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Does anyone pick up the water bottles riders throw out on the side of the road?

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Does anyone pick up the water bottles riders throw out on the side of the road?

Old 02-24-06, 01:02 PM
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Does anyone pick up the water bottles riders throw out on the side of the road?

Was watching and the Tour of CA, and sure enough, just like in the Tour de France, riders throw out their bottles when they're empty.

I consider this littering, and i think it's pretty ridiculous how these guys get away with turning the roads they race on into their personal garbage bin. Yesterday's stage was 130 miles, do team personnel actually go back and analyze both sides of the road for 130 miles and pick up water bottles ??

There were long section without any fans on the sides to pick them up...
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Old 02-24-06, 01:17 PM
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Originally Posted by kubla khan
Was watching and the Tour of CA, and sure enough, just like in the Tour de France, riders throw out their bottles when they're empty.
Well it's not like they can carry all the empties...


Originally Posted by kubla khan
I consider this littering, and i think it's pretty ridiculous how these guys get away with turning the roads they race on into their personal garbage bin. Yesterday's stage was 130 miles, do team personnel actually go back and analyze both sides of the road for 130 miles and pick up water bottles ??
I HIGHLY doubt it. Such is life.
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Old 02-24-06, 01:20 PM
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I'd be willing to bet the city requires the event cover costs to clean up after the event - including those water bottles.
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Old 02-24-06, 01:39 PM
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Originally Posted by kubla khan
I consider this littering, and i think it's pretty ridiculous how these guys get away with turning the roads they race on into their personal garbage bin.
Puh-Lease! Gimme a break.

There's plenty of OCD types who are as obsessed with free bike schwag as you are with the enviornment.
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Old 02-24-06, 01:40 PM
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Everyone tries to get those water bottles. I have some for pro races. Discovery does not toss their bottles, they don't want anyone to analyze the contents.

Are you really trying to say that bike racing has a negative environmental impact? Should people drive pickups around looking for bottles?
 
Old 02-24-06, 01:45 PM
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Originally Posted by kubla khan
Was watching and the Tour of CA, and sure enough, just like in the Tour de France, riders throw out their bottles when they're empty.

I consider this littering, and i think it's pretty ridiculous how these guys get away with turning the roads they race on into their personal garbage bin. Yesterday's stage was 130 miles, do team personnel actually go back and analyze both sides of the road for 130 miles and pick up water bottles ??

There were long section without any fans on the sides to pick them up...
It's a Euro tradition to pick up and/or collect discarded bottles. Know a guy in Frahnce who has something nutty like 500 of 'em, dating back to the early '70s. I'll admit, the population density in Yurp is even greater than that in Cali, but they're considered to be like candy thrown by the homecoming queen to curbside waifs, or beads at Mardi Gras, or sech like.

Oh, no. I may have opened a whole other can of worms, now...
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Old 02-24-06, 01:56 PM
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caltrans will pick 'em up. or the race organisers. or fans. or the team.

they won't be left on the side of the road for long. you just don't get to see that part on TV. it'd be pretty boring.

if you're so inclined, call the tour and complain in addition to ranting here. that'd be pretty responsible of you. they'll give you a straight answer that none of us here can answer.
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Old 02-24-06, 01:58 PM
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Are you kidding? Pass up a free water bottle? They charge 2 bucks for those things at the LBS. For every 45 free bottles I pick up, I save enough to buy the CF bottle cage to hold it on my bike.
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Old 02-24-06, 02:06 PM
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Those discarded water bottles are like foul balls at a baseball game. Even fat, middle-aged old guys race little kids to retrieve them. I have a Tour de Georgia water bottle that Mario Cippolini discarded on Brasstown Bald a couple of years ago. I had to trip a kid that was about to beat me to it.
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Old 02-24-06, 02:17 PM
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you just don't get to see that part on TV. it'd be pretty boring.


Funny!
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Old 02-24-06, 02:26 PM
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Actually, at the 03 World Championships, some guy was in the crowd telling his buddies some stupid theory about carbon fiber when a tossed bottle bonked him right upside the head.

If only Bike Forums was like that.
 
Old 02-24-06, 02:35 PM
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Originally Posted by kubla khan
Was watching and the Tour of CA, and sure enough, just like in the Tour de France, riders throw out their bottles when they're empty.

I consider this littering, and i think it's pretty ridiculous how these guys get away with turning the roads they race on into their personal garbage bin. Yesterday's stage was 130 miles, do team personnel actually go back and analyze both sides of the road for 130 miles and pick up water bottles ??

There were long section without any fans on the sides to pick them up...
In all races I was in weather it was a running race or cycling race, the participants sure wasn't ask to carry thier empty water bottles.. it is custom to throw them on the ground, makes you feel guilty at first but I quickly realised that part of the volunteer's duty was to pick them up. I did speak with friends of mine who volunteer and it was expected that the participants would do so and picking after racers was not frustrating but something that came along with helping out at a race. I think it's pretty clear that racers are not littering out of being inconsiderate but more as an understanding that someone will have thier backs and let them be as lite and safe as possible. Can you imagine racing long distance and not throw them out? that would be exactly how many empty bottles to carry? might as well pick up juggling to go along with cycling.
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Old 02-24-06, 02:41 PM
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Race organisers do a quick sweep behind the caravan to pick up stuff, but other than it's free game for everyone. And who cares if it's littering! It'll be picked up eventually.
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Old 02-24-06, 04:08 PM
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Just don't pick up the rolled up hats they discard.

