Red Hook Crit 2016

Nah, genuinely not on a windup - and I'd never criticise anyone who organises and promotes an actual event.

Obviously racing is expensive, but are you really getting sufficient value from your sponsors to make racing significantly cheaper? Fair enough if so.

I suppose there aren't many races in the UK so you have to travel to them... but then I don't understand why you'd fly to the States unless you were pretty confident of doing pretty well. I'd stress that these are general observations and not specifically about your or any other fixie crew.

Best and truest comment yet. May the dude/tte with the biggest tree trunk legs win! And get sponsors! searches google for best quad exercises 😁😄😭

Why do fixie crews need sponsorship? Genuine Q.

Because businesses need to do content marketing, and by doing what they like doing, crew members can give their sponsor businesses the eyeballs they need at a fair price.

Win-Win.

We didn't fly to the States for Red Hook, not saying that that won't be the case in the future, but the big races are what sponsors really care about and if you're there, on view and getting photographed etc., then you're featuring your sponsors at a massive event.

It's not always about winning the race, but chasing your own personal goals. I've asked every rider for NLTCBMBC what their personal targets were for the year and I've tried to help them achieve that if possible, I'm not going into detail about team setup and sponsorship terms etc., as it's not the right thing to do, but don't discount the marketing power of Instagram/Facebook et al.

Anyway, I enjoyed racing again at Red Hook Crit. It was my first race back since breaking my collarbone in April and I felt a bit of pressure to do better than I did last year, but I failed due to my training (yes, amateur rider in training shocker) taking a massive setback for the last 3 1/2 months. I chickened out working with groups of riders after earlier crashes in qualifying so thought it would be best to roll around on my own and set a qualifying time. It wasn't to be though, but it gives me something to aim for for next year.

It was awesome. It will just get better!

And yeah the lead motorbike man looked like he was having a smashing time 😁😭😆

Oh yeah. Strickland managed to ride Marius Petrache off his wheel on the solo break, crazy show of strength. There's also Daniel Holloway who unfortunately got a puncture but he didn't manage to bring Strickland back in Brooklyn. Ignazio Moser, ex pro and son of Francesco, came 58th.

And the best thing is right up among them is some of us, locals, people you do laps of Regents Park with. They may not realistically be in with a chance of winning, but to beat professionals, ex-professionals, 6 day racers etc. shows just how much hard work and training has been done. Which is why I took issue with Antidotes implying pros are only pros just because they put in more work.

RHC is the pinnacle, it's always going to attract the best riders and it should, it gives people like me something to aim for if I could beat even one of those guys I'd be happy. I think it would be different if it morphed in to an only-pro's race, it needs the grass routes connection to keep interest, it's what sets it apart from any other pro crit like the Tour Series. And besides, it needs 150 people like me willing to stump up £50 to probably not qualify to pay for the whole thing.

At least that's my perspective from the Men's side, I don't know what it's like to have an Olympian lap you half way in to the race, but I do know what it's like having half a team of Elite's turn up to the local road crit and blow everyone out the back 5 laps in, it sucks.

Wow didnt realise there was so much pro hate. What would these haters do if they actually got good enough and then offered skme kind of pro deal? Turn it down?😂

Yieeeew!Amen!

Its people like you who I look up to. You're doing and not complaining! Hope training/competing goes well for you in the future matey!👊🏽

Penalty report on Instagram, shots fired

Would it not possible to change the race format and course in such a way that is more inclusive of non-professional riders, without discouraging the pros? I have only raced one crit, but I saw pretty quickly that the drafting strategies of "road-first" riders (which is what I assume most of the pros are?) are more important than the technical aspects. In my mind, crits are great races because they simulate everyday riding more than anything else, but when the courses are relatively simple loops or long straights it seems like it favours pure speed, whereas a more technical course might favour a street rider? (tbf RHC Brooklyn looked much more technical than the London course this year)
Also the format of elimination when you are lapped can be pretty discouraging - maybe for the first 20 laps it could be "you are only eliminated if a third of the field has lapped you" or "you have to be lapped by a number of riders greater than the number of laps remaining", then you wouldn't end up with the frustrating situation of the women's race where only 3 were in it after 15 laps... Also would give hope of epic comebacks to the underdogs :)

https://www.instagram.com/p/BHwdbUFgBlq/

an absolute shitshow

HANDS OUT OF FIXED GEAR, you ugly david trimble

I bet he imagines he's the First Minister of fixie-critting.

#fuckspecialized

Popcorn thread gold, but wrong way to put out a press release.

I simply cannot understand all this negative stuff.

I went on Saturday and it was probably the best cycling race(s) I have ever seen.

The atmosphere was great and I've seen forum peeps racing against Olympians.

Keep on cycling folks....

What utter clown shoes, organisers and banned riders, you put stuff like that in a discrete press release on your own website. Don't tell me it's on instragram, twitter, facebook and myfuckingspace?!

Its amazing how people manage to have a stab at ELF at almost every opportunity. (So we not even allowed to help friend out?)

@roboto summed it up the best. Personally and I would imagine my teammates would back him up.

And whilst I'm at it..... I don't check personally for the upside down crosses etc of the NLTCBMBC but Roboto, KRZ, CAZ and others I do not really know ( apologies...) worked really hard to pull off their thundercit thing and were riding to the best of their abilities on Saturday against some top riders.

Big up all Babylon-don fixed riders !!!

Couldn't agree with @roboto anymore on this. Without completely repeating what he's said and to get my own two pennies in. I think it's great that pros are showing more interest in fixed gear crits, it will only grow and benefit the scene tremendously, which is what a lot of the London teams aim for (although I am partial to the odd selfie too). It's also a great privilege to race with the pros, even though I only qualified for the last chance race on Saturday, it was dope just racing and I loved it, which is why me and my team attend these events in the first place, win, lose or even qualify, we always have a rad fucking time, get to see everyone from the community..And then get hammered. Yes, it must be annoying if you were one of the lapped riders, but a race is a race and hopefully it inspires people, rather than spread hate (fair enough I had a different view on Saturday after a couple of beers and was very "hate the pros" but I've changed my tune now sober) and as long as the race doesn't become something primarily dominated by the pros then I think it's an awesome balance.

I went on Saturday and it was probably the best cycling race(s) I have ever seen.

Yea - it was awesome. I had a great, great afternoon. Smiles for miles.

I spotted you, too @JAH_tim !

You were spotted
https://www.instagram.com/p/BHvgn-3ANFB/?tagged=rhcl2&hl=en

Some A1 popcorn in here — can't believe I missed the show.

General observation — a lot of people taking something (which is supposed to be fun), quite seriously?

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