Re: Olympic Games London 2012 : Sat Jul 28, 2012 5:05 pm  

Saddened! wrote:

Rather pathetic from everyone involved in the GB team really. What was all the hype about? What's all this about team tactics? They are now saying it's because they only had 5 riders, yet the Kazakhstan winner didn't have a team holding his hand. One wonders about the money spent inflating these egos. Oops.

GBs tactics were pretty much right, they just lacked the help they needed to kill the break away. 50 seconds is hardly anything in cycling afterall and can be closed down in a matter of kms normally, just not with only 4 people doing all the riding. The Germans tactics were truely shocking, they needed a sprint as much as GB yet refused to help till it was too late.
Also they are hardly over inflated egos, Wiggins won the Tour De France and Cavendish is the most successful sprinter in its history. They are pretty much the best sports people we have at the moment and some of the best of all time.

Re: Olympic Games London 2012 : Sat Jul 28, 2012 10:13 pm  

onewild is correct - gb are so feared in cycling at the moment that other countries are happy not to contribute to setting up a bunch sprint - even if they know they won't win a medal - strange olympic ideal.

canellara might be out of the TT on weds, wiggins even more of a chance. and there are no tactics in this one, possibly only tony martin to stand in his way

Re: Olympic Games London 2012 : Sat Jul 28, 2012 10:25 pm  

Dont follow Cycling but if the GB guys are so good and feared why do they need 'help' from other countries ??

Re: Olympic Games London 2012 : Sat Jul 28, 2012 10:44 pm  

GIANT DAZ wrote:

Dont follow Cycling but if the GB guys are so good and feared why do they need 'help' from other countries ??

Because to chase down a breakaway, it takes a huge amount of effort. The person at the front of the group sets the pace, while the others behind them get a rest (believe it is something like 30% by been in the slipsteam) if there are only 4 guys setting that pace, then it is next to impossible for them to keep up a high enough pace to bridge a gap. Now in pro teams, you have 9 cyclists, in the worlds they have 8, so it is possible for a team to do all the work themselves.
However at the Olympics it is only 5. Since our best shot was Cav, they had to ride for that. If the teams were abit bigger than maybe they could have sent Millar down the road or something to mark the breakaway.
Basically the other teams were so scared of allowing Cav to get a shot, they messed it up for themselves espeically the Germans.

Re: Olympic Games London 2012 : Sat Jul 28, 2012 10:49 pm  

the artist wrote:

onewild is correct - gb are so feared in cycling at the moment that other countries are happy not to contribute to setting up a bunch sprint - even if they know they won't win a medal - strange olympic ideal.

canellara might be out of the TT on weds, wiggins even more of a chance. and there are no tactics in this one, possibly only tony martin to stand in his way

I really don't understand what the Germans were thinking, André Greipel is a great sprinter and he has managed to beat Cavendish in the Tour this year. Who knows what would have happened after Cav had gone over Box Hill 9 times. Also the organisers shouldn't have used fair play in the course design, why wasn't it just flat? stupid unselfish ideals.

Re: Olympic Games London 2012 : Sat Jul 28, 2012 11:31 pm  

So why didnt our guys just pedal faster to start with and get everyone to chase us instead of us trying to chase them if there werent enough of us to do it ?

i thought it was just a case of the bloke who rides fastest wins the race.....obviously am way out here ...also why would we expect another team to help us out to win a medal, surely you're racing against the other teams and shouldnt expect help from them ?

Re: Olympic Games London 2012 : Sat Jul 28, 2012 11:57 pm  

the teams that should have helped also had sprinters in their midst who would have challenged for the medals, mainly germany and australia. by not doing so they ruled their men out of medal contention as well as GBs

Re: Olympic Games London 2012 : Sun Jul 29, 2012 6:04 am  

GIANT DAZ wrote:

So why didnt our guys just pedal faster to start with and get everyone to chase us instead of us trying to chase them if there werent enough of us to do it ?

i thought it was just a case of the bloke who rides fastest wins the race.....obviously am way out here ...also why would we expect another team to help us out to win a medal, surely you're racing against the other teams and shouldnt expect help from them ?

Mate, i used to think exactly the same until i started working with some serious bike enthusiasts, basically the guy at the front works 34% harder than anyone else, so to be at the front means doing the most work, the guys work in teams to keep the energy reserves up, basically taking it in turns to lead, usually the lead cyclists gives a little throw of the elbow and that's the signal to say "im knackered can someone else have a go". Being in the pelaton puts you in a stronger position as a 1 minute lead is nothing if you have a few km's left.

The trouble is if you let too many riders brake away, and they work together, you have no chance of catching them.
If the Germans had helped the British they would have caught the lead pack easily, the Germans also knew though that if they did that they'd still lose to Cavendish, so they selfishly came to the thought, sod it. What makes it worse is that 'i think' the Germans and Brits had worked out before the race joint tactics to beat the Spanish riders.

Re: Olympic Games London 2012 : Sun Jul 29, 2012 10:10 am  

Surely they should have changed tactics then fairly quickly when it became apparent that nobody would help them? Which was fairly early on because they were always at the front of the peleton. It was pretty tactically naive if they didn't consider the fact that due to how good they are that others would be reluctant to have to run in with Cavendish.

If you need a team to win it, how was the Khazak guy able to do it?

As not a big cycling fan it was strange to hear the commentary professing how brilliant GB were doing when then never seemed to be able to significantly reduce the gap.

Re: Olympic Games London 2012 : Sun Jul 29, 2012 10:29 am  

ST_CONROY wrote:

Surely they should have changed tactics then fairly quickly when it became apparent that nobody would help them? Which was fairly early on because they were always at the front of the peleton. It was pretty tactically naive if they didn't consider the fact that due to how good they are that others would be reluctant to have to run in with Cavendish.

If you need a team to win it, how was the Khazak guy able to do it?

As not a big cycling fan it was strange to hear the commentary professing how brilliant GB were doing when then never seemed to be able to significantly reduce the gap.

The Khazak guy was part of a "team" just not a national one. The breakaway riders worked together as a "team" far better than the peleton.

It wasnt that obvious early on that the tactics weren't working. At one stage the lead was over 6 mins. That was reduced inititally to 3 mins. They then reduced it from 3mins to 1min fairly quickly. Clearly the commentators didnt appreciate just how much that had taken out of GB or just how little help they were going to get.