Friday, March 19, 2010

USA Cycling

Thought that I would like to make a few fair comparisons as to why I am exceedingly disappointed in USA Cycling and quite impressed with the race structure over here:

1.Registration over here is not a huge ordeal-show up and give your John Hancock next to your name, finit
2-I do not have to fill out god knows how many number of forms that we have to back home, guess how many I fill out here? 1 at the beginning of year and its good for the whole season-what a concept?
3-Races cost like 4 euro-top that
4-Officials here are not yelling at everyone for stupid shit i.e.-no helmet when rolling around, folded numbers because guess what numbers here actually fit, especially a relief to not have a yellow line for racing, and frankly no one here cares where you go piss. For those who do not know at Tour of Utah we were able to skip the first 8 km of a stage of the race to go to bathroom so that we would not go midrace-major lame
5-The FFC is meant to turn out good racers, not make money for a few folks
6-Officials here have somehow figured out to do all of the placings by eye and no of this new electronic stuff and they get it right, even with a field of 175!
7-Guess what USA cycling, bidons are going to get tossed mid race-waste of energy to go back and give them to a car. Here they just get picked up post race and its not a big deal. No need to fine everyone for every bottle tossed, races are charging enough, just pay someone to pick them up.

To round this out pretty darn impressed with how fluid everything seems here and looking back on it, there is a lot that racing back home leaves me wondering why it doesn't get changed? Got a fun race coming up on Monday, 30 tours of a 3 km circuit. Day is going to be 1 km uphill 1 k flat and 1 k downhill. Wish me luck.

4 comments:

  1. I couldn't agree with you more.We american's are so up tight,We need to learn how to relax. Eric, I hope you are having the time of your life,because it sure sounds like it.I would love to just take time off and tour europe on my bike.

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  2. Congrats, USAC just moved you up one place at Nats last year because Clingon tested dirty.

    I don't know if I could use that crapper with a face!

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  3. Merde a la puissance treize !
    Kick some butt !

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  4. Not really USAC, but USA as a whole on most of those issues: Most of this comes down to sue happy americans and insurance costs/regulations.

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