Originally Posted by
Baby Puke
I don't really see the new keirin rules as much of a problem. The windup behind the motor has been shortened, and now you have to stay in your slot until the motor drops. On a local level, this eliminates what is often pointless tough-guy posturing in the first part of the race, and now the race is simply from the moment the motor drops off. From a TV perspective, now the race is a bit shorter overall. Maybe that's good?
The sprint seeding rules are a bit strange, but I don't really see any of this as a deterrent to people getting into sprint events, and much of this will not affect us on the local level anyhow. The kilo has already been dead as a premier event for over ten years. Maybe this helps its TV watchability in some way? Trying to see positives here.
You only need to stay in your slot for the first lap. This eliminates some of the pointless crashes and restarts at the beginning of the race as people won't be aggressive and start bashing shoulders and crossing wheels going 10mph.
The three lap keirin sprint can actually put pure sprinters at an advantage over kilo specialists by allowing more time to come to the front. Hoy-like riders will be less incentivized to come to the front when the motor comes off. It'll give more room for different tactics from different types of riders. It's an extra 7 seconds of racing. Even pure sprinters should be able to manage the extra half lap. And in exchange for the extra 7 seconds of sprinting, you spend 2.5 fewer laps rolling at aerobic efforts - much better for sprint punch. With 6 laps total rather than 8 and only three laps of pacing, you'll come up to speed much faster behind the motor and the race will be more sprinting and less looking at one another.
Looks like women get to feel what it's like to be dropped off at 50kph now...
They also fixed the exchange in the team sprint too. That's nice. You can come under the lead rider again, as long as you don't actually pass until after the pursuit line. Simpler now... and faster.
As for the racing formats, kilo heats, etc.; everyone's riding the same format. Bring it on.
Here's a link to the full rule changes for USAC (Track page 8):
https://s3.amazonaws.com/USACWeb/for...ges_170104.pdf
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"If you’re new enough [to racing] that you would ask such question, then i would hazard a guess that if you just made up a workout that sounded hard to do, and did it, you’d probably get faster." --
the tiniest sprinter