Originally Posted by
Heathpack
Seriously. $hit happens when you're racing. You have to roll with the punches.
My coach raced at Nationals in the tandem TT. His partner came unclipped and his foot went into the front derailleur. They actually had to stop, get off the bike and fix it, one minute of stopped time in the middle of a TT. And they STILL won by 30 seconds. That's actually more bad a$$ than just winning by 1:30 IMO. Because its way harder to keep your head in the game when something goes wrong than if everything goes perfectly.
Amateur bike racing is just a fun thing, as far as I know, there's no penalty for not winning.
For sure, you have to roll with the punches. 4-5 seconds spent on a dropped chain is no different than 4-5 seconds on a hill because you didn't shift early enough. It would just eat at me really bad if it was a mechanical issue to the point that I wouldn't let myself tell anyone. This is 100% a psychological issue on my part.
Honestly, Only losing 4-5 seconds on a dropped chain in the heat of the moment is pretty badass in my opinion. Last couple of times I've done that, I ended up having to stop completely. I couldn't manage to pull the chain back up with the FD as I know it should work. But as I've said before, I suck at riding. That was also with those damn Q-rings. I've never dropped a chain on a bike I've set up with standard rings.