crappy starting position, and in most cases, a crappy race.  Myself and my two teammates, Lonnie “The Legend” and Baxter, had a great “race to the start” and were all positioned in the second and third row.

My plan for the race was to conserve as much energy as possible, then see where I was at for the finish.  There is never usually a breakaway in the 4/5 race… that’s just how it is.  If there was a move, I wanted to be near the front to cover it and go with it, if need be.  I also wanted to keep an eye on my computer.  In a 40 minute criterium, the first 10 minutes is crucial.  If you can make it through the first 10 minutes, you can settle and hang.  If you’re in distress before that point, you should probably pack it up and call it a day.

I had a really good race.  I avoided crashes, stayed near the front, and didn’t take ANY pulls.  I downshifted before turns so I could pedal through without getting out of the saddle and expending any extra energy. I had no idea where my teammates were.  I didn’t see them for quite some time.  I think we lapped Lonnie at one point.  He got stuck behind some crashes and got separated from the main field.  I was consistently in the top ten throughout the race, so I figured a good sprint finish was in the cards.

I had good position for the field sprint, so I went for it.  I probably took off a little too early.  Roswell’s finishing straight is deceptively long, and I was running a 12t small cog.  If I had an 11t (my own stupid fault), I may have had enough gear to finish in the money.  I still managed ninth place.  Top ten is nothing to complain about.

After the race, it was back to work with Mavic.  We worked through the rest of the day’s racing, then packed up and headed to the house.  Lots of little sidebar stories throughout the weekend.  Ran into a lot of old friends and racers I have wrenched for in the past.  Made some new acquaintances, too.  All in all a good weekend of racing and fun.

Athens/Roswell Recap, Part 1

It’s a bit late, but as they say… “better late than never.”

Last weekend, Georgia hosted two of the biggest criteriums on the racing calendar, the Athens Twilight Criterium and the Historic Roswell Criterium.  These two races are very well-attended by pro road teams, and amateurs alike, primarily due to their constant spot on the schedule year after year, but also highlighted by their inclusion in the USA Crits series and the Georgia Cycling Grand Prix series.

I was delighted to find out that Mavic was going to be in attendance, offering neutral race support services for both events.  Having been a part of their volunteer mechanic program since 2005, I was thrilled to get the opportunity to do some actual “PROBIKEWRENCH-ing” again.

There’s nothing like working the wheel pit at Twilight… it’s always so amazing, year after year, regardless of the racers in attendance or any other conditions.  It’s always pretty magical.  For instance, back in 2005, I worked Twilight with the Cane Creek neutral support program.  I got the chance to push National and Olympic Champion Marty Nothstein back into the race after a crash.  He didn’t win, but played a part in the victory of his teammate Vassili Davidenko that evening.

A few days before departing for Athens, I got a call from Team Kenda p/b GearGrinder mechanic, John Columbus.  Evidently, some of the team’s gear needed some work before the weekend, and it was all being kept pretty close to where I live.  I made a trip out to Cumming to pick up three bikes and sixteen wheels to prep and deliver to Athens.

After gluing tubulars and tuning some wheels and bikes (and pretending my garage was PROBIKEWRENCH Service Course for a few days), myself and the gear got delivered to Athens, courtesy of my wonderful wife, Niki.  I met with the Mavic guys for dinner on Friday, then we crashed at Hotel Indigo in Athens, to get ready for an interesting weekend.

Amateur racing was first on Saturday.  We arrived on course a little before 8am, already getting wet from the steady rain that hung around for the remainder of the day.  After all the amateur racing had been done, we moved downtown to Broad Street to prepare for the evening racing on the classic downtown Twilight course.

As you’d expect, the rain played a big part in most of the racing.  The women’s race went off without a hitch, except when the race winner decided to celebrate her win, pushing two other riders into the barriers about 50 meters beyond the finish line.  One girl hit the ground pretty bad, so myself and two other Mavic crew members, Collin and Pete, ran to assist.  We handled the situation until the girl’s dad arrived and she was able to collect herself and get back up and on the bike.

The men’s race was a different story.  Athens always has a HUGE field, and if it’s gonna get hairy, the Men’s Pro Race is where it’s going to happen.  Around about Lap 5 or so, the wheel pit was covered up with riders with flat tires or getting caught behind a crash.  We were switching wheels, left and right, and more riders kept coming…

The business in the pit kept coming.  If it wasn’t a flat from an unseen pothole, it was more crashing.  At one point, we had to jump back in the truck and prep some more wheels to change because we were running out.  When a rider would pull out of the race, we’d grab the wheels he got from us and use them on someone else.  Non-stop… all night long, just like the rain.

