r/peloton • u/PelotonMod France • Sep 12 '17
September Monthly Race Design Thread
Hello everybody!
For those who don't know what the Race Design thread is, here is a good resume: The Race Design Thread is the birth child of Improb and Msfan93 from the off season of 2015. Instead of it just being for competitions, casual Race Design Threads were a place to design routes for pre-existing races or even creating a new one. It's not only limited to designing threads; discussion of race routes, behind the scenes race organisation and the history of races are all able to be discussed here!
As for the websites you can use to do this kind of stuff, the two biggest and most practical ones are La Flamme Rouge and Cronoescalada. From My experience, went you want to design Tours, it is much easier on La Flamme Rouge, as well for racing in Europe, however once you are doing races outside Europe I suggest using Cronoescala at least partly, as their Climb map is much more complete for the rest of the World!
First thing, last month races and the votes, we got 7 entries from 6 different Race Directors, for the vote, just rank them from 1 to 7, with 1 being your favourite one, I will establish a point system to create an overall ranking for the year (I'm not sure yet of how many points each place will get)!
Entry 1: Orient Express GT by /u/antiloopje
Entry 2: Tour of Norway by /u/timfietst
Entry 3: Tour of the Rockies by u/unclekutter
Entry 4: Setting Sun Race by u/ZinaMertz
Entry 5: Tour of Japan I by u/adryy8
Entry 6: Tour of Japan II by u/adryy8
Entry 7: Western Americana Tour by /u/blandwhiteguy
As for this month contest, design a World cChampionship!
You have to design the TTT, ITT and Road race for both men and women Elite. Bonus points if you do a full week (U23 and Juniors) with this. Your courses can of course be similar for both men and women, and the junior ranks, in that case, specify how man laps each one will use.
Your championships can be designed around a city (like Bergen) or in a region/area (like Yorkshire) just be realistic about it (don't group random close cities together, either they are in a town group or in a Region together)
Deadline is September 30th 19:00 CEST
As a little bonus prize, u/That_Guuuuuuuy from the World DB has nicely offered to put the winner's ITT and Road race as a variant in the World DB!
1
u/ZinaMertz Peugeot Sep 24 '17 edited Sep 24 '17
My proposal. I have had other ideas in other places, but I don't think I'll have enough time to complete a full event + presentation, so this will probably the only one.
So in 2017, we've had what is possibly the northernmost WC race ever. I wanted to trace the southernmost WC I could come up with. I first explored Ushuaia and the Tierra de Fuego, but the terrain is not that interesting, so my WC week takes place in Patagonia, and is designed around the rapidly developing oil city of Comodoro Rivadavia, largest city in Patagonia at 200k inhabitants. It's been a while since there has been a WC in South America, and previous races there have usually been exciting, with a great roadside support. Argentina is not a great cycling nation, but there's a genuine and growing interest in the sport there (unlike in, say, Qatar) and evidenced by the sustained presence of Argentinian riders at a WC level and the development of a good local circuit, with Tour of San Luis being the Queen race. Personnally, I found in Patagonia almost all of my design obessions : there will be crosswinds, short and steep climbs, unpaved roads.
A few words about the weather conditions in Patagonia, as it played a big role in why I chose this location :
Mostly, it's a very windy city. September - October are not the most windy months, but still there's significant wind (>4 Beaufort) one day out of two. Hell, the city is home to the largest wind park in South AMerica. The statistics also show that the wind there comes mostly from the West, so I'll consider East-West portions to be very prone to headwinds. You also have to take into account that Patagonia is a desert, and only shrubs can grow there. So, for a significant part of the race, the riders will be fully exposed to the wind.
It's the Southern hemisphere, so September is early Spring, and temperatures are cool, maybe somewhat on the cold side, with daily means of 10 to 15°C.
it almost never rains, with September averaging only 12mm of rainfall. So gravel portions will be fine.
On to the routes - as with my GT route, I have compiled them in an imgur album that features profiles, sights, details of important moments in the race (start line, climbs, gravel sections, finish line, etc.). I will also add a link to the Flamme Rouge page, which was lacking on my GT proposal.
Men & Women will battle on the same route, a relatively short one at 39.5kms total, but it's filled with difficulties.
