Originally Posted by
Iride01
Well that's an interesting perspective I've not really considered. Myself, just being a spectator of the high dollar hungry UCI tours and one day classics, I've sort of grown accustomed to the team having spare bikes on top the team cars that are worth more together than my home.
I suppose it is a drain to teams sanctioned under other organizations that don't demand big money. I don't have any idea what neutral support is like among them or anything. Might you sort of be alluding that maybe it's unfair for them to be allowing so much diversity of equipment and that reduces the chances of the more cash strapped teams even when they have just as good cyclists as the other teams?
That might be a hard thing to keep the talking on track in this type forum with all us arm-chair QB types.
Most the pro teams do have spare bikes. When away from the car, a like sized teammate would sacrifice their bike for GC, but now they are out. It used to be they could just sacrifice a wheel and wait for the MAVIC (or other) neutral support motorcycle and be back on the road. Now they mostly need to wait for a car.
Forgetting the UCI races and big teams, I drove support for a lot of USAC races. Wheels-In/Wheels-Out is common. And even when it is not, finding a rider's own wheels in the back of a car/pickup is not a smooth easy to do thing. Getting a random disc braked wheel Having that disc off 1-2mm means it is rubbing. If the idea is to get home, you are probbably OK, if it is to chase back into the race, it would not be my choice.