Track Cycling 2023 Discussion Thread

[heywoodu 16,010]

55,433 seconds

[phelps 8,292]

just another day at the office for Jeffrey Hoogland  

 

yesterday he improved the 500m world record with a flashy 24.564 seconds (record previously held by Sir Chris Hoy with 24.758 since 2007 in  La Paz)

 

then he missed out his 3 attempts to smash the flying 200m record (held by Nicholas Paul with 9.100 secs since 2019, also made in  La Paz)

 

9.130, 9.201, 9.103 the 3 times clocked by the Dutch sprinter

[heywoodu 16,010]

16 minutes ago, phelps said:

just another day at the office for Jeffrey Hoogland  

 

yesterday he improved the 500m world record with a flashy 24.564 seconds (record previously held by Sir Chris Hoy with 24.758 since 2007 in  La Paz)

 

then he missed out his 3 attempts to smash the flying 200m record (held by Nicholas Paul with 9.100 secs since 2019, also made in  La Paz)

 

9.130, 9.201, 9.103 the 3 times clocked by the Dutch sprinter

Yeah, nobody in the world is going to be anywhere close to Hoogland when it's about 1km, but powerful as he may be, the pure top speed isn't his strongest part (obviously he's up there in the top of the world though ). 

 

He got closer to the 9.100 than I thought actually, and of course those three attempts in a few hours are of insane quality. The one I'm confident about in terms of beating that is Harrie Lavreysen, the king of top speed and raw power. I would honestly not even be surprised to see Lavreysen go sub-9 if he'd focus fully on this attempt for a good while.

[Grassmarket 4,047]

On 10/23/2023 at 12:59 PM, Rafa Maciel said:

First leg of the UCI Track Champions League Track Cycling in Mallorca:

 

 

Sprint Events

 

Women's Sprint

1.)  Alessa-Catriona Propster

2.)  Emma Finucane.

 

Series finale for the Track Champions’ League in London this weekend - double bill of racing on both Friday & Saturday evenings.

Edited November 10, 2023 by Grassmarket

[Rafa Maciel 1,658]

Have rewatched last weekend's UCI Track Champions League event - taking place on the same velodrome which will be used for the Olympics next year - and it doesn't seem to be a great facility from a sprint perspective. The finishing straight seems to be quite short, so if you are in the lead going into the final bend the chances are you are going to take the win. 

[mpjmcevoy 375]

8 hours ago, Rafa Maciel said:

Have rewatched last weekend's UCI Track Champions League event - taking place on the same velodrome which will be used for the Olympics next year - and it doesn't seem to be a great facility from a sprint perspective. The finishing straight seems to be quite short, so if you are in the lead going into the final bend the chances are you are going to take the win. 

The straight in London was/is unusually long if memory serves, which before the Games was thought to maybe help the more pure power-based sprinters - Hoy, Meares and Bauge. in Two of those cases, it worked, but Kenny found a way around Bauge. I suppose what you do is you factor it in, bring some expertise and analysis to bear, and work out how to manage it with your talent pool, up to and including attacking a full bend earlier.

[heywoodu 16,010]

37 minutes ago, mpjmcevoy said:

The straight in London was/is unusually long if memory serves, which before the Games was thought to maybe help the more pure power-based sprinters - Hoy, Meares and Bauge. in Two of those cases, it worked, but Kenny found a way around Bauge. I suppose what you do is you factor it in, bring some expertise and analysis to bear, and work out how to manage it with your talent pool, up to and including attacking a full bend earlier.

Absolutely this. A short or long finishing straight doesn't make it 'better' or 'worse', the top athletes simply take it into account when making their race plans.

[mpjmcevoy 375]

5 hours ago, heywoodu said:

Absolutely this. A short or long finishing straight doesn't make it 'better' or 'worse', the top athletes simply take it into account when making their race plans.

I think you can certainly make a case that a type of track suits a power sprinter, or a rush sprinter; someone who can maintain speed, and someone who can accelerate to a super high speed for a shorter time. That doesn't mak the track bad for sprinting - it might make it 'bad' for a certain subgroup of sprinters - nothing new in that - Helsinki Athletics track is infamous for its tight bends, i've even heard people comment about deeper and shallower 50 metre pools.

 

the only bad track is one that is either wildly unfair or one that allows no room for tactics - the first is a disservice to the athletes, the second to the fans