*hangs head*
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Old 02-24-06, 04:43 PM
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Well there are some pretty odd answers here like, "And who cares if it's littering! It'll be picked up eventually." I wonder if you have ever volunteered to go out and pick em up? As a race organizer and newly trained official, this is one of the headaches of trying to put on a Road Race. People complain when they see racers in local races tossing bottles onto the side of the road. And I'll guarantee you there are not a bunch of people fighting over a bottle discarded by a cat 4 or 5 racer. In order to try to minimize the impact, we do ask our volunteers to pick them up. But our RR is 85 miles long and it would take a WHOLE bunch of volunteers to check the entire route. So the American Cycling Association has this rule, "18.1.5: Riders are not permitted to discard water bottles, food wrappers or other litter except in designated feed zones or designated bottle discard zones. All such zones will be clearly marked by the promoter." If the racers do that then the zone volunteers can easily pick them up, the navtives are happy and the racers will help the organizers to keep the races going.
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Old 02-24-06, 05:19 PM
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Originally Posted by DocRay
Are you really trying to say that bike racing has a negative environmental impact? Should people drive pickups around looking for bottles?
I don't care who ya are, that's funny!
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Old 02-24-06, 08:31 PM
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Originally Posted by kubla khan
Was watching and the Tour of CA, and sure enough, just like in the Tour de France, riders throw out their bottles when they're empty.

I consider this littering, and i think it's pretty ridiculous how these guys get away with turning the roads they race on into their personal garbage bin. Yesterday's stage was 130 miles, do team personnel actually go back and analyze both sides of the road for 130 miles and pick up water bottles ??

There were long section without any fans on the sides to pick them up...
Is this a joke???
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Old 02-24-06, 09:27 PM
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Originally Posted by DocRay
Discovery does not toss their bottles, they don't want anyone to analyze the contents.
That's just plain wrong! Everyone knows Discovery doesn't toss their bottles so the riders can't be cloned for racing in the year 2030.
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Old 02-24-06, 10:55 PM
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They just sit on the side of the road and eventually, in a couple million years or so, they rot away and become part of the earth again.

Don't worry your pretty little head about it.
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Old 02-24-06, 11:15 PM
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Originally Posted by DocRay
Are you really trying to say that bike racing has a negative environmental impact? Should people drive pickups around looking for bottles?
Well, actually, after spectating at the Tour of CA and seeing the sheer amount of support vehicles/cop cars/cop motorcycles hauling ass uphill, downhill or pretty much anywhere they could haul ass I realized that the athletes might be cycling, but the surrounding organization is causing a good amount of polution.


Originally Posted by Olebiker
Those discarded water bottles are like foul balls at a baseball game. Even fat, middle-aged old guys race little kids to retrieve them. I have a Tour de Georgia water bottle that Mario Cippolini discarded on Brasstown Bald a couple of years ago. I had to trip a kid that was about to beat me to it.
LOL


Originally Posted by RockyMtnMerlin
Well there are some pretty odd answers here like, "And who cares if it's littering! It'll be picked up eventually." I wonder if you have ever volunteered to go out and pick em up? As a race organizer and newly trained official, this is one of the headaches of trying to put on a Road Race. People complain when they see racers in local races tossing bottles onto the side of the road. And I'll guarantee you there are not a bunch of people fighting over a bottle discarded by a cat 4 or 5 racer. In order to try to minimize the impact, we do ask our volunteers to pick them up. But our RR is 85 miles long and it would take a WHOLE bunch of volunteers to check the entire route. So the American Cycling Association has this rule, "18.1.5: Riders are not permitted to discard water bottles, food wrappers or other litter except in designated feed zones or designated bottle discard zones. All such zones will be clearly marked by the promoter." If the racers do that then the zone volunteers can easily pick them up, the navtives are happy and the racers will help the organizers to keep the races going.
Exactly. It make sense during a circuit race since there is one feed zone and bottles can be discarded there. In a point to point race things become complicated, and like you said, no one is fighting over bottles discarded by amateur racers.


Originally Posted by Talewinds
Is this a joke???
nope, not a joke.


It seems to me that the whole cycling establishment could be more efficient about this. Why do the riders carry such tiny bottles in the first place? No wonder they are always throwing them out, you finish a bottle like that in no time. If they carried larger bottles they might last longer, long enough for them to hand them to a team car or to the domestique handing them the bottles he got from the team car...
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Old 02-25-06, 12:00 AM
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Larger bottle = more weight?

I was just thinking about this on my ride to school this morning. About how cool it'd be to have a waterbottle of some pro racer sitting in my room. I even thought of selling this waterbottle on Ebay but its one of those things that you can't prove. I just thought it'd be kinda cool. Glad I'm not alone.
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Old 02-25-06, 12:38 AM
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Originally Posted by kubla khan
but the surrounding organization is causing a good amount of polution.

the organizers are trying to offset the pollution by purchasing renewable resource credits so that the race will have a zero impact on the environment. if you saw the clif bar "green" green jersey spots it'd make you laugh how funny the it was. but they're trying. they know the impact they're creating. this might very well be the "cleanest" pro tour ever.
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Old 02-25-06, 06:55 AM
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What, exactly, is a "renewable resource credit"? I've seen the commercials, but being a mid-western, hillbilly, eco-terrorist, I have no idea what that means.
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Old 02-25-06, 08:57 AM
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Oh yes, and we shouldn't forget that bike races help the environment because we are, well, riding bikes. This always attracts other people into bikes and away from gas guzzling vehicles. I think road races are perfect for fighting pollution.

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Old 02-25-06, 05:11 PM
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Originally Posted by kubla khan
Well, actually, after spectating at the Tour of CA and seeing the sheer amount of support vehicles/cop cars/cop motorcycles hauling ass uphill, downhill or pretty much anywhere they could haul ass I realized that the athletes might be cycling, but the surrounding organization is causing a good amount of polution.
as opposed to motorsports?
give me a break-just keeping traffic off the roads for the day more than offsets this.
I wish more environmentalists would knee-jerk less and think more.
 

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