• kahjtheundedicated@lemmy.world
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    8 days ago

    The race organizers really fucked that one up. But women catching the back of the men’s peloton is a “problem” that happens from time to time, and it can be hard to tell when it’s incidental or intentional strategy. It has been a tactic for some women to push extra hard at the start to try and catch the men’s field to draft behind them until the finish, which is an unfair advantage. Which is explicitly illegal in most racing series.

    Though that gets complicated when it’s a woman catching a large men’s peloton that the female rider can’t ride alongside, and would have to just ride awkwardly far behind the pack to avoid running afoul of the rules.

    I don’t know the details of this race in particular, but it seems the organizers halted the race to avoid this once they realized they really should have started the women’s race later. Was she intentionally trying to catch the men’s group? Maybe. Starting a breakaway from 2km in is almost certainly unsustainable, so if she wasn’t planning on catching the men’s field, it was either gross overconfidence or terrible strategy. She was very likely going to get caught by the women’s peloton regardless, and passed since they’ll be on fresher legs when they do catch her.

    Edit: I should add that stopping the race for a few minutes with a neutralized restart is not entirely uncommon in pro cycling. For example, if part of the field has to stop and wait for a passing train, they’ll stop the front of the race as well, and restart them with the approximate gaps between groups they had before the train.

    • melfie@lemmy.zip
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      7 days ago

      This article is clickbaity, making the situation sound like misogyny to the uninformed, but I wasn’t aware of the profound effect of slipstreaming in cycling, so TIL.

        • Lady Butterfly she/her@reddthat.com
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          6 days ago

          Hi nimrod and welcome to WomensStuff! We’re a trans inclusive women only forum and ask cis men don’t comment. Please check out the rules ❤️

            • ZDL@lazysoci.al
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              6 days ago

              Let me flip that around.

              Why do men (and let’s be honest here, almost always specifically white men) simply have to comment where:

              1. They have no meaningful lived experience outside of “I think i saw a woman in porn once”.
              2. The people who are talking don’t want to be constantly correcting and educating the ignorant.
              3. The group in question is a single fucking group out of literally THOUSANDS OF GROUPS where they are unwelcome?

              Doesn’t that just make you cringe a little, being so fucking whiny and so fucking self-centred that you can’t stand a single fucking space that doesn’t want you?

              Note: these questions are for you to ponder, not reply, because:

              1. Answering it is against the rules. Don’t be the kind of whiny shit that breaks the rules because your ego got bruised.
              2. I won’t see the answer because nothing is more of a turn-off for conversational purposes than a whiny manosphere twit. You’re getting blocked the moment I hit “Reply”.
            • LadyButterfly she/her@piefed.blahaj.zoneOPM
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              6 days ago

              Thanks for your thoughts! We are women only because we need a safe space. Due to you repeatedly breaking the rules we’ve banned you, but please enjoy your weekend ❤️

      • kahjtheundedicated@lemmy.world
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        7 days ago

        Yeah it’s a little different for ultras. Drafting isn’t allowed, so they play out very differently from road races, they tend to spread out. But absolutely incredible result from Maddy!

        • Fmstrat@lemmy.world
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          7 days ago

          Good point on the draft requirements, I’m more commonly watching women’s gravel or MTB. So people like Maddy and Syd who commonly push past large contingents of the men’s groups.

    • N0t_5ure@lemmy.world
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      8 days ago

      Wow, thanks for the insight! In this clickbait world, it’s nice to get other perspectives.

    • BryyM@lemmy.world
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      8 days ago

      I’m fairly sure in this race in particular the men were going slow enough for me to keep up, so yeah, they shouldn’t have held her back as many other women would’ve eventually done so too.

      • hobovision@mander.xyz
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        7 days ago

        They paused the entire women’s race, so it wasn’t like it was just her who got “punished”. They probably should have noticed the gap was decreasing way sooner and intervened before it got so bad that a headline like this can come out.

        Without all the details this seems really bad. Even with more details than the headline it seems awful that she had to stop and then ended up losing the race by a lot. It almost seems like she stopped while the race continued behind her. But with all the details, it seems like she may have lost the race due to her strategy. She was pushing way too hard early on and the women who paced themselves better ended up passing her later in the race.