In article <
[email protected]>,
"trailgalore" <
[email protected]> wrote:
> Would like to know if one must compete in races to earn a Masters rating, or
> is one a Master by virture of age?
> If one races for the first time in the USCF, it would be in the cat 5 class
> correct? Can one be a cat 5 racer and also be a Master?
> In what class would race points be credited? In cat 5, how could, lets say a
> 65 year old compete with a 30 year old?
Somebody downthread pointed out how baffling racing and classifications
can be for new riders, so for some strange reason I will try to answer
your questions carefully.
Here's the super-short version:
-If you're old, you're a Master. You can be both a Cat 5 and a Master,
maybe; locally anyone old enough for Master-ness is automatically
enrolled as a 4, but that may or may not be the case in the US, and it
hardly matters.
-If your race license application asks you to choose between being a
Master or not, you should almost always choose to be a Master. This
makes very little difference, except that it might exclude you from
racing Elite championship races, and it will allow you to race in
age-grouped races. If you are 65, you REALLY should choose "Master".
-race points will be credited according to the way the race is
categorized. Note that in most places, Cat X points will be "upgrade
points," and any points earned in your Masters age group will be more
like overall series points (ie, no upgrading, but you might win a trophy
at the end of the year for accumulated points).
-a Cat 5 65 year old and a Cat 5 30 year old compete on absolutely even
terms in a Cat 5 race.
Long boring version:
Read the first page or two of this:
http://www.usacycling.org/forms/Masters Eligibility FAQ.pdf
With the proviso that things can vary from region to region and
technically, I have no actual experience of USCF racing, normally the
Category and the age group are separate things.
Category says how slow you are.
Age group says how old you are, except Elite, which can be any rider
(with broad provisos). "Master" usually starts at 30 on this continent,
but if you're fast enough, you'll probably stay in the Elite category,
where you get to race against the fast guys, until age slows you down.
Actual pro-level (or certain not-quite-pro-but-demonstrably-fast) riders
aren't allowed in Master categories.
Most races are categorized by only one or the other of these things, so
it's perfectly normal to be a Cat 4 Master (35+), which happens to be
exactly what I am.
In races that have Categories, you can race your Cat. In races run by
age groupings, you can race your age. In some races there may be both
age and Cat groupings, and you may or may not be able to choose which
races you enter. Some organizers will even let you enter both races, if
age group and Cat races run separately.
When you're racing in a category, you're racing for upgrade points,
which means you are accumulating points towards becoming the next cat
up. Your local body can tell you how many points within what interval
qualifies for an upgrade. Category is a goofy thing: it's akin to a
skill grouping, and theoretically the goal is to advance up the ranks
until you find your level of incompetence. But because much of the
nature of road racing is dependent on a group of roughly similar
(ability-wise) riders in a bunch, it works well. It really doesn't
matter much for time trials, except for the upgrade points issue. The
key thing is that simple personal-best benchmarks don't really work in
road racing because the character of the race has everything to do with
the weird collective will of the pack that day, influenced by the type
of course (parcours).
The whole deal of a 30-yo versus a 65-yo in a Cat 5 race is this: if the
young guy was any good, he'd have won a few races and upgraded. If the
old fogey was any slower, he'd basically have to give up road racing,
because every race would end with him being dropped. There is no Cat 6,
so anyone in Cat 5 is either new to the sport or is unable to win
against the weakest competition organized cycling offers. Some people
spend their entire racing "career" in Cat 5. Some people, at least once
they are fast enough to consistently stay with a Cat 5 pack, will
request an upgrade to Cat 4 just to avoid racing with the sketchy
novices in Cat 5. There's little difference in the raw performance of
Cat 4 and 5 riders, though the 4's will be a little less sketchy and a
little smarter. But only a little.
When you're racing in an age-grouping, you are racing to be the best
rider against a pack with a common handicap: your age. That's more or
less self-explanatory, I think. Most age-grouped races that offer points
are probably offering them for a local masters category series, which
means that someone tallies up the point and the winner of each age group
gets a trophy or a jersey prize.
The other thing that happens is that most regional or state or national
championships are nominally age-grouped, though a lot offer "challenge"
races for lower-cat riders who would otherwise be uncompetitive in their
age group (mainly it's the lowly end of the 23-40s who get hardest hit
here), and that Elite is usually anyone over 23 who is fast enough to
want to race it.
--
Ryan Cousineau
[email protected] http://www.wiredcola.com/
"In other newsgroups, they killfile trolls."
"In rec.bicycles.racing, we coach them."
