Ttoc6

Alex Dowsett has been posting his power data on Strava from the races he's been doing. If you want to be impressed, go take a look. Then remember he is "just" playing domestique at this race...

gsteinb

anyway at all you can stop polluting every thread with your pet peeve issues? Ever race on the track? No? k. You're wrong. Let it go. Move on. Not a request.

Enthalpic

Just bought a wireless Powertap wheel set (32s open pro) for $340 CND.

It even came with tires, tubes and two spare batteries.

TMonk

nice find!

Flatballer

I'm sad the Olympics are over. I feel like I missed a ton of sports I would've liked to see, and watched way, way more of some other sports than I needed to see. As usual.

I think they just show what they think some hypothetical average person wants to see, and nobody ends up happy. They also focus on stuff Americans are in, which I don't care much about.

Didn't see much long track at all, very little short track, not much snowboarding or alpine skiing. Couple minutes only of sliding stuff.

So, so much curling and figure skating. I happen to like curling but it was still too much. Too much cross country skiing too.

TheKillerPenguin

I think i'd be more in to both of those sports if they simply combined them. Make the skaters chuck those giant-ass stones in the middle of triple axles, make the brusher dudes have to dodge those stones and steer em towards the bullseye.

Flatballer

I just wish the judging made more sense in figure skating. From what I can tell you're better off attempting a very hard jump and failing instead of nailing an easier jump.

TheKillerPenguin

I can appreciate the athleticism, making that stuff look easy requires so much work. I hate the floofy pageantry around it though, seems a bit ridiculous to expect competitors to dress up like debutantes.

Doge

I'm at the bar at the United Club in LAX with the head of USA Hockey glowing about the women's Gold Medal win. Very cool. 75K members, grew from 20K just a short while ago.

himespau 

See, and I was thinking figure skating would be a lot better if you combined it with speed skating. The higher the difficulty the jump, you get a few points taken off your time. And make it a relay where you can only hand off after landing a jump so you have to do a jump every other lap, and, if you don't land it you can't do the exchange, so you have to take another lap and then try again.

Ygduf

you all are 1 step away from making facebook posts with the word "sportsball" in them.

carpediemracing 

I'm picturing a rally cross kind of ice skating track, with jumps and stuff. Maybe a figure 8 course, where you have to jump over the crossing track. Combine that with lobbing massive stones at some target (perimeter curling, where the stones bounce off bumpers around the track?) you could eventually have all the Olympics in one venue, a mad one or three rink circus with every possible winter sport all combined together.

I'm bummed that normal channels didn't carry the Olympics. We couldn't put it on at work.

Ttoc6

tetonrider

It isn't. However, you responded to my post which said that while a Cat 1 road license transfers to MTB, I do not feel a Cat 1 MTB license (/skills) transfer to the road (or track).


I've never researched it, but it sounds like since road Cat 1 licenses do not freely transfer to the track, the answer is, by definition, no -- there are no examples of that. They would have had to go through some progression from what I understand.


Well, one man's "expect" is another man's "hope." Hope isn't much of a strategy.

I get that you are arguing that if they showed they could drive a sedan (road) they can also drive a coupe (track).

Sounds like some folks think road is like a sedan and track is a motorcycle, i.e. different enough to require other skills.

I don't know.


Like MTB and CX, if you go out skiing you are far more likely to hurt yourself than someone else. (Of course I can cite several friends who are injured *right now* due to being hit by other skiers, but that's a small portion of overall injuries.)

In other words... have at it!

Most people would say that skiing has a ton of barriers: you need snow and colder temps (getting less common!), specialized equipment, possibly lessons, lots of money (for most people this is a multi-day trip due to where they live), etc.

I'd also argue that skiing lift-served terrain/inbounds is a neutered experience and not so dangerous. Much of the real danger has been mitigated (summer grooming of terrain, mitigation of avalanche hazard, etc.). So, it's by and large fitness and technique.

Now, if we were talking *real* skiing in the mountains...

It comes back to this: if you're in a discipline where a mistake is LIKELY to take other people out (road and track), one needs to prove their skill. Further, due to the nature of the racing and equipment (fixed gear), the powers-that-be feel that track is sufficiently different from road to require one to prove it.

You disagree.

Maybe they feel that if someone displays such little interest to clear those hurdles that they are not likely to remain on the track, and if that person causes ONE bad crash they can take out people who are actually big fans of the disciple. I.e., perhaps it's a conscious choice that the revenue from some folks who may jump in a race or 2 when convenient is not worth the risk of the cash cows.

I don't know. Seems doubtful they thought things through that way, though it is possible.

My perspective as a road rider -- which would be similar if I was serious about the track -- is that I am actually GLAD that a governing body is attempting to protect the safety of riders. When we travel to a new region (/RR or track) it is nice to have some assurance that the other riders in the P12 race have demonstrated similar skills. It's an imperfect system.

Ygduf

the above: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogue_wave

mattm

How about the mass-start speed skating though, that was pretty fun to watch. Like a velodrome but on ice.

They talked about "Nascar on ice" and even had some Nascar dude talking about the similarities: drafting, crashing, etc.

spectastic

apparently you can get your cat 1 upgrade without the full 35 points now, and instead, petition to USAC, and they'll do it?? it's definitely not something i'd do, but I know of 3 guys who have done it?? one of these guys had like 6 points from crits, and couldn't even hang in a 60 mile road race as a cat 3 last year??? wtf**********

Flatballer

Yeah, I enjoyed that one. The commentator at one point said something like "he's trying to get on his wheel."

himespau 

I wanted to see that but missed it. In an earlier regular speed skating race they showed a dude (who at least at the time had the top time) who'd carved off a chunk of his calf due to a solo training accident. The thought of a pileup in mass start speed skating had me thinking of all the debate about disc brakes in racing. Blades aren't spinning, but they're a lot sharper leading to some potentially hazardous pileups.

gsteinb

Doge was asked to let it go. Probably best we all move on.

gsteinb

I watched a ton of curling. I wished it was on tv with more regularity.

himespau 

For some reason, curling wasn't on whenever I turned on the Olympics. Had it been, I probably would have watched more of the olympics. Probably the fact that I'm somewhere on the spectrum, but the whole artistic thing doesn't do as much for me. I like events where there is a clearly measurable winner (and rules I can understand).

TheKillerPenguin

Wha? Weaksauce.

Flatballer

Once we have some free time (in 20 years or so) my wife and I want to try it out. It's something close to a sport, but we could do it together. Maybe we'll be in the 2050 Olympics mixed doubles (old people class).

himespau 

I'm feeling rather frustrated that because another child did something that grossed her out so that she threw up, my daughter had to come home early today and can't go back to school tomorrow. She has a really bad cold and had to stay home Friday because she had a fever (that's been done since Saturday), so extra rest isn't the worst for her, just makes for hard planning. Another child mashing up peas and potatoes and repeatedly spitting them out pretending to throw up leading to my daughter throwing up for real sounds to me more like a discipline issue for the other child rather than a health issue for my kid.