The 2021 Tokyo Olympic Thread

[foo on patrol]

I thought the Aussie team sprint had found an unusual way to mess up, then the Brits did the same

Yeah, I just don't follow why there have been so many stuff ups in the Team Sprint and Pursuits!

Foo

[stevenaaus]

I thought the Aussie team sprint had found an unusual way to mess up, then the Brits did the same

Yeah, Australia underachieving with style.

What a night in the track! Seeing that Dane try to run over the poor pommie, then abuse the carp out of him. And the team sprinting chaos.

[Derny Driver]

I thought the Aussie team sprint had found an unusual way to mess up, then the Brits did the same

Yeah, I just don't follow why there have been so many stuff ups in the Team Sprint and Pursuits!

Foo

The gears they are riding in the pursuit make it almost impossible to accelerate and gain speed during the race. The only way to get that gear going is to stand up and get the cadence up in the first half lap. Then they sit down and just try to maintain that cadence. Its almost impossible to increase the cadence (unless you are Ganna). Riders are tired towards the end and struggling to hold cadence and hold the wheel. If you let the wheel in front go, you have no hope of closing the gap. And once you have a gap, you lose draft and go out the back real quick. The most critical time for each rider is after they have done their turn on the front, they are buggered and swing up and drop in at the back. If they do not drop in perfectly close to the last riders wheel, if they leave a small gap, they are too tired to close the gap. And they are dropped. Seen that happen a few times.
As for Team Sprint, they all have this silly idea that Rider 2 lets Rider 1 go out to about a 4 or 5 meter gap, then they accelerate into their draft just before they swing off. In reality this thinking just means Rider 2 just does 2 laps in the wind. Why they dont all sit nice and close first lap is beyond me. Rider 2 can sit in the draft and then in the final straight, soft paedal, ease back a metre and then run at the first guys wheel as he swings off. But all the Teams are going with this idea of Rider 1 just launching away and riding the first lap on his own. Dumb if you ask me. And it doesnt work.

[Derny Driver]

Baffling tactics from the Aussie sprinters too. Or lack of tactics.

[stevenaaus]

Yeah, sprint repechage knockouts were a bit ordinary. Nice to collect a bronze in the team pursuit... Another 'choice' stack. - I think commentators said Plapp was sick, was the reason he missed the first round.

Mate how about those Dutch sprinters in the qualifying - 78kph lap.

[foo on patrol]

Baffling tactics from the Aussie sprinters too. Or lack of tactics.

There is a complete lack of tactical compression by all of the Sprinters and that includes the girls as well. It is well shown as you say in the Team Sprints with how they have been coached to leet the first rider gallop away. It just does my head in the complete lack of critical thinking with the Track riders now.

John Beazley has the two Malay riders primed and they are also great to watch on the bikes in the Sprints.

You also know my thinking on where we are at from my page and I don't think I'm to far off the mark!

Foo

[LG]

Really enjoying the commentary team, great insights from Anna and Scott.

[foo on patrol]

Thank god that clown Jones is going, he has destroyed the Track Team with his stupid ideas. So much talent yet when you look at the gears and tactics used, it was embarrassing for the much hyped Team. The Madison last night the girls were out classed, despite showing good signs early in the race. I'm still waiting on the real reason why Matthew Glaetzer pulled out, after the Team Sprint, to me, he'd burnt all of his matches in the first two rounds but also fell asleep at the start of the final one.

Foo

[warthog1]

Really enjoying the commentary team, great insights from Anna and Scott.

Agreed

[stevenaaus]

Yeah, track performance has been so disappointing, and embarrassing even for quite a while.

Geez, seeing the two Dutch sprinters battle for gold was a good one. Only thing is - I guess they're real cyclists, but they just look like body builders.

[10speedsemiracer]

Matty Glaetzer just blitzed the field in his Keirin heat, even had to go round the long way to do it ..

Brilliant ride from the big fella.

Love the Keirin..

[Arbuckle23]

Aussie performances aside, have really been enjoying the track racing and coverage.
Great being able to just watch the one sport on 7+

[foo on patrol]

Yeah, track performance has been so disappointing, and embarrassing even for quite a while.

Geez, seeing the two Dutch sprinters battle for gold was a good one. Only thing is - I guess they're real cyclists, but they just look like body builders.

Watch their body language when the are sprinting, unlike most others, they are in tune with the bike and very minimal wasted movement.

Foo

[foo on patrol]

Yeah, track performance has been so disappointing, and embarrassing even for quite a while.

Geez, seeing the two Dutch sprinters battle for gold was a good one. Only thing is - I guess they're real cyclists, but they just look like body builders.

Our performance has been extremely poor but the rest of the racing as a whole, has been very good.

Foo

[foo on patrol]

Matty Glaetzer just blitzed the field in his Keirin heat, even had to go round the long way to do it ..

Brilliant ride from the big fella.

Love the Keirin..

He is still not looking comfortable on the bike but his ride to qualify for the final was pretty good. I still haven't heard what was wrong with him, to make him pull out of the Sprints.

Foo

[foo on patrol]

Aussie performances aside, have really been enjoying the track racing and coverage.
Great being able to just watch the one sport on 7+

Yes.

Foo

[stevenaaus]

Our performance has been extremely poor but the rest of the racing as a whole, has been very good.

In the Men's madison, we were non-starters. And just turned on the womens elimination race, one of my fave races. Aussie Annette Edmondson rider out on second lap ! Matthew Glaetzer in the keirin final though.

