[Closed] people always mock xc jeyboys....

I watched a video of the Mega the other night and there were loads of riders walking on the snow at the start because it was quicker than riding

No it wasn't; they were obviously just slower riding. Last year however there was a long traverse on a cat track that was virtually unrideable. Not really sure what your point is.

Continuing on the Mega theme, there were a few bits in the quali and race where folk feel the need to stand about at the top of sections totally messing it up for everyone else. It's highly frustarting and at times fairly dangerous.

I think the point he is making is that it's sometimes impossible to keep people apart and riding 100% of the time in a massed start race.

Having to get off the bike to keep going is not a sin and not restricted to XC racing.

Dan Martin had to get off and push on a climb during a stage of the Tour of The Basque Country this year. He's proper crap isn't he! I mean he's only won a single stage of the Vuelta this year ffs!

Put a hundered or so riders together with barely enough room for them and inevitably some stalling will happen.

In all the races I've done in the last few years the onus was always on the overtaking rider to move past when safe, NOT the person in front to get out of the way. You shouldn't force other people out of the way, they're racing too.

Yeah Brycey, just trying to point out that it's not just XC racers who resort to walking if it's quicker/safer.

I don't know what the point of trying to make a point like that is though tbh.

🙂

round of applause for GW for some of the best trollage in ages, well done squire 😆

Don't really get all this. If it's quicker to walk, it's quicker to walk. It's a race. "Fair" doesn't come into it. If you're quicker, you should be in front anyway?

In motorbike racing, if one guy prefers to keep loads of corner speed, and somone else prefers to stop the bike, lay it over, get it back up and get hard on the gas, they're going to have a mismatch, but the faster guy round the circuit will win. And if it's very close, the canniest racer will win.

What's different here? And who cares, really?? The guy who would have come 26th, but came 27th because someone was walking ahead of him? Or the guy who came second, but would have won if that guy hadn't been walking? The latter doens't seem likely, the former should be thinking about how to get 10 places ahead, not 1.

And neither would mention it if they were good enough to avoid something avoidable, or sportsmanlike enough to write it off as a racing incident, whether avoidable or not.

I don't know what the point of trying to make a point like that is though tbh.

What are we arguing about again? 😀

Brycey - Member

Not really sure what your point is.

+ 1 😕

...blokes were pulling up well behind me, shouldering their bikes and trampling way around through the undergrowth to barge in in front of everyone. Is that really fair?

Anyway, if you think XC racers are soft for walking, take a look at these pro roadies.
A bit of sloping tarmac is hardly a Technical Terrain Feature, but they're all off and pushing.

[img] [/img]

In motorbike racing, if one guy prefers to keep loads of corner speed, and somone else prefers to stop the bike, lay it over, get it back up and get hard on the gas, they're going to have a mismatch, but the faster guy round the circuit will win. And if it's very close, the canniest racer will win.

And if one of them decides to get off and walk around a difficult corner, the entire world will call him a mincing gaylord and collectively point and laugh 😉

Mountainbike racing implies riding a bike, not pushing/carrying it. If someone wants to run, they should do some XC running races. If the course is too difficult, then the course is wrong. If XC races are all about fitness then the is something wrong with the discipline as a whole.

2p

[img] http://t2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQVU814dW2C3anB30E-Rz8bQS8ArxwPC-ZhR24s1LzxMIbudcoT [/img]

legend, they're not about fitness, they're about speed. The quickest guy wins. The next quickest guy comes second, etc.

Bizarely MTG that pic is Dan Martin walking at the Basque Country as I mentioned earlier!

Tom, I know nothing about road racing, I just remembered a friend from the Basque Country talking about roadies pushing on another forum, so I went back and blagged the pictures.

That climb in the Basque Country was steep as ****, again it got bunched up near the top which is the steepest bit and the guys behind ran out of gears and stalled.

Very seldom pro roadies need to get off and push as do pro mtb riders.

People who race MTB's need to improve their starts, I am not a great sprinter but 95% of the time I get to the bottle neck/first corner/first climb in the top 5 and then your away, while all the rest fight it out, including some that are fitter than me.

People who race MTB's need to improve their starts

Exactly what I was thinking. If you're being held up by somebody, it's because they're better than you at something you were(n't) doing earlier.

All my XC race bikes have nowhere near as good technically as any trail bike I've had

Well they're not, but that just means going slower on the really rough stuff and it makes it a bit more sketchy and much slower on really steep stuff. Not much that you simply can't do on the XC bike outside of proper rocky stuff. And even then when you go really slowly a 80mm fork helps by not diving much 🙂

I'd do that drop on my Pitch no problem, probably not on an XC hardtail though. All the people I've ridden with that have competed in XC to a decent level have been pretty shit-hot in terms of all round bike skills btw.

