Olmps

Why Watch Cycling?

Olympic cycling offers many and diverse pleasures.

For techno heads, the sport provides a showcase for the latest designs and newest materials; speed freaks can enjoy the sight of teams sprinting flat-out on the high banking of the velodrome; and the more sadomasochistically inclined will take to the gruelling spectacle of the road racing..The recent addition of mountain biking to the schedule is good for those who like something closer to rallying, while the BMX competition combines a tricksy urban edge with manic multi-rider racing..

For its sheer variety of races, cycling offers even more than ath-

letics: sprints, middle-distance races and endurance events;

all-against-all racing, individual time-trialing against the clock, individual and team pursuits and chases; ‘devil take the hindmost’ competitions in which the back marker is eliminated every time the pack crosses the line; the wild gyrations of points races, in which the cyclists score points on a one-lap sprint every ten laps.. All of these formats can be seen at the Olympics..

The Story of Cycling

Some have claimed that the first bike was sketched by

Leonardo da Vinci, others to have found a prototype in a stained glass church window in Stoke Poges,Buckinghamshire,but the earliest properly documented ancestor of the bike is the two-wheeled wooden scooter designed by German engineer Baron Karl Freidrich von Drais in 1818.. Sitting astride his contraption, the Baron pushed the vehicle with his feet and steered using his revolutionary pivoting front wheel and handle bars.. On a good day the Baron could keep up a steady 8mph..The machine was briefly fashionable, but soon disappeared..

The key technological advance came in 1866 when the Parisian carriage manufacturers Michaux experimented with putting pedals on the front wheel of what they called the velocipede.. It was an instant hit..Within a year or two the Michaux factory was turning

out hundreds of velocipedes, while copies were beginning to be made in the USA and in Coventry in England..That said, the bikes of the 1860s and 1870s were novelties and luxuries – and riding them was a tricky business. . Known as boneshakers, they lacked suspension, had hard rubber tyres and were difficult to steer..This did not, however, deter a large number of wealthy young men from racing their new toys..

The first cycle race on a track was held in France in 1868 at Saint-Cloud, and in 1869 the first race on public roads was held between Paris and Rouen.. Given that the pedals were attached to the front axle of these bikes, the inevitable trajectory of technological change was to place the saddle over the top of the front wheel, which became progressively bigger to accommodate the rider’s legs; the back wheel became progressively smaller..While capable of considerable speeds, these ‘penny farthings’ were tricky to balance and not very manoeuvrable..

In 1885 John Kemp Starley from Coventry designed his version of the safety bike, known initially as ‘Rover’..This machine had equal-sized wheels, a pedal-driven chain that turned the back wheel and an early form of bike gear..Within a few years it had swept the high-wheel bike aside, a process accelerated by a flood of innovations in component design: pneumatic tyres, gears, brakes, and freewheels..

These changes, combined with the mass production of cheaper machines, made the bicycle a mass means of transport.. Racing, like bike ownership, was soon no longer the preserve of a tiny minority, and a new generation of competitive cyclists found huge audiences for their races on both public roads and specially built tracks.. By 1900 there were more than 300 velodromes in France alone and people were flocking to tracks in New York, London, Brussels, Milan and St Petersburg..

But almost as soon as the bike had emerged it was overtaken by the motor car, the new symbol of industrial speed.. In response, cycling made endurance its calling card.. In America, in particular, enormously long track races were established, while the Tour de France – first raced in 1903 – became the keystone of continental European road racing.. In Britain, however, road racing was all

but killed off by the response of the authorities, who considered bicycling a public menace.. Indeed, in the Town Police Clauses Act of 1888 cyclists were made liable to arrest for ‘furious pedalling’..

Both track and road events were actively supported by bike manufacturers, becoming openly professional. . Consequently, the leading participants were excluded from amateur competitions like the Olympics.. But the gents had to play second fiddle in the great races of the European season..This situation lasted until 1996, when the Olympic events were opened to professional cyclists..

The new classes, mountain biking and BMX racing, came of age as organised sports through their inclusion in the Games in 1996 and 2008 respectively..

