Phil Gaimon
 

I heard that Phil Gaimon crashed pretty hard at his first track race. The Vegan Cyclist also had a spill his first day out on the velodrome. It seems to be an error that is made by many that the track operates the same way as the road.

Yeah I saw it on his Instagram feed the other day and he also posted a short YT video. Looked bad,poor guy.

From his Twitter: "So the first track race didn’t go very well. Broken scapula, collarbone, ribs, and partially collapsed lung."

And it was not his actual first race, but first race of the day. Also from Twitter: “'First track race' was poor choice of words. Been a few years but I did many summers and Friday nights at ttown and many other tracks and national/international events. It was the first (and possibly last) event of this chapter."

Not the best start on the road to Tokyo.

Anna Meares broke her neck seven months before Beijing. He's got plenty of time.

Are there any reports of what happened? Did anyone here see it?

Crossed wheel? Unclipped pedal?

I was there, but I didn't see it. It was actually his second race of the day. There was a TP qualifier first thing. This was a points qualifier for the IO. All the accounts that I heard was his hands came off his bars and he crashed himself and two others out on the backstraight. One person said there was a close pass just before, so a friend has a theory he instinctually tried to coast for a second, which bucked him. Multiple sources said if he didn't crash in the qualifier, they felt he would have at some point in the omnium.

Thanks for the details.

That's terrible. I hope he heals up soon and it's "once bitten, twice shy" about riding track.

I read the books on some plane flights I had for work a while back, to break the boredom, and always wondered "what would have been" if he didn't have a few of the crashes he has had.

You can what if with anyone, but San Dimas sucked. As did the slide-out in Paris-Roubaix.

One calculus I don't get even after reading the book is the whole "I lost 20 seconds sliding on my ass, I'm giving up and going to the team car so I can be a better team mate being ready for the bus ride out of here".

What?

I misread on the Paris Roubaix part. I went back and looked at Velonews and he was pulled from the race some time after the slide out. For some reason the book led me to believe it was over right then. That was like 2016 I think.

I'm confused about what you're confused about. Phil crashed hardcore at San Dimas years before that and that probably set him back a lot on his journey, and some of the other crashes in races he had seemed to be at inopportune times.

Kind of like the velodrome crash. Something is looking on the up and up and a bad crash happens. I feel for the guy.

Look. I didn't know the man existed until a week ago...much less that he wrote ass calculus books.

ass calculus?

I don't kink shame, but that sounds like some taboo stuff right there.

Not really. Instead of talking nerdy, they just talk turdy and make things up by pulling numbers out of their asses.

Or maybe it just means he's not a great bike handler?

Yeah.

Mass start and sprint track racing require superior bike handling skills. At the highest levels, pack speeds are 30MPH/48KPH and sprint speeds are over 40MPH/65KPH...all while being inches apart.

The controlled nature of track cycling significantly lowers the rates of crashes when compared to the road. But, you have to keep from wrecking yourself at the same time.

Not saying Phil didn't make a mistake, but he did mention in his first video about the track racing endeavor that he got into competitive cycling as a junior on the track, and continued to train on the track until he was in his early 20s (10+ years ago), so he isn't completely inexperienced. Personally I hope he recovers fully and gives the Olympic team a shot. His first attempt at the individual pursuit would have gotten him silver at US nationals the year before, so clearly he has the talent to make the cut. Maybe he should stick to the individual events, though.

How fast was his time? Honestly time is more important than place when determining rider competitiveness on the world level.

Track skills are a “use it or lose it” kind of thing. Taking 10 years off is like starting from scratch.

He may know the rules, but his brain has forgotten the curves of the track and the buck of the fixed hub.

Imagine being a F1 driver then taking 10 years off for family or other career. One can’t just jump back in at those speeds. There has to be an adaptation period.

He probably should have raced CAT3 for a couple of weeks and then CAT2/3 for a couple of weeks then local P/1/2 for a couple of weeks before jumping into an International UCI Pro field.

The average and top speeds increase at each of the aforementioned steps.

^ that’s kinda what Robert Kubica is doing this year in F1, and he’s failing miserably 😕

His first effort was 4:30.

yeah, 4:30 for his "first" go doesn't put him on the TP squad immediately, (and you figure AL's effort at nationals wasn't peak performance either) but it show(ed)s enough potential that in a year you could bet good money on him being on the squad before Tokyo.

Still possible I suppose, but looks a lot less likely.

Honestly, I'm not 100% sure why (other than youtube views) he'd even be on the start line in a mass start at Ttown. I guess people probably won't tune in to a dude doing 16 laps by himself on tracks across the US.

Having read his books it seems like bad wrecks are a common theme with him.

Bad wrecks are a common theme in road cycling, period. It's a risky sport.