I’m with you on the general point – nothing at all wrong with that descent from a technical POV, and I don’t think CB disagrees either. The danger involved was horrible though. I have to take issue with your last point though – riders crashing and getting broken collarbones is par for the course when riding in big packs and touching wheels, it’s not what usually happens on fast descents where road rash is normally the worst result. On multiple descents on multiple stages of the TdF did anybody crash so badly to end their race?

I can only think that all the injuries were from riders hitting things where there should have better protection. As mentioned above it wouldn’t have been that difficult to put some hay bales out and they would have probably helped a lot.

It’s what they’re not saying in their medical updates which is worrying – no mention of what immediately worried me seeing that crash.

edit: thanks soma you posted while I was typing – as feared, though the lack of official updates is still worrying (I know the biggest priority isn’t updating us, and she deserves some privacy, but if she was OK you’d think they might say), potentially rather more life changing than any of the men’s injuries

Time trials next – we surely have a decent chance in both of those.

Strange headline on this video: “Annemiek van Vleuten escapes injury after heavy crash” – they may want to think about editing that: http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/olympics/37004454 (and you may not want to watch the video if you haven’t already seen it – I’m not wanting to watch it again)

Have sent feedback to the BBC – I’m not sure it’s something they act on very quickly though!

Aracer – BBC are quoting UCI.

Apparently concussion and fractures, but no internal bleeding or lost consciousness. I’m not sure that’s not serious. Hopefully simple fractures that heal and not effect on spinal column.

That’s the worst road crash I’ve seen for a long time.

Aracer – BBC are saying “avoids serious injury” now. That said I don’t think I’m really arguing with you. I certainly wouldn’t want to crash like that.

Fairly low speed crash wasn’t it, compared to some of the crashes we’ve all probably had. Getting thrown over the front like that has been fairly common for me in the past.

Which is precisely why I’m going to start wearing a back protector, or at least one built into a backpack. You’d have to be properly hooning/unlucky to break your back from a frontal impact or one to the shoulders.

oh and….

I think I’m gonna stop reading this thread now.

Glad to hear that she’s going to be ok, i’m going to leave this alone due to being in danger of suffocating under the massive pile of bullpoo.

I really have to wonder if anyone complaining about that descent actually watches road racing. Go search for Bardet’s descent on youtube, the penalties of getting it wrong there are a sheer rock face or a 1000ft drop, makes the dangers on this weekends course seem bland. And i just used that as an example, there’s any number of mountain descents with life threatening consequences for getting things wrong.

Just because it may be the case now doesn’t make it right.

We had all these arguments 50 years ago about motorcycle racing and thankfully they did something about it.

So we should ban mountains then, and cobbles?

Maybe crosswinds too? (See Alaphilippe’s TT crash in this years tour)

Would love to sit down and chat with CB about it, he clearly has been quite vocal that he had a problem with it, but would love to hear his logic how its different from what riders deal with on a day to day basis.

For me the only difference is the lure of an Olympic medal caused several riders to abandon any caution at all. Maybe we should just ban the Olympics?

Boardman better not watch the DH mountain biking or Red Bull Rampage then.

The difference to a day to day situation is you or I aren’t racing on the limits of grip.

CB is right, and there is nothing wrong with the course (he even said it was the best ever on the highlights last night) but the problem was the street furniture. Look at any European road race, for the TDF they have councils rip up whole roundabouts and remove everything in the last few km’s, lampposts get padded, etc etc.

The organisers should have looked at that corner, and the others, and put straw bales over the ditches and kerbs to protect riders from the consequences of crashing.

Riders have been killed by kerbs, https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fabio_Casartelli

Road riding will always be dangerous, but thankfully with decent precautions it’s probably now not much more risky than track racing. You’ll always get road rash and broken bones, but riders shouldn’t be slamming into larger than average kerbs and drainage ditches without some mitigation for the consequences.

+1 spoon.

Anyone who thinks/or is they are riding at the same level of commitment as pro rider in a pro race on the public highway is an accident looking for somewhere to happen. I hope they are carrying a donor card!

Certainly won’t here me disagreeing about the cars/motorbikes. In many cases there would be no race without TV money to pay for it, but that shouldn’t come at the expense of the riders. Have seen some cases this year where the motos outnumber the riders which is madness.

Actually, it seems very common for amateurs to ride at that level of commitment, sadly without the same skills much of the time. They have had to neutralise one of the descents in La Marmotte as riders kept throwing themselves over the edge of the mountain…….

Thing for me was her lying there for > 2 mins with no medical help at all. WTF, the Olympics, and that happens. Just as well the guy there didn’t try and move her.

We have no comment about Disc Brakes on road bikes yet..

🙄

Just a shame that bad luck had serious consequences that were avoidable really…

No.The risk of injury is not a prerequisite for good racing.

I think there is general agreement it was an excellent course in terms of delivering competitive racing. The descent was challenging (narrow road, tight bends) which is not a problem in itself. The problem was that there was little safety margin when someone got it wrong, because of the big kerbs, storm drains, big poles and other street furniture. I think Chris Boardman is calling that out and saying they should have done more to engineer out potential hazards. It would be difficult to do that in some cases (those big storm gutters are there for a reason) but all I could see on the descent was green netting, so CB is probably right, and they could have taken more precautions

I share you sentiments but not the conclusion. Serious consequences can be minimised but never avoided completely – my cousin’s tragic injury is testament to that unfortunately