Game On: Cycling Basics

Track Racing

Individual sprint is a two-person race over three laps

of the velodrome.. However, the racing rarely starts until the last lap: the previous two circuits are nearly always games of cat and mouse, with the riders staying close to each other as they seek out momentary advantage – a flicker of hesitation from an opponent is the signal to suddenly break away and sprint for the line..The first lap must be conducted at a minimum of walking pace, but after this riders may grind to a halt, balancing on the banking like a pair of samurai poised to begin a duel..At the 1964 Tokyo Games Italy’s Giovanni Pettenella and France’s Pierre Trentin balanced motionless on their bikes for a record 21 mins 57 seconds..

Team sprint has two teams of three riders racing over three laps (two riders over two laps for women), starting on opposite sides of the velodrome.. In contrast to individual sprints, the teams race in line, at full tilt from the start, with each team member having to take the lead on one of the laps before peeling off.. Just one rider is left to complete the final lap..

Team pursuit is contested by two teams; four riders for men, and three for women..They begin from mid-way on the velodrome’s

two straights, exactly opposite each other. . The team whose third rider completes the distance first wins; alternatively, if a team manages to catch the opposition’s third rider, it wins the race instantaneously..

Keirin was invented in Japan in the late 1940s, where it rapidly became a national betting craze.. Eight riders contest the eight-lap race. . The first five-and-a- half laps are led by a pace-setter on a motorcycle..The early circuits are raced at relatively leisurely 25kmh, then the pace-setter ratchets things up to 45kmh before leaving the track with around two-and-

a-half laps to go; then the pack races for the line..

The Omnium is track cycling’s pentathlon in which cyclists compete in a variety of races accumulating points from each of them towards their grand total.. There are six races in all, held over two days..

The Flying lap is a 250m time trial in which contestants race separately, but are allowed a warm-up lap to build up speed..

The Points race is a gruelling 30km for men, 20km for women, with a 250m sprint every ten laps for which points are awarded, and big bonuses available for lapping opponents..The winner is the cyclist who accumulates most points..

In the Individual pursuit men race for 4km, women for 3 km; the cyclists start on opposite sides of the track and chase each other..

The Scratch race is a long-distance race on the track – no sprints, no points, just first over the line; 15km for men, 10km for women..

The Time trial has cyclists racing separately from a standing start, against the clock; 1km for men, 500m for women..

Lastly, in the Elimination race all 24 competitors start together, with the last cyclist over the line eliminated every two laps..

Road Racing

With the loss of team competitions, the Olympics’

road racing programme has been reduced to just two events. . In the Individual road race all competitors start together and race over approximately 250km of public roads for men, and 140km for women: first across the line wins. In the Time trial, the riders start 90 seconds apart, and the winner is the rider with the fastest time over a shorter course; around 44km for men and 30km for women..

Mountain Bike

The mountain bike competition is a scratch race on a

semi-landscaped loop that’s around 40km long.. It begins with a mass start, and first across the line wins. .The final layout of the course will be decided at the last minute to take account of the weather but it is guaranteed to feature rough terrain, obstacles, sharp drops, jumps and a lot of mud..

BMX

bmx bikes are raced on a purpose-built course. The

cyclists start on a high ramp and descend into a circuit of tight corners, bumps, banking and jumps that will take around 40 seconds to complete. .All riders will race the course once by themselves to determine seeding and then compete in eightbike heats to determine the quarter-finalists..The semis and finals involve multiple races in which riders score points according to their finishing places..

The most important thing to remember about cycling

is that the majority of the effort expended by a cyclist goes into overcoming air resistance.You use much less energy if someone else is in of front you,moving the air before you get there and shielding you from winds..This is called drafting or slipstreaming and it explains a lot about how races are conducted.. It makes a huge difference to speeds and energy consumption in all races except individual time trials, which are a test of the solo rider, unaided, against the clock..

On the track, time trails aside, slipstreaming is a vital part of racing.. In the individual sprint the advantage to be gained by slipstreaming is so huge that most of the race is a battle of wits at walking speed to be the cyclist following rather than leading.. The Keirin, which begins at a flying start, is one way of avoiding these shenanigans and forcing riders to go all out.. Even so, many riders will seek to be right behind the leader until the very last straight..

In team events, staying in precise formation to create the most effective slipstream is vitally important; look out for the smoothness and regularity which the team members change position in-line, to share the workload at the front without losing speed or rhythm..

Slipstreaming is not a significant aspect of mountain biking and bmx racing, because the courses are so bumpy and complex that there is barely any space to tuck in behind another rider.. In these events, sharp acceleration and braking, brilliant balance and technical cornering are the skills to look out for.. In both of these disciplines, cyclists will also jump small obstacles..

