WELCOME TO AMERICA. THIS IS HOW WE ROLL.
That’s right, bitches. Welcome to America, where our traffic doohickeys cause massive pileups that could have possibly ended the race for some of the best European riders.
Oh snap that was terrible. I watched the race at Thom and Mikes, and when that happened we all just held our breath. It was absolutely terrible, and I’m amazed that no one was seriously injured. I am, however, surprised at the officials decision to extend the 3k to go crash rule out to where the crash occurred.
“Due to the crash and the large number of riders that went down in the crash, our panel of commisaires made a decision to award all the riders with the time of the winner,” said race director Jim Birrell. “I think it was a fair decision and the right decision.” When asked who initiated the discussion about making the change from the UCI regulation, Birrell said it was the chief commissaire.
AKA if we didn’t extend that ruling, we would have pissed off all of the ProTour teams and the 2008 Tour of California would have been made up of 50 year-old club riders with very expensive bikes and beer bellies. I bet if Marka was out there, she would have said, in her cigarette-roughened voice “WHAT? A CRASH? WHO? HUH?” and then walked away to leave someone else to deal with it.
Despite saying that, I understand where the officials were coming from. This finish circuit is nothing like what is seen overseas – for instance, there aren’t plastic bubbles on the pavement, and rarely does a 100 mile stage end with a three lap circuit.
I was mostly bummed for Ben Jacques-Maynes.
“Thinking that I was going to be in the leader’s jersey is an honour and a dream, but that is counting chickens before the eggs hatch,” Jacques Maynes said. “The commissarie’s ruling is sticking, and we just have to live with that. We have a lot more racing and my team is motivated to keep going and to race our hearts out. I’m trying not to pay attention to all these details and get on with the job at hand.”
I would have loved to see him in the leaders jersey – mostly because it’d be an American who is relatively unknown to most of the international cycling community, and also because I’m pretty sure I’ve screamed at him at cross races. And he’s on the same team as the Kings…and I once talked to Robbie King…so basically Ben Jacques-Maynes and I are BEST FRIENDS!
Regardless. Despite how horrible the crash was, there are multiple ways that it could have been way cooler:
1. Jeremy Powers bunny hopping over the entire pile of mangled, bloody Europros.
2. Tim Johnson flat-out riding over them and screaming “FUCK YOU I’M TIM JOHNSON BITCH.”
Aaaand why did I just write commentary on a bike race? I don’t know, but it was probably so I could imagine Tim Johnson letting loose a battle cry as he crushes the tracheas of multiple ProTour racers.
