Radish_legs

Masters 40+ cat 1-4 crit, my first one, starts raining right after the whistle. Sketchy as crap, several people go down in different laps at one particular turn. I am totally rolling easy through corners. Of course big gaps open. I catch up to a chase group. Then the lead group of about 20 catch us (I didn't realize that only 7 of those twenty were on the lead lap). With about 3 laps to go I move to the front. I have a teammate who I know is on the lead lap. I am 2nd wheel, the guys around me asked me if I was lapped. They told me to get out, go to the back, you are lapped.

I'm kind of star struck. My first 40+ race, racing with these Cat 1s and 2s. So I respect their request and go to the back. At the end, I thought I finished maybe 22nd. Turns out I was 13th of 41. And if I hadn't moved to the back, I'm betting I could have finished top 10.

So did I do right, by going to the back? I don't think I'm going to listen to racers anymore. They don't have my interest or my team's interest in mind. I paid my money, it's my race too. If they didn't want us in the group, they shouldn't have lapped us.

Fingolfin

There may be a little ambiguity left open if there was another group up the road and still on the lead lap. The answer depends on if your group would be classified as the field, chase, or dropped riders.

1) If you are in the field you can ride anywhere in the group you want.
-Most likely.

2) If you are the chase, same as 1.
-This is not technical not possible since you were lapped.

3) If you are a dropped rider, you can only ride on the back (rule 3D4).
-Only if there were a large portion of the racers still unlapped.

The riders who lapped you probably have a few reasons for telling you to drop back. First, since they lapped your group they may see it as a liability to have you between them and a potential attack. Second, part of rule 3D4 is that lead riders can not take assistance from dropped riders, and as such they may feel there is less risk of a DQ if they actively avoid the perception of taking assistance*. If they realize the field has reformed and think you could provide a lead-out for your teammate they may be trying to psych you out.

*For a lead group picking up a lot of riders as they lap them it can be difficult to tell when or if the field has reformed. One dropped rider attaches, then another, and eventually it is once again the field. However, the lead riders have been at the front of this group the whole time and don't know how large it has become. You are just another group that they see as being dropped.

Edit:
Noticed I didn't answer your question. By your description you were racing in the field, and there was no obligation to drop back. If you could provide a leadout for your teammate you were free do do so. From an emotional perspective riders in the lead group could be annoyed if the feel a lapped rider interfered (not necessarily the same a a leadout) with their finish.

mattm

As someone who's lapped a field before, it is just annoying to have guys out of contention in the way. Of course even if they finish ahead of you you still beat them (as the lapper), but at that point they do just get in the damn way.

That said, you don't need to do anything anyone besides an official says in a race, generally. So yeah guys will yell at you to get the **** out of the way, but it's up to you what you do next.

Yes, it's their "fault" they lapped the field and everyone is now mixed back in, but it's also your fault for getting lapped. Usually it's the case that some in the group want to lap (bc they have teammates in it), some don't want to lap, but can't control what happens.

I'm confused though. If a group of 20 lapped you, how did you get 13th?

mattm

As for rule 3D4; I always thought it mostly meant that if you're otb of the peloton, then you can't help the break (i.e. teammates can't drop out of the field to help someone in a break that's about to catch them)

But once everyone is all back together, you can all race as one big pack again - it's just the placings that are different in that case.

https://s3.amazonaws.com/imm-usac-ua...RoadRacing.pdf

gsteinb

It was a not uncommon tactic for a team to have a guy drop back from the field and help a guy in a break (or away solo). This rule made that against the rules.

rubiksoval

Just ignore them. People yelling instructions in races gets so annoying, especially when they don't know what they're talking about.

Radish_legs

I don't know what exactly happened. There were 7 people who were in the "breakaway", which when it caught up to us had many more than 7. Only 8 others were 1 lap down. The rest were 2 or more laps down. I don't remember if I/we lapped some of the others, or they sat out in the rain or what. The whole thing was very confusing.

Fingolfin

I think it is just one of those areas where the wording of the rules covers a large set of actions because the specific behavior it wants to prohibit can be a little ambiguous. In theory it would also cover rider(s) falling back to help the break get established, or maintained. In general, I would find it unlikely that the rule would be enforced in a Cat 1-4 race where it is expected there will be a lot of lapped riders because:

rubiksoval

In the first year of the series, we had a guy DQed at our weekly crit races for dropping a bit off the back to help his teammate's group lap up. After that everyone made sure that their guys know that you absolutely do not drop off the back. It's kind of silly anyway, as most of the guys lapping the field are strong enough that they don't really need anyone to escort them back through the pack, but overanxious teammates can get a bit excited sometimes and may not know the rules exactly. But the racers made sure it was enforced on that occasion during the protest period.

As for the confusion part: the solution is to not allow dropped riders who are at risk of being lapped, at least not in the upper categories. It's pretty simple. They're completely out of the race and just get in the way.

aaronmcd

In most crits around here they pull dropped riders.

In the main series of weekend business park crits they let everyone stay in even in the 1/2 race. That race always blows up cuz it's small, half the racers are 2s who just finished the 2/3 race, and even the cat 1 level varies a good bit. More often than not I'll get dropped at some point, long after the break is gone, after half the 2s are dropped, and the remaining cat 1s start attacking again cuz they aint catching the break. I may pull myself but sometimes I just ride around til the break laps me and I let them go by.

Come to think of it, it would technically be within the rules to ride the main pack while they chase, drop back when they start attacking, ride the back of the break for a fairly steady ride, and rejoin the pack somewhat fresh if the break laps the field. I'm sure this would be frowned upon by the 12 riders remaining in the race though.

rubiksoval

Would it? I don't think it would.

I don't think you can tag on to a group of riders that have lapped you if it's not the main field. That's specifically the issue with a teammate dropping off the back to help his guy in a break lap-up.

Psimet2001 

You can join up you just can't pull - or rather "lead" according to the rule. The rule, as mentioned, was meant to stop riders dropping back to help riders up to the field.

In the end it's always up to the official and how they apply the rule. Around here they watch like hawks but honestly they pull like crazy too so it doesn't really end up an issue.

Having to basically score for myself while announcing it can get cray cray real quick. Try keeping track of a juniors field sometime when all ages run together.

Brings up a story I just semi-remembered. We had the 10 mile record attempt at the track one night back in 2012. 2 really strong guys were going for it. I knew them and accidentally stumbled into their planing session as I showed up to the track super early that night. They had it nailed down. They ended up setting the record. Basically they would go off the front of the field together and the one who was only helping the effort would pull them around to lap the field. They did that twice or 3 times. One of the next attempts at lapping when he was getting too tired to keep it up he held back from lapping the field and let the other rider lap. he spent time drifting back towards the field again - taking a rest. Because it's track when the lead rider integrated into the pack the other rider became the leader on the track .....but the distance is taken from the rider who lapped the field. The strong one going for the record would then come up out of hte field again and the other had rested enough that he could pull him around for a little while before he would jump out and lap the field again. They would repeat the process. They set the record that night and it held all the way until last Thursday. I don't know how the new holders did it as I left after the Juniors second session as my son wanted to get home. womp womp.

topflightpro

Yes, it's within the rules.

If you fall off the field, you can use a break to carry you back to the field. But as Psimet said, you cannot work in that group. You can only sit on.