I have to agree walking/running in races is lame, and very annoying in the Mega.

Again in XC racing people IME don't run through choice.
What I find is if you have ninty people all racing the same race, something :|might happen....a slip, a missed gear, clipping a tree, over cooking a turn. The minute delay that causes can a have a domino effect on the field.
It's nothing to do with lack of skills or poor course design, it's what XC racing is. Many thousands of riders seem to grasp that, I don't see what the problem is.

Off topic slightly. You can see this 'must ride at all costs' in cyclocross. How often will you see a mountainbike going up a section in the granny ring whilst others are running past.
It's cross country, all about crossing country.

legend, they're not about fitness, they're about speed. The quickest guy wins. The next quickest guy comes second, etc.

Sadly, when it comes to xc racing fitness = speed. Has an xc race ever been one on technical ability?

gw is clearly a overcocky forum monkey with what appears to be the technical seat dropped skills of hans rey coupled with iban mayo'esq climbing ability while he was courteous during racing?.
i made this thread to credit xc racers so troll off if people are just going to mock.
racing doesnt care about courtesy,manners or pleasantaries.Dc,ls and metters are the only forum users i know of who beat me and without sounding cocky i can do better than most and i run alot.Its about the fastest to the finish nothing else matters,getting ridden into the tape and out of the way is part of it.
thanks for all the jey support though guys. Isnt stw wonderfull
Bruce

It's nothing to do with lack of skills or poor course design, it's what XC racing is.

Yeah, you might as well complain about Formula 1 drivers slowing down when there's wreckage all over the track. It's just how it is, they do the best they can in the circumstances.

Gary_C - Member
"Lol at the mincers in the video off the bike & running with it.

Err, guys, you're in a XC BIKE RACE, not an xc running race.

So stay on the bike & **** ride the damn thing"

Err perhaps you'd like to remember the little drop down to the stream on xmas eve Gary before you go critising other riders

jeez and to think i get called a ****er on here for pedantry, arguing etc. GW and Njee a surpassed my levels of ****erdom!

[img] [/img]

Err perhaps you'd like to remember the little drop down to the stream on xmas eve Gary before you go critising other riders

genius 😆 😆 😆

Sadly, when it comes to xc racing fitness = speed. Has an xc race ever been one on technical ability?

dunno if you're old enough to remember the first UK national ever won on a full susser (must have been around the early 90s), Paul Lazenby won it by dropping his seat and managed to pass the leader by out descending him on the final descent to the finish. it's laughable really posting this here as it was on a marin 😉
Before that, Tomac and Peat would have also beaten fitter riders because of their higher skill levels. Oh and that wee martinez guy could do ace wheelies in his day!

Paul Lazenby passed me the other year without dropping his post, of course I let him.

you let him do [i]what[/i] with his post? 😯

Dirty boy...get indoors.

Who's won?

Who's won?

I'm walking this last bit.

If you ever find yourself baulked by slower riders walking, just think to yourself, what would Basil do ?

[img] [/img]

I'm walking this last bit.

Sadly, when it comes to xc racing fitness = speed. Has an xc race ever been one on technical ability?

I've never won a race, but I've definitely gained tons of places purely on technical ability. On the climbs the whippets cruise past me but I take a good few places back on the descents 🙂 If I climbed like me and descended like them I'd be really screwed.

Err perhaps you'd like to remember the little drop down to the stream on xmas eve Gary before you go critising other riders

I'll criticise who I want thanks very much. After all, the riders in the video are at the XC World Champs, so one would assume they are sponsored professional racers. Is it too much to ask for them just to stay on the bike & ride the damn thing ? It's not as if they don't do lots & lots of training which is bound to include riding techy stuff.

Is it too much to ask for them just to stay on the bike & ride the damn thing ?

If it's slower, then yes of course. I think they are a lot more professional and committed than you make out. If you want them to stay on the bike even if it's slower then you'll have to make a rule that they must not get off the bikes. Which means you'll need judges all around the course watching them.. which is hardly practical.

Top XC riders are excellent technically. They pass most of us on the descents just as easily as on the climbs. Not sure what you are whining about here. They show a degree of commitment and focus that most people could not even imagine (which I suspect is the issue here).

Get out of my fing way then and let someone with the ability answer the fing question. Who f***ing won?

Rider in the zone 🙂

200! 😀

[/thread]