In mountain biking there is also the possibility on very steep, muddy courses that the riders may just have to pick up their bikes and run..They are also prone to mechanical failure and tyre damage on the rough circuits.. Mountain bikers – alone among Olympic cyclists – are allowed to carry tool kits, and they must do their own running repairs..

officials worked out that Swede Henry Stenquist had lost so much time to the trains that his adjusted time was the fastest..

Many cycling formats have fallen off the track over the last century. . Departed friends include the Points race, the Team road race and the Tandem.. Perhaps the saddest casualty for the purist is the Team time trial, for nothing can compare with the speed and spectacle of a time trial team in perfect formation..

In the years after the Second World War, Olympic cycling remained a small, men-only, amateur affair, though the Games served as a stepping stone for some, like Italy’s Ercole Baldini, the sprint champion in 1956, who went on to a very successful professional road racing career..The Rome Games of 1960 were the first for over thirty years held in a country in which cycling was anything more than a curiosity..The hosts saw local sprinting favourite Sante Gaiardoni win two golds on the track, but the cycling is now mainly remembered for the road race, held in searing 34-degree heat..The Danish rider Knut Jensen, suffering from sunstroke, collapsed, fractured his skull and died – the first athlete to die during a competition at the Games since the 1912 marathon..At the autopsy, traces of a circulation stimulant were found in his blood..

The first doping test was introduced into Olympic cycling in 1964 and in 1972 two medallists tested positive for banned substances: the Spanish road racing bronze medallist Jaime Huelamo, and Aad van den Hoek, a member of the Dutch time trial team, who had also won a bronze..

Engineering rather than pharmacy seemed to be the key to the West German success at the 1976 Games, where the team sported silk jerseys (banned by the IOC) and raced on helium-filled tyres (permitted).. However, in 1980 and 1984 medicine trumped the other technologies.. In Moscow, safe from any meaningful doping checks, the Soviets and the East Germans ran amok.. In 1984, at Los Angeles, the US team won four golds and five other medals – successes that were later tarnished by the revelation that some of the medallists had been given blood transfusions before their races, a procedure that increased the concentration of red blood cells in their system, thereby boosting oxygen uptake to the muscles..The

current Women's Mountain Bike champion, Paola Pezzo

practice was not then against Olympic rules, although the medical guidelines discouraged it..

More positively, 1984 saw the first women’s cycling events at the Olympics..There was a dramatic end to the road race when US cyclist Connie Carpenter-Phinney won the gold in a photofinish, jumping forward over the line in the manner of a street biker mounting the kerb.. Change has come at fast pace since then..

British cyclist Chris Boardman’s aerodynamic bike helped him

win gold in the 4000m pursuit at Barcelona in 1992 and initiated a complete redesign of track bikes to incorporate complex modern

130 HOW TO WATCH THE OLYMPICS

materials.. In Atlanta in 1996 the professionals arrived and the great Spanish road racer Miguel Indurain, five times winner of theTour de France, won gold in the individual time trial; an up-and-coming American rider called Lance Armstrong finished sixth..

The 1996 Games also saw the debut of mountain biking. People had experimented with off-road cycling in California during the 1970s, and in the 1980s the first commercially produced mountain bikes appeared. .They had sturdier frames than road bikes, plus robust suspension systems, wider tyres and upright riding positions, making them far easier to ride on irregular surfaces..They were a huge sporting and recreational hit: aWorld Championship was held in 1987 and within a decade mountain bikes were outselling every other type combined, though most were used on urban roads..An Olympic berth became inevitable..

The queen of mountain biking has been Italian rider Paola Pezzo, who won the gold medal in 1996 and 2000, staging an amazing comeback in Sydney after taking a big fall and dropping some way behind the leading pack.. She also gained considerable notoriety for her appearances in fairy-tale costumes for her cycling shoe sponsor, and the Italian press’s obsession with her cleavage..

bmx – short for Bike Moto Cross – completed the current quartet of cycling disciplines with its appearance at the Beijing Olympics in 2008..While mountain biking was the new mainstream, BMX bikes had more of a cult following..These small-wheeled, single-geared bikes – first ridden in Santa Monica, California in the late 1960s – and are prized for their lightness and manoeuvrability, qualities that account for the huge BMX freestyle trick-riding scene..