It’s a long season and every now and again, through this circumstance or that, a rider will find himself dropped from the main field in a road race. If there’s no chance of regaining contact with the group, there are few choices for a rider in that position: In a one-day race, the only sensible option is to go home. But in a stage race, one must finish in order to continue the next day, so he has to press on.
Behind the field, late in a difficult stage-race road race, is The Bus (a.k.a. The Grupetto, or The Laughing Group). The Bus contains a variety of riders: guys who flatted and couldn’t get back on, dropped riders who are having a bad day, dropped riders who just aren’t fit, and some who decided to save it for the coming days. In all cases, the riders in The Bus no longer care about their finish time, and just want to survive another day.
The riders in The Bus need each other. Riding alone to the finish can be agonizing for someone who has been suffering all day, so he needs the company of others to get through it. If the stage race is timed, there’s still a time cut to worry about, so they can’t just soft-pedal along the course, and they need to work together a little bit. Also, in a stage race, the commissaires usually don’t time-eliminate large groups. So it’s important not to get caught behind the group. The Bus is a civil community of riders with a common interest. They’re no longer competing, they’re just getting home– together.
Unfortunately, The Bus would be my vehicle of choice late in the road race in this weekend’s Tour de Ephrata, in Pennsylvania. By the time I got popped, the field was very small, and I knew there would be a big group coming along where I could share my misery with others like me, and enjoy a friendly chat en route to the finish. So I rode very, very slowly through the Dutch farmland, enjoying the mixed scents of field manure and Cherry Blossoms, both in full bloom. Eventually The Bus came along, and I hopped aboard.
I was greeted by some familiar faces and some smiles. But the pace of the group was uncomfortably high. I asked around about it, and no one seemed to understand what was going on. There was a “team” drilling it up there with the help of two others. I went up to remind them to relax, that there was no reason to go hard, that they were making others uncomfortable and angry, that their race was over, that their chance to ride hard had come and gone, that they’re now beating up on the already-beaten, etc. But they were uninterested and continued to nail it.
After a while, I convinced them to settle down. But it was like pulling teeth. After repeatedly telling them to relax and yelling at them to stop it, I finally assumed the front and demonstrated the pace that we should ride (“Just stay on my wheel”, I said. “I’ll do all of the work if you want me to. I’ll take us all the way to the finish”. One of them tried to pass me, so I gently rode him to the gutter. He then tried coming around my other side, so I drifted in the other direction and felt his handlebar on my hip. Then he accelerated past me in a huff and rode away. Once he was gone, the rest were content to ride calmly. In a short time we were riding two-by-two, talking, smiling, and enjoying the ride through the countryside. Civility had returned. But I heard the most astonishing explanations for why they were riding so hard:
“If we all work, we’ll get back faster.”
He failed to grasp the reason why others weren’t contributing. He also failed to understand the low return rate of time-gained to power-spent.
“I want to give my coach some good numbers.”
Oh…my….gawd. Your coach wants to see how much power you can produce after you’ve been dropped? Don’t you think there are other things you and your coach should be focusing on, like How Did I Get Dropped? Good numbers?! Was being dropped part of your training plan too? “Your numbers are two minutes up the road”, I replied.
But the guy I feel sorry for, is the guy who rode away from us. He’s young and new to racing, and should be taught these lessons from the club/team he’s with– the etiquette of the sport, the unwritten rules that bind us as a community. Instead his team was demonstrating for him how to annoy his companions. Nice.
Then… the pathetic drama turned into pure comedy. When we arrived on the finishing straight, we watched this “team” start setting up for… you guessed it: The sprint! Someone said, “Oh no, they’re not going to…” Yes they were. They sprinted each other for the line. How must this have looked to those watching? They were competing to be the best of the losers. As I was shaking my head in disbelief, I decided it was my own fault for being there with them; I shouldn’t have been dropped.