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im with gary coleman on this
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If its gonna go aero it needs to be tight jeans really, same as most street/trails riders wear and what we used to wear in the 80's. Aero & keeping it real.
Do all BMXers have to use the same gearing too??
Their legs are turning like road runners.. meep meep...........
and to my eyes could do with a better gear
It doesn't affect the (relative) results because everyone's wearing the same thing. Like it or not the image of the sport is what helps it to make money and DH and BMX take their styling cues from motocross rather than the velodrome.
^^ This, exactly. Rightly or wrongly, this gets people interested in the sport and sells advertising because it is considered cool:
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This, not so much:
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Much like DH - Why is image more important than winning?
No idea, ask this lot of posers.
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DH, skinsuits and rules
Atherton wasn't happy that Moseley used a skinsuit, which being much more aerodynamic than loose clothing, would have given her an advantage."Fair enough to Tracy if she wants to do that to win, but for the sport and the longevity of the sport, to wear cool race kit and to make an image for yourself is more important than the odd win here and there," said Atherton
Do all BMXers have to use the same gearing too??
Their legs are turning like road runners.. meep meep...........
and to my eyes could do with a better gear
its about acceleration not top speed. sure a bigger gear down the bottom of that starthill would be cool, but coming out of a 180 berm you;d go backwards damn fast.
I think these professional athletes should be allowed to wear Lycra if they so desire, its these podgy 30/40-something IT managers that need banning.. .
Many a time I've been put off me cereal bar by the sight of a sweaty fat gentleman mincing about with undesirable bulges. . ...
Who defines what's baggy enough? Is there some kind of UCI baggometer to take a measurement?
IIRC there's a minimum amount of material you have to be able to pinch without stretching the material
SDH from several years ago called. They want their argument back.
I think they should all have to wear Gary Coleman's jumper.
I was surprised how many racers were using soft soles SPD shoes.
In a sport where power transfer is everything, surely using a stiff carbon race shoe is best? Most riders were using some form of race shoe, but some were not and probably loosing out.
The british rider, Liam was wearing fairly tight clothing (still considered baggy probably). I'd guess they have measured it and given him the tightest clothing according to the rules to maximise his chances.
Who cares if you are wearing tighter clothing if it helps you get a medal? That is what people would remember.
wait untill they hear about marginal gains...maybe they wear lycra under their baggies, just to rebell 🙂I think its great that lycra is banned from BMX
also the rubber suits that Team GB used on the track in Beijing were outlawed because they changed the body shape of the wearer.
Urban myth, allong with them being shredded to avoid having to submit them to the UCI. DB said he like the muths arroudn them but the reality was far more boring and they were just in a box in a store room in Manchester.
Personaly I thing baggies should stay. Why not? The dressage and horsey events wear blazers as it started with posh toffs. BMX wears MX gear as it started as a kids alternative to propper MX.
Didnt they wear skin suits in the last Olympics ?
I remember Shazene Reade getting alot of injuries on the way to the final.
In the past I've thought banning skin suits was silly, but yesterday showed even in a time trial riders will fall off.
No one is suggesting the BMX riders should wear time trials helmets are they ? Even though they would have gone faster. That bloke who fell off (nosed dived into the jump) would have had serious problems with a TT helmet.
Once you've forced the riders to wear a certain amount of armour is there much advantage from the skin suit still ?
Who cares if you are wearing [b]tighter[/b] clothing if it helps you get a medal? That is what people would remember.
Thing is, the argument isn't tight[b]er[/b] clothing, it's tight or loose. As above, there are 'pinch' rules to determine how tight to go, so everyone is the same so the end result is no net benefit against other competitors. Everyone will be working within the rules to maximise what benefit they can get so it'll all even out.
also the rubber suits that Team GB used on the track in Beijing were outlawed because they changed the body shape of the wearer.
Urban myth, allong with them being shredded to avoid having to submit them to the UCI. DB said he like the muths arroudn them but the reality was far more boring and they were just in a box in a store room in Manchester.
Boardman (BC tech director) said at a lecture in may that the suits used in sydney (iirc) had been banned and they were redesigning the lot.
jason Quelly's idea to try swimsuits in the wind tunnel apparently.
I did wonder about this myself yesterday when watching the B'mers. I could be wrong, but maybe it's because tight aero matters less compared to tire choice, line choice and whether you mess up in the whoops or at the start gate. The scientists will always say that it give 'x' amount of aero advantage - but isn't this more true in a 5 hour road race on open, flat road surfaces than in a 1 minute BMX run, where the line choice and tire grip is more important. And DH - where line choice and even the terrain varies massively on each run.
@clubber - respect to Atherton, but pissed of sports people will say lots of things when they lose.
And image is massively important in cycling. It drives the business. Why else will the average joe spend £100 on a pair of shorts? For the "technology"? Please....
Image. BMX is like downhilling. Apparently the participants are all cool and "rad". Lycra isn't . Baggies however are cool and individual. Non uniforms type stuff 😆 🙄
Complete cobblers. Re protection, you can stick armour in lycra as well so that argument is equally junk.
Image.
""BMX in Lycra would look silly, same as show jumping in Lycra would look silly. It's not just "image", it's a recognition of the sport's roots. "
He he . Origins.
Kids in tatty jeans.
[b]"when the suits were most developed and giving the most advantage. "[/b]I do- but we weren't talking specifically about mojo's suits so it's not relevant.
hmm... *is most confused as to what "development" you refer to then* 😕
The british rider, Liam was wearing fairly tight clothing (still considered baggy probably). I'd guess they have measured it and given him the tightest clothing according to the rules to maximise his chances.
Indeed - if the rules say your clothes have to have a certain amount of bagginess, there's something to be gained from having the most aero clothing that conforms to those rules. Arguably there's actually more to be gained by the secret squirrels given such a rule than if they're all in skinsuits.
Have the rules changed since last time though? As seeing shots of Shanaze's crash being replayed, some of the clothing looks awfully tight.
Slight tangent but watching Whitfeld's crash in the triahtlon in just his lycra tri-suit made me wince!
GW - Member"when the suits were most developed and giving the most advantage. "
hmm... *is most confused as to what "development" you refer to then*
The continuous development that took us from bog-standard skinny lycra, to the modern cycling skinsuit.
How hard would it be to make non-baggy, flexible, tough, abrasion resistant clothing without resorting to skinsuits. Not hard at all I reckon.
if its all about image, why do they ride in bloody pyjamas? surely skinny jeans and a t-shirt could be made out of "tech" fabric
They don't.
Other than Hill, almost all the top DH racers wear relatively tight fitting moto shorts and tops these days. (and even Hill's aren't all that baggy)
Seriously? 😯 WTF are you on about?The continuous development that took us from bog-standard skinny lycra, to the modern cycling skinsuit.
the cycling skin suit was developed way before DH racing even existed.
and used from the beginning of the sport..
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Tomac (almost 20 years ago) ^^
and even Tomac knew it was so wrong.......(so so wrong)
For final testing I would like to recruit some lycra wearers and some people wearing proper DH type shorts to bounce along a trail on your arse at speed. See who comes of best.
As the mens QF's showed its not all about speed in the end.
so if we get them all wearing skinsuits, they'll get round the track 1000th of a second quicker.
But it will be irelevant, because bmx, as a sport, will die on its arse, because kids wont want to ride around dressed as a gimp.