![]() ![]() In my years of attending big-time bike races, I’ve never had a clear view of a finish. Add to this that the start/finish line of any big-time race is jammed with spectators, often ten people deep, and race organizers like to fence off the start/finish line and allow only big wigs into the area, so it’s almost impossible to get a clear view of a start or a finish unless you’re willing to stake out your spot along the fence hours before. It’s like watching a football game and only seeing one play. So you see the action for a minute or two out of 4 or 5 hours of racing. You stand at the start/finish line and see the riders leave, or finish, or perhaps you drive to a point on the route and wait there until the riders come by, which they do once. It’s the worst format for seeing the actual racing. Road races: as the name implies, they’re races on public roads, covering 50 to 120 miles, usually loops so the start line is also the finish line. I’m not including track racing, which takes place on a track oval, like stock car racing, is often indoors, and is generally ignored by the American cycling community except when the summer Olympics are on. Each of these formats provides a different experience for the spectator. There are six basic bike racing formats for bikes like ours: road races, time trials, cyclo-cross races, criteriums (not “criteria”), circuit races, and stage races. First we’ll talk about attending a live race then we’ll talk about watching racing on TV. Here’s what you need to know to get the most out of your experience. ![]() TV interviewer talking to sprinter Mark Cavendish before a race :Ĭavendish : “I’m not going to tell you that!”Ī bike race can be a strange and intimidating sub-culture to a new-comer-like being dropped in the Casbah without a translator. Peter Sagan’s analysis of the day’s stage) ![]()
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