Bit of background info: a couple of months ago during a BC U10 road race one rider was deliberately trying to know another rider off when they were attempting to get past (looking back and swerving/blocking). End result was they were successful and the rider came off and sustained grazes to knees/elbows. Not sure if the parent reported it or what action was taken.

Last night during a Go-ride race the same rider tried to do the same thing to my daughter: slamming his brakes on whilst she was behind him, resulting in her colliding with his bike and then the same swerving/blocking. Luckily this was happening whilst they were going uphill and therefore easier for her to avoid him. After being shouted at by another parent my daughter was able to get past to beat him over the line 🙂

This is clearly unacceptable behaviour and I am looking for an unbiased opinion on what to do as I tend to overreact in this sort of situation. The organiser of the race was busy afterwards with the older races and therefore I didn’t approach him, however he is also the coach at our club and I therefore plan to bring it to his attention at the next training session but what should I realistically expect him to do?

If he says he will speak to the rider and/or their parent I guess I can leave it there and hope it doesn’t re-occur (the consequences don’t bear thinking about if he tries it on the downhill part of the track where they go 25mph+).

If he doesn’t plan to take any action then I’m tempted to a) ask that my daughter is not placed in the same training group (they have 3 or 4 groups based on age/ability) as the boy as I don’t feel it is a safe environment and b) if the boy is at the next BC race a week Saturday to not let my daughter race and make it clear to the organiser that I don’t feel they are offering a safe racing environment.

Is this an over reaction, which I accept is likely due to it being my daughter involved?

Ta.

Tell her to stuff him into the barriers first.

Complain to the commisaire, or the race organiser. That kind of dimwittery needs to be stopped before he causes serious injury; it’s just not the done thing at all in racing.

Throw a bottle of piss at him.

😉

I don’t think it’s an over reaction. Kids don’t always fully understand the difference between tactics/competitiveness and unreasonable behaviour (actually neither do many adults but that’s a different story…).

If it was me, I’d be trying to talk to the kid’s parent(s) or if as IME is quite likely, they’re the source of the problem, talk to the commisaires – that’s what they’re there for.

What about a quiet and polite word the the boys parents?

This is gong to sound childish, but that’s kind of the point … No one likes a snitch… especially kids.

Think carefully about the effects on the social/fun aspect for your daugther after any actions you might take

Teach her a retaliatory technique 😀

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r1JtMpBiSWQ[/video]

If it was deliberate, that’s really very serious. You should have complained to the commissare at the time, no matter how busy they were.

Don’t bother with a “quiet word with the parents”. If its BC racing under BC rules its the commissaires job to ensure the racing is fair and safe. They may not thank you if you tried to sort out without informing them of the problem.

As it was go-ride there was no commissare, just the organiser so guess its them I need to take up with. The parent is a locally well known and successful rider so I’m quite sure he wouldn’t have been encouraging it.

write to the commissare, that makes it formal, and not a knee jerk reaction at the scene.
mention the other parent who intervened as they are a witness.
if you don’t a formal response then up the chain to BC.
its not on, fair play should start at grass roots.

And well done to jase jnr for dropping him:-)

film it?

BC have a clear procedure to be followed for incidents like this – official complaint in writing to the race organiser. Don’t have a quiet word with anybody, make a formal complaint before some kid gets seriously hurt.

but what should I realistically expect him to do?

Sort it out.

as rusty says ,it’s part of the deal when you coach/run these BC sessions .

What he said – complain formally – I suspect the parent may be of the highly competitive type tbh
As for the snitching complaint – I dont get this attitude at all
– all you are doing is telling the truth to someone who can do something about this dangerous behaviour.

Email or write to the race organiser in the first instance.

It’s worth making the incident known to British Cycling – probably the Compliance/Safeguarding dept should be your first point of contact as they tend to take rider on rider bullying very seriously. I know it’s “only” Youth racing and the rider may not be aware of the consequences but an email or phone call from BC to the parents will often result from complaints and that usually nips it in the bud.

compliance@britishcycling.org.uk or 0161 274 2084

Alternatively…

Edit – oh bloody hell, why won’t it embed?!

Get them off the road bike and into a 4X race : ) See how they cope with some real elbows-out line-crossing action.

Throw a bottle of piss at him.

😀

oh bloody hell, why won’t it embed?!

you have to use the full youtube.com link (eg not youtu.be)

“As for the snitching complaint – I dont get this attitude at all”

The point I was trying to make is that Jase jnr does this for fun…

It’s not going to be much fun for her when all the other kids will not talk to her because she’s a tell tail…. Because Jase’s action may well be reflected onto her

The over competetive Dad/kid is a pain … so are the over officious.

