The Other Half of Crashing
Tuesday, May 18, 2010 at 5:27AM I can't seem to find a picture of Tom Boonen's road rash from yesterday's crash (please post a link in the comments if you find one), but the carnage from stage one of the Tour of California was spectacular.
Amazingly, nobody was seriously injured. That is some real luck when you're racing in a tight pack and hit the pavement doing 35 mph wearing spandex and a styrofoam lid.
I assume the race directors forced the race to go around a tight circuit multiple times at the finish to make it more spectator friendly. Some could view it as sacrificing the safety of the riders to get more eyeballs, but that's part of the spectacle of racing. Nobody knows how awesome you are unless they see it.
From a training perspective, I wanted to point out the finish of stage 2. Crash victims Boonen and Hincapie finished far behind where they should have, presumably because of the crash injuries, both physical and mental. Boonen was back by 15 minutes, which is eons in pro cycling.
This serves as testimony as to the effect crashing has on your performance, even when you don't get injured. It shakes you, it makes you second-guess, and it often makes you crash again. Not only that, but the effects can last for days up to a lifetime.
Some crashing is good, if you take it in stride and as a learning experience. Crashing teaches you the limits of you and your gear's performance, so you know how far you can push it before risking your neck. Show me somebody who's never crashed and I'll show you somebody who's not aware of their full potential.
But back to the title of this post, the other half of crashing is that it can negatively impact your training/fitness/health for far longer than you think. A safe ride without a crash today is another day of great training tomorrow.
Reader Comments (3)
There's a pic in this article.
Hey Brett, I haven't found any pictures, but I saw a twitter post about this video from the crash:
http://www.vimeo.com/11824989
This is not pretty... the sounds of the crash are terrible...
cheers,
marcos
Great vid, first you have the bad crash then you have a crazy volunteer just walk out on to the course telling speeding racers to slow down....amazing that he did not get slammed into...then the idiot american with the bike while the rider is down getting a pic from his buddy....OMG!