F1 Fanatic

I’ve got the cycling on while I fiddle away on the F1 Fanatic test site. The Keirin is a curious event – it’s a bit like a wet F1 race with the safety car staying out too long. Why do they have the ‘pace bike’?

First of all, it’s called a Derny. Second, I don’t really know why they are there, only that they’ve pretty much always been a part of track cycling. I guess they’re meant to give the race a more tactical aspect and to reward timing and explosiveness. They’re also used for slipstreaming at full speed (well over 50 mph), don’t know whether that’s an Olympic discipline or not.

I presume Dernys were introduced to make six-day-races more diverse.

Why do they have the ‘pace bike’?

What’s it for? Why is he there?

I believe the idea is that the pacer is there for strategy. Rather than simply sprinting from start to finish, the pacer controls the first phase of the race to let everyone get into position for the second phase, which comes when the pacer peels off. The riders at the front have the advantage of track position, but expend more energy getting there. The riders at the back have to make up track position at the end, but can sprint harder. The riders essentially have to choose where they want to be on the circuit before the pacer leaves and lets the field break away.

Yeah, Pendleton attacked very early yesterday, meaning those behind her came close to coming back at her.

I see Australia has been flattened this Olympics, particularly in the pool. Honestly, I’m not bothered by it. In fact, I think we needed a disappointing run. There is far too much in the way of pressure and expectations piled onto our athletes, and a lot of the broadcast media in particular seem to think the only way to represent your country is to win lots of medals. I was watching the rowing last night when Great Britain beat Australia in the men’s coxless fours and the commentators kept talking about how the Australian team was drawing closer and closer to the British crew, and that it would surely go right down to the wire – but looking back over the race, Great Britain maintained a gap of 0.6 seconds over the entire field from the 500m mark. Likewise, the commentators were prepared to call the women’s triathlon two kilometres from the end of the race and award Erin Densham the gold medal, but in the last few hundred metres, Nicola Spirig and Lisa Norden broke free and relegated Densham to third.

But if you want an athlete who epitomises Australia’s attitude to the Games, look no further than James Magnussen (I’m embarrassed to admit I was born in the same town as him). He lost the men’s 100m freestyle to Nathan Adrian by just a tenth of a second, and then stood on the podium and pouted. He just won a silver medal, for crying out loud! I can understand the disappointment at being beaten like that, and that knowing your personal best would be enough to win the gold, but to say in an interview that you were expecting to win is outrageous. Compare that to Cristina Iovu and Anatolie Ciricu, who both won bronze medals for the tiny eastern European nation of Moldova – they were exhilirated just to be at the Olympics, and I have it on good authority (my best friend is Moldovan) that the entire nation went bonkers when they won bronze.

I think the Australians need to take a good, hard look at themselves before the Games in Rio. I’m embarrassed by their attitude, which I find to be the antithesis of one of the nation’s core values: fair play in the spirit of competition. I’ll go ahead and say it: we’re a bunch of sore losers.

But what do you guys think of Pistorius?

There’s techncially nothing preventing a double amputee from entering the Olympics. It’s not the first time something like this has happened – there was an Australian fencer in Beijing who was deaf, and he claimed it helped his concentration, though he needed a visual cue to tell him when to take position or when a hit had been registered. Pistorius should be allowed to run.

Hard not to be inspired by Britain’s greatest ever day/hour at the Olympics. Ennis had to win- she had so much pressure being essentially the face of the Olympics, I can’t imagine how she would have felt if she hadn’t backed it up with gold.

YAY! Del Potro beated Djokovic :D!

And Murray’s beating Federer in style!!

I’ll second that, Broom. Came so close to getting several more golds too, particularly in the mens gymnastics pommel horse. And to back PM’s claim of Australia having a poor time, I saw an article saying that Yorkshire alone has more medals than Australia, although it used the dubious claims that one of the golds was from one yorkshireman who was actually part of one of the rowing teams.