The OP should be careful not to drain the fun out of it by over reaction

Do you really think the kids are not pissed off with this behaviour as well?

Its like thinking they will be cross because someone told the teacher x always hits them and steals their money

Its only “snitching” if you did it with them and then you say something IMHO.

In essence i think your fears are unlikely to come true though I can see why you would consider it.
Personally i would teach my kids to do the right thing whatever the consequences

I would also imagine someone trying to make you crash to win the race somewhat takes the “fun” out of it anyway

I guess Junky it depends whether you are a complaining and arguementive know it all… or you just get on with the trails and tribulations a race/life will throw at you… 😆

😆

Proper awesome put down with no get out

Chapeau

😀

The event organiser has a duty of care to provide a safe environment for all competitors, particularly when they are children or vulnerable adults. BC have a comprehensive policy for safeguarding and protecting children in their events and the organiser will have been required to attend a workshop where this policy was explained in detail and agreed to follow this policy before they can put on an event.

the rider came off and sustained grazes to knees/elbows. Not sure if the parent reported it or what action was taken

BC require that all accidents and incidents, no matter how trivial they might appear, should be reported. If they didn’t do this then they’re in clear breach of the policy and failing in their duty of care.
Just because it’s supposed to be fun for the kids doesn’t mean that the organisers can be negligent – they need to be more vigilent in looking after kids than if they were running an adult event.

You need to make a complaint to the race organiser / BC Commissionaire.
However this really should have been done at the time of the incident and doing it retrospectively you may just get a “thanks for letting us know, we will keep an eye on him” response.
Unless a commissionaire actual sees the infringement there is not a lot he can do about it as it will come down to a he said/she said.

I put an official complaint in at BMX race where there was obvious impediment entering the last straight out of the final berm. BMX is a rough and some would say contact sport but you are meant to stick to the line you are on when entering the last straight and not move around. The rider in question was riding close to my son and got his elbow out and rammed it into my son 2 or 3 times resulting in my son not surprisingly crashing.

When I spoke to the Commissionaire, I was told that it was my son (age 6) had to make the complaint and a parent could ‘support’ his complaint. My son told his story and the commissionaire agreed that this would be a strong case for impediment, BUT as he did not see it he could not disqualify the other rider but would have a chat with him and his parent to explain the rules on the last straight.

Definitely inform the race organiser!

Jeez, just think that kid is going to have a car licence one day.

Get something done about him now in the hope he learns from it.

Nice to know some things never change. Only bike race I’ve ever been in was aged about 10, kids race before a crit in my home town. I was a random entrant but several kids were there in various club kit. They made it very clear to me and a couple of others that if we even drew level with them they’d collectively put us off (or rather onto) the road.

They tried it on a couple of occasions so I didn’t bother riding hard and never went back again.

If there’s one thing I properly hate, it’s people who can’t tell the difference between competing and being a ****

I guess Junky it depends whether you are a complaining and arguementive know it all… or you just get on with the trails and tribulations a race/life will throw at you…

Otherwise known as rolling over and ‘taking it’.
Those who say “that’s the way it is” will never contribute to “making it right”

If rules are being broken, then the situation needs to be addressed, otherwise the lad in question may grow up to be a ‘professional sportsman’ – much like those who grace football grounds up & down the country (and thereby setting a fine example to our kids)

They made it very clear to me and a couple of others that if we even drew level with them they’d collectively put us off (or rather onto) the road

I had a similar experience when I started cross country at school – just laughed at them and ran faster than they could.
As long as we allow threats to work @rses will continue to use the threats.

I’ve seen the brakes on as a tactic used twice in road races, the first was a chippy junior who attacked on the first lap of a race and got all emotional when he decided that the other three of us weren’t working hard enough. A fellow member of the break told him that he would be well advised never to do such a foolish thing again, or he would be hurt in a way that would mean he wouldn’t race again that year, I’m paraphrasing, you understand.

The second time was during a road race abroad, where a certain teams’ sprinter took umbrage at being pipped for the prime in a 70 lap race with primes every 10 laps. It developed into a full on punch up, on bikes, at 30 mph. He lost that too.

OTT? Maybe
But he won’t do it again…

Sorry, had to, couldn’t quite believe no-one else had…

There is only one solution…

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KlLi0Hrx9QE[/video]

Hope the bike followed. 🙂

Thanks for the advice. I don’t have any Bombers and I checked out the bridges last night, nearest one is over a dual carrigeway so probably a bit OTT.

Emailed the organiser who is going to speak to the rider and his dad so hopefully this will resolve.

Teach them how to do this?
[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m6dUf4VxtWE[/video]

Raced on Saturday and not sure if he’d been spoken to but didn’t get a chance to try the same thing again as my daughter was in front of him the whole race – seems it did her some good 🙂