Should They Have Waited For Mayo?

gntlmn

This is a little bit satirical, reflecting on all the controversy last year over whether Lance should have waited for Beloki instead of getting right back into the lead group in the 2003 Tour or whether Jan Ullrich and others should have waited for Lance when he crashed.

Well, as you know, Mayo was left behind today in the 2004 TdF as 15 riders were separated from the main group in a crash before reaching the cobblestones in the TdF. The gap widened as the other Tour contenders, seeing their opportunity to crush Mayo and eliminate him from Tour contention, ground away, making it impossible for the weaker team to catch up. Mayo lost 4 minutes and was worn out from having to struggle to minimize the lost time with almost no support from other teams.

Now what makes it more honorable to take advantage of his crash here but not to have taken advantage of Lance last year?

Actually, I am happy to see the hunger of these contenders. It was an exciting stage today. We shall see if Mayo has any hope left when he takes to the Pyrenees. I doubt that he will be a contender now.

HKP

Nice post!! I was also viewing this subject with some humour when earlier posting the poll for "should Armstrong have waited for Beloki".

In all cases I don't think there should be any waiting. It's a race after all. You don't see motor racers slowing down if a rival has a puncture/mechanical problems etc. You can say that the falling riders were subject to "bad luck" but you can also say that you make your own luck. If you ride close to the crowd in the mountains you've got more chance of coming down. If you ride on the side of the road (rather than the crown) on the cobbles you've more chance of puncturing. If you don't ride at the front on a cobbled stage (especially if you haven't scouted the cobbles beforehand) then you've more chance of having "bad luck".

Sure you can always argue afterwards whether someone *did* wait or not - and IMO it's pretty difficult to decide conclusively either way. My point of view is that I don't care - as I don't think there is a need to wait. Whether to attack or not is a different question - but I don't think there should be any waiting.

By the way, I think this whole subject is getting a little out of proportion - in the 1999 race the exact same circumstances arose following the passage du gois - Zulle lost many minutes - but I don't remember any great debate about whether they should have waited.

Cheers

HKP

gntlmn

I just watched OLN interview Lance after the cobblestone stage today. He said the fact that Mayo went down had nothing to do with his team's strategy for the day, and that was to stay out in front for safety sake. He said that where Mayo went down, which was even before the main crash in the cobblestones later, the riders were going around 40 mph (65 kph), trying to stay ahead in order to get safely through the later cobblestones. He said there really wasn't opportunity to consider whether they should wait or not. The riders were all going very fast and had no opportunity to hesitate.

George Hincapie is a hell of a rider. Cobblestones are his game.

patch70

How do you think Lance would have reacted if he was in Mayo's shoes? Do you think he'd expect the peloton to slow up for him?

gntlmn

Nahh. I don't think so, under the circumstances. Mayo actually didn't think anyone should have waited for him either. And then you have the fact that the peloton was still large, especially compared to the cut off group. This creates a competitive atmosphere within the peloton, and a resulting runaway freight train focused on outdoing riders right next to you rather than a couple of km behind you. That's what happened, it seems.

jstraw

There's a big difference between a half-dozen riders attacking on a mountain waiting when someone crashes and 180 riders going 65 kph on the flat waiting when 15 pile up early in the stage.

Everyone waiting would have meant everyone abandoning their quest to get to the pave first....to cover them with the least risk.

gntlmn

I agree with what you say here. Safety is the number one consideration in both of these cases. When it's safe, it seems that people will want to stop to do honor to the other riders and not to take advantage of them. But when you stop sometimes, and not others, even in the interest of safety, you alter the outcome of the race. If you concede time to a contender whom you could have left behind when it is honorable and safe to slow, and then you have to give up time to that same contender later simply because it was too dangerous for him to wait for you, it would be a very bitter loss for you.

Luckily, these mishaps don't happen very often. I just find it rather humorous to watch these passionate debates on the subject of waiting, whether they should have or not.

Tuschinski

If I were Ulrich I would give him the finger with an "up yours bro".

Mayo and Zubeldia had no respect for him last year when he took them through the Pyrenees... so of course he is laughing now.

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HKP

IMO the most successful classics rider of the last 20 years has been Sean Kelly. As some of the classics (especially cobbled ones) can be a bit of a lottery, it seems that a great portion of his success can be attributed to riding for the KAS team. The KAS team rode in predominantly yellow jerseys - which led many riders into being fooled, and then waiting for Kelly whenever he ran into bad luck. Being a good sprinter it enabled him to win when reaching the finish.

Johan Bruyneel said "next year with our new sponsor we may use yellow as our jersey colour - that way Georgie may finally win in Roubaix".

Mayo said "With the angle of the sun at that time of the day I thought my Orange jersey might look at little bit yellow - I didn't take into account the effect of the dark lenses most riders have in their sunglasses".

musette

See related discussion under "Where was the tour cop today?"

gntlmn

Hah, that's a good one. But I don't know, it might be different today. Telecommunications and race coverage are much better now than they were in Kelly's day.

That's an interesting thought. What with George's incredible riding during this Tour, it would be neat to see him win Roubaix. I'd like to see him get more acclaim. He deserves it.

ds0709

I think you wait for Yellow, not a person, the Jersey, which would have canceled out Lance waiting for Ulrich, but not Hamilton or Ulrich waiting for Lance last year as he was in Yellow. Nor would you wait for Mayo yesterday. You wait for Yellow because if you beat Yellow via a crash or flat that is the cowards way of winning. Just my 2cents

Lisbon

Like everyone else is saying, there was just too many people and they were going too fast to sloww up.

davidbod

I think you also have to consider a couple of other facts. One of the Postal riders went down with Mayo and the rest, yet he was able to finish with the lead group. He payed for it yesterday in the TTT. Also if it was Lance who had gone down, the team would have been able to pull him back to the front. Liberty Segeuros was able to get Herras back to the lead group as well. Also the lead Peleton did slow toward the end, but the trailing group were so weak they couldn't make up the time.

It just goes to show that you have to have a strong team to be a real contender.