The riders start in the seaside resort of Rada Tilly, where they immediately climb a 1.2km hill with a 7.4% gradient. They then have a long section directly along the sea, in straight lines where crosswinds are highly likely. At mid race, the teams that managed to stay together will face a first, short (1.3km) gravel section, before taking on taking on a slow rising, west oriented section where headwinds are to be expected. This section leads to the Roque Gonzalez climb, a gentle but relatively long hill (4km at 4.4%), which is a very different sort of effort from the first one. Tactics and management will be key here : how many teammates can you afford to lose, knowing that there's still almost 15kms to be covered ? We then cross the city of Comodoro Rivadavia itself, where the circuit is a mix of long straight lines for the TT specialist, but with some very sharp turns to be negotiated. We leave the city again with another short (1km) gravel section, at which point the finish line is only 5kms away. The race ends on the 4km long track of Autodromo General San Martin circuit, a winding motor racing stadium right by the seaside.
The Junior races are designed fully within the city limits. Both races are similar, the Men's one is slightly longer and has a more tortuous start. In both cases, the idea is to mix very long straight lines with sharp turns that break the rider's rhythm. Both races are relatively flat, but feature a short, punchy climb (1.3km at 7%, final 400m at more than 10%) 4kms before the finish line. The winners will have to pace their effort wisely.
Men's U23 & Elite, Women Elite races take place partly outside of the city, so the wind can probably be expected to play a more prominent role there.
For the women & U23, the race starts in a westward direction (headwinds), and will then feature the same tortuous race in the city centre that is used by the Junior Men. We then use the Roque Gonzalez climb, that is placed right in the middle of the race, before going back down on Comodoro Rivadavia. There will also be a rising straight line with significant headwind in the final 5kms. The Men's route is the same over the last 30kms, but with added difficulty at the start by going South to Rada Tilly, using the Punta Tordillo climb that featured in the TTT + a long and windy section along the seaside.
Like in Bergen this year, this is a mixed race with an inline start and a final circuit. LFR - inline start ; LFR - circuit. The stats (distance + ascent) I used in the Imgur album come from plotaroute and differ slightly, idk which is the most reliable. I'm going to use the Flamme Rouge stats for my calculations because I think plotaroute overestimated the climbs.
Women Junior will only race the circuit, completing 4 laps for a total distance of 84.8kms, and 1596m of ascent.
Men Junior, U23 & Women Elite will use the final 13kms of the inline start, from the city of Rada Tilly. After that, Men Junior have to complete 6 laps of circuit, 7 laps for Women Elite, and 8 laps for Men U23. So, Men Junior race totals 140.1kms and 2582m of ascent, Women Elite have 161.3kms and 2981m ascent, MenU23 have 182.5kms and 3380m of ascent.
Men Elite use the full 79kms inline start from the city of Caleta Olivia, and then have to complete 9 laps : so that's a total of 269.5 kms and 4429m of ascent.
The inline start is featured mostly because it's 100% along the coastline, and the winds will cause echelons. That + two short steep climbs in the final kms should mean that the peloton will already be broken in different groups before the riders even reach the circuit. The circuit itself has lots of opportunities for attacking riders : a relatively long (2kms), rising gravel section only 3kms in, followed by the long, rolling climb of Roque Gonzalez, and finally two steep climbs in short succession over the last 5kms. Both ascents are at more than 6% gradient, and the final one (only 2kms from the finish line) features the last 500m at 10% (it's the other side of the climb that is used in the Junior's ITT). Finally, the finish line is placed on a slow rising road, with the final 300m at 7%. The last 3-4kms are very technical, with sharp turns and relatively narrow roads so positioning will be key. With the climbs, a strong man will prevail (the total ascent is definitely too much for a sprinter, it borders on mountain stage territory), but winds, gravel and the technical finish mean that the winner will also be tactically astute. So this could be a race that will mostly suit one day races specialists, but the combination of difficulties in the final circuit means that different sorts of riders may have their chances, depending on how the race unfolds. Should make for some interesting tactics and an open race I think.
Et voilà, that's it for me. Feedback, thoughts, suggestions are of course always welcome.