Om-g embarrassing.

[Retrobyte]

He is still not looking comfortable on the bike but his ride to qualify for the final was pretty good. I still haven't heard what was wrong with him, to make him pull out of the Sprints.

Short preparation and lack of riding after his thyroid cancer treatment - wanted to keep his fresh

[foo on patrol]

He is still not looking comfortable on the bike but his ride to qualify for the final was pretty good. I still haven't heard what was wrong with him, to make him pull out of the Sprints.

Short preparation and lack of riding after his thyroid cancer treatment - wanted to keep his fresh

I'll give that on but his thinking ability or lack thereof has been shown again. If he wasn't prepared enough, then he shouldn't have been in the Team. He made a huge mistake in watching behind him for to long, when he had already given Kenny 3-4 lengths gap. Kenny just looked and thought, I'm out of here now and backed himself, Glaetzer made no inroads on him at all and was swamped. I'm a fan of his but very disappointed with all but two rides.

The biggest problem with our Team, is the way the fools that are supposed to look after them and provide the best advice for training and tactics, just screwed them over. Just look at how they struggled on the gearing, only the Team Pursuit Team looked half comfortable, the rest, struggled to get on top of their gearing and motor along when needed.

Thank god that fool that heads the HP unit is gone but the damage that he has done to the Team on so many levels, will takes ages to fix and trust me, I know many former top class and current ones that think the same. I call a spade a spade when I see such destruction of our riders on a performance and personal level and there will be plenty to come out from many people and family members are now talking about it.

Foo

[foo on patrol]

Our performance has been extremely poor but the rest of the racing as a whole, has been very good.

In the Men's madison, we were non-starters. And just turned on the womens elimination race, one of my fave races. Aussie Annette Edmondson rider out on second lap ! Matthew Glaetzer in the keirin final though.

Om-g embarrassing.

Sadly, it's one of the worst efforts of our Team. You can't get race fitness by hiding in gyms and not racing at every chance that you have and you only need to look at half the Team not racing at the Nationals and only a couple of riders being sent to the last lot of Worlds. When we had the 6 Day Event in Melbourne and Brisbane, the National Team Riders were prevented from going, so that they could do gym work ffs!

Foo

[find_bruce]

I'll give that on but his thinking ability or lack thereof has been shown again. If he wasn't prepared enough, then he shouldn't have been in the Team. He made a huge mistake in watching behind him for to long, when he had already given Kenny 3-4 lengths gap. Kenny just looked and thought, I'm out of here now and backed himself, Glaetzer made no inroads on him at all and was swamped. I'm a fan of his but very disappointed with all but two rides.

To lose the heat in the Keirin by looking back for too long is unfortunate - to lose the final making the same mistake looks like carelessness.

Pretty underwhelming performance by the track team - the mens team pursuit was the only one to win a medal. The SMH gives cycling a tick as winning 1 gold and 2 bronze from a funding of $8,729,081 per year over the last five years. That includes Dennis' ITT bronze & the BMX freestyle gold. How much of that funding is spent on road cycling or bmx?

[foo on patrol]

I'll give that on but his thinking ability or lack thereof has been shown again. If he wasn't prepared enough, then he shouldn't have been in the Team. He made a huge mistake in watching behind him for to long, when he had already given Kenny 3-4 lengths gap. Kenny just looked and thought, I'm out of here now and backed himself, Glaetzer made no inroads on him at all and was swamped. I'm a fan of his but very disappointed with all but two rides.

To lose the heat in the Keirin by looking back for too long is unfortunate - to lose the final making the same mistake looks like carelessness.

Pretty underwhelming performance by the track team - the mens team pursuit was the only one to win a medal. The SMH gives cycling a tick as winning 1 gold and 2 bronze from a funding of $8,729,081 per year over the last five years. That includes Dennis' ITT bronze & the BMX freestyle gold. How much of that funding is spent on road cycling or bmx?

I have found out on my cycling page that the whole funding thing was controlled by the High Performance Unit head, which was the useless bloody import Simon Jones. I always thought that Australian Cycling was one entity but no, funding was controlled by the HPU. Thank god that destroyer of our Elite Team is gone and the toxic environment with him!

I personally can't say what the funding allocation was for each discipline was or is but lets hope everything changes now and no other fool like like this bloke ever controls the finances or teams.

Foo

[Mububban]

Australian Alex Porter's faulty handlebar that caused his cycling crash at Tokyo Olympics was not adequately checked or tested, report finds

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-02-24/ ... /100856784

Baker's report sheeted the bulk of the blame for the failure home to inadequate specifications for the base plate and a failure to conduct adequate fatigue testing.

It said the base plate was exposed to forces one and a half times greater than specified, creating fatigue which led to the failure.

Also, the time frame to design and make the base plate had been reduced from 10 months to four months.

The titanium material specified was lighter and stronger than steel but more sensitive to fatigue damage, the report said.


"Fatigue testing specified was reduced by the Australian Cycling Team from 200,000 to 50,000 cycles," the report stated.

Fechner said the decision was made to “optimise the opportunity for the boys to train with the base bar on the bike".

"In hindsight, that put everyone and the process under significant pressure,” Fechner said.

The report also laid blame at governance failures in the Australian cycling team, saying: "There were scant policies or processes in a technical sense and individuals made it up as they went along."