I didn’t get a lot of pictures from Twilight, primarily because we were busy working.  The men’s race was over around 11:35pm, which made for a ridiculously long day.  We estimated that we did around 100 or more wheel changes for that hour and a half criterium.  For me, Athens did it again… lived up to my billing that there’s not another race like it.

I finally got back to the hotel around 1am.  My feet were wrinkled and pruny from the wet socks and shoes I had on since 7am the previous morning… so bad that they hurt.  The day wasn’t over yet.  I still had to prepare for Roswell by drying out my shoes and packing my gear to leave the next morning.  I also had to shave my legs.  I had thoughts that I may actually race my bike in Roswell… but I’ll talk about that in my next post.

My New Addiction – Track Racing

This weekend, I had the privilege of attending the Beginner Track Class at the Dick Lane Velodrome in East Point, GA.  As I mentioned in a previous post, I have been wanting to attend this class and get started racing for quite some time, but things never lined up for me to be able to do it… until Saturday.

Upon arrival, we signed a liability waiver and got ready for the class.  If you didn’t have a bike, one was provided for you.  I brought my new Jamis Sonik, which got a lot of looks and comments.  Afterwards, we gathered in the stands and waited for Brian Sullivan (lead instructor) and Jeff Hopkins (Director of Operations/former pro roadie/former World Junior Track Champion) to kick off the class.

We had around 30 beginners that were ready to get on the track.  Before riding on the track, we discussed the basic safety rules at the velodrome, basics about Dick Lane Velodrome, and details about track markings.  It was good to get all of those pertinent bits of information out of the way before taking the bikes down for some practice laps.

There were two distinct groups of riders in the class; those who had ridden a fixed gear bike before, and those who hadn’t.  The instructors did a great job by splitting us up and allowing the fixed gear newbies a little extra time to learn how to handle the bike. The riders that had ridden fixed before were allowed to get a few laps on the track to accustom themselves with riding on the banking of the track.  It was definitely different than cruising on the road… that’s for sure!

After everyone was used to the bikes, we did some drills to get used to riding around others on the track.  We practiced pacelining first, taking turns at the front, then pulling up higher on the track, allowing the rest of the paceline to pass you before jumping onto the tail of the group.

The second drill we did was side-by-sides.  We rode with a partner, one on the red line, one on the black line, and had to stay right next to our partner, regulating our speed all the way around the track.  That drill got us used to riding very close to another rider, and also to get used to how much extra energy we had to use to stay next to our partner when riding around the upper line.  It’s a longer distance around the track, so you have to pedal more/faster to stay close to your partner.

After the first two drills were done and we were moderately comfortable with riding on the track, we practiced the flying 200m sprint.  I was first, and really decided to let it go.  The feeling of dropping off Turn 2, down the back straight, then diving into Turns 3 and 4 in the pole lane was EXHILARATING!!!  The first time barreling through those turns was such a killer feeling!  I feel I put in a pretty respectable time (even though we didn’t clock it…) for my first try at the 200.

After the class concluded, Brian wished us well and asked those that had time to stick around if they wanted to do some racing.  My response was an immediate “OH HECK YES I DO!”  We lined up on the boards on the front straight for a 5-lap Scratch Race, my first race on the track.

The pace started out pretty quick.  One guy in our race decided to make a quick acceleration right off the bat.  Myself and a few others matched his accelerations, but shortly afterwards, a female that was racing with us and another guy (that had a pretty little gear on his bike) fell off the pace, leaving three of us out front, battling it out for the next few laps.

With two laps to go, I was drafting along in third position when I decided to make a move around the outside.  I jumped around and dropped into the pole lane, then accelerated to see how much distance I could put into the other two riders.  I looked back, had a pretty good gap, but still had a lap to go.  When the bell rang, I just gave it a little more juice and maintained the pace to lead the others to the line.  I WON MY FIRST TRACK RACE!

Even though it was unofficial, with no money or points being awarded, it was still a win to me.  It’s just what I needed to get me 100% jazzed on heading down to the track a few times a month to stretch my legs a little bit.  Even my boss has said, “It’s good to see that you’re excited about racing again!”

If you’ve got time, it would be worth your while to give velodrome racing a shot.  Take the next beginner’s class that you can make it to, then come join me on the track.  If you don’t want to do that, then at least come spectate and “beat the boards” a little.

For more information on track racing, see http://raceatra.com or also http://www.dicklanevelodrome.com.