Road Bike Racing - stage 5 question....

uhh.... why do the first 185 riders all have the same exact time for stage 5?? was there yet another crash?

All riders who come across the line in a huge pack receive the same time.

At the moment I can't recall how far back one has to be in order to receive a different time.

If one finishes in the lead group, one gets the time of the winner of the lead group - excepting time bonuses. The winner gets a 20 second bonus, 2nd place gets 12 seconds, and 3rd place gets 8 seconds.

Time splits only occur when there are gaps between riders. I hope that made sense. :)

yes perfect sense. thanks!!

One thing that confuses me because of that rule... why on earth do the guys in the back try to stay with the peleton in the last km? They would get the same time anyway, because of that rule. I don't see the point of having 150 extra guys flying to the finish when they don't have to (why don't they just back off to be safe)... especially with the danger of a crash.

You have to stay with the pack in order to get the time. So when the pace picks up for the sprint you need to keep up to prevent a gap from forming. As long as you are in the pack, you get the time, but if there is a decent gap, you lose time.

Originally posted by bac
- excepting time bonuses.

I saw a standing chart that listed the USPS team as 1-8 after stage 5, is this correct?? Wouldn't the winner of todays stage be given a time bonus?

Wait...I may have just figured out my own question....the winner of today wasn't even close to the time of the USPS, thereby keeping the overall standings from yesterday?

Originally posted by BikerDawg
Wait...I may have just figured out my own question....the winner of today wasn't even close to the time of the USPS, thereby keeping the overall standings from yesterday?

Correct.

yes the winner would get the time bonus but 20 seconds probably isnt enough to get them past any of the posties.


lol you were too fast for me n/m :)

Originally posted by Styk33
You have to stay with the pack in order to get the time. So when the pace picks up for the sprint you need to keep up to prevent a gap from forming. As long as you are in the pack, you get the time, but if there is a decent gap, you lose time.

So they only put the rule in if a person crashes?
That is what was confusing me. When I would hear about that rule, they would never say that it only applied to crashes. I wondered because I thought the sprinters could get a gap.

Originally posted by BikerDawg
I saw a standing chart that listed the USPS team as 1-8 after stage 5, is this correct?? Wouldn't the winner of todays stage be given a time bonus?

Yup, but Postal's TTT time gaps were larger than the time bonuses today.

So ..... the Posties are still on top! :D

Originally posted by BikerDawg
Wait...I may have just figured out my own question....the winner of today wasn't even close to the time of the USPS, thereby keeping the overall standings from yesterday?

Yeah. If you looked at the overall standings, and looked at the stage winner's position... he would be 20 seconds ahead of where he was he day before.

To avoid crap like we had on stage 2 they need to impliment a rule that gives the same time to all riders who are within 2K of the finish when the first rider crosses the line.

Today in stage 5, I just read that Heras went with an early breakaway. That kind of suprised me.

From velonews:

"Another quick start
The riders soon went into action, with 14 men easing away just 14km. But one of those riders - Postal's Roberto Heras - was too far ahead on GC to be ignored by the peloton and the chase began soon after.

Indeed, the peloton's target was clearly Peña, because as the 14 were being reeled back in, five riders managed to elude capture and they were allowed to stay off the front for much of the day. "

That is kind of confusing... "target was clearly Pena"?