Too Much Pressure?

Do we just expect that some of our greatest will win gold? How the hell do they cope with that pressure?

Cav has not done it and must be gutted, what if Jess doesn't do it, she's the media's poster girl.

Do you think that in this situation the mass media have a positive or detrimental effect?

I didn't realise Jess was racing.... HH must be proud!

Media is generally negative... lets hope they prove me wrong.

Must be a hell of a lot of pressure on all the media fav girls/boys (I kind of know how they feel from this year's RW/ASICS Paris marathon comp!). I know Paula suffered for the media attention in the past, building her up cause she was in form and they were looking for an angle. I do hope though that they all come through, Jess & Mo in particular. Although I also hope there are a few surpirses like Kelly Holmes.

The media are a bunch of wankers, look at Paula Radcliffes response to finding out the Daily hate mail had told everyone she was injured....they hide behind freedom of speech and the public have a right to know bollocks but in reality they don't care whos life is destroyed.

They create most of this "pressure" and then seem to take great joy in bringing the person down if they do fail.

I'm not a fan of Cav...so yesterday when the media were giving it "Cavendish, the fastest man on the planet...blah blah blah" it just made me think of that time they hyped Paula up beyond all recognition....Paula's marathon is coming up, etc...and then she fell by the wayside. 

We were wondering...we didn't watch the road race...had stuff on...but was it a team event??  They were on about the GB team setting it up for Cavendish and both Mr CS and myself said stuff that...if only 1 person is getting a gold medal  then sod setting it all up for another team mate to get it.

Well he is the fastest man over 200m trouble is this was a 200Km race which meant he needed towing for 199,800m of it.  There is no point moaning that no other country helped when you knew there was a chance they wouldn't.  The guys that got the medals did it without teams mollycoddling them which is more in tune with the olympic spirit.  On the day the team tactics didn't work and they didn't have the imagination to read the race accurately and implement plan 'wing it' like many in the leading group did.

We are still the strongest cycling nation the fact that they got no help demonstrates that Team GB just got taken down a couple of pegs on the day.

CazSoul wrote (see)

We were wondering...we didn't watch the road race...had stuff on...but was it a team event??  They were on about the GB team setting it up for Cavendish and both Mr CS and myself said stuff that...if only 1 person is getting a gold medal  then sod setting it all up for another team mate to get it.

Yes, it is a team event. If you've got the fastest bunch sprinter in your team - and Cav is the fastest bunch sprinter in the world - it makes sense to base your strategy on trying to deliver him to the finish line in a bunch sprint.  It's a calculated risk because as yesterday showed, if the break-away is strong enough there's not much you can do to bring them back.  The break-away was unusually strong, since two groups got together to form a group of over 30 riders, containing some of the best time trialists in the world - Cancellara, Sanchez, Vinokourov...

With the extreme benefit of hindsight you might argue that someone like David Millar would be a good man to have in such a break, and may have had the strength to make a move towards the end, but if you ran the race ten times, he might be lucky enough for this tactic to work once, whereas the GB team would have fancied themselves to execute the bunch-finish plan perhaps more often than not.  So it's a percentage plan, and unfortunately yesterday it didn't work out.

Phil, you clearly understand about cycling, when I don't at all, but a few other things simply don't make sense to me.

What was the British tactic exactly? Sit back in the big gang, blocking anyone who tried to form a breakaway? Hold the 100s of cyclists back for 155odd miles knowing that you have a guy who can beat anyone over the last 2k?

What's all this "didn't get any help" business. Why would anyone help a different team? And how do you help exactly? By politely not making a break?

And why when only medals go to the front 3, would you as a team member obliterate yourself in an event you have no chance of winning yourself, and get no medal, when you have your own events in the upcoming week!

Bonkers

Team GB's tactics on the day were wrong. Cav today blames the Aussies !!!

To win a medal you have to be at the front, not three and a half minutes behind taking it easy hoping to catch up on the last lap.

Crazy tactics

Stevie G . wrote (see)

What was the British tactic exactly? Sit back in the big gang, blocking anyone who tried to form a breakaway? Hold the 100s of cyclists back for 155odd miles knowing that you have a guy who can beat anyone over the last 2k?

Not sit back, quite the opposite.  Main priority is to keep the pace high in the peloton, to chase down any breaks that occur, and then towards the end to keep the pace really high, to prevent any further break-aways. 

Stevie G . wrote (see)

What's all this "didn't get any help" business. Why would anyone help a different team? And how do you help exactly? By politely not making a break?

 

Teams like Germany and Australia also had good sprinters that they could have helped to put in a good position, had it come down to a bunch finish.  As it was, the German team did contribute to the chase but it wasn't enough. You might hedge your bets a bit, which might be what Australia did, as they had Stuart O'Grady in the break and he finished 6th.  You can't really whinge about it though, especially when everyone knows precisely what GB's plan is going to be.

Stevie G . wrote (see)

And why when only medals go to the front 3, would you as a team member obliterate yourself in an event you have no chance of winning yourself, and get no medal, when you have your own events in the upcoming week!

 

This comes back to the percentages thing.  Cycling road races are a bit of a lottery; compared to your average athletics event where there may be only a handful of realistic medal contenders, the result is open to a very complex set of possible circumstances, and very few of the 100+ riders would fancy their chances of repeating a victory if the race was run again. I don't know what incentives GB team members would get if they had contributed towards a team mate's gold but there's an obvious attraction to being part of a team with an odds-on chance of medalling compared to a very slim chance working as an individual. Besides, whatever effort they put themselves through yesterday, Wiggins and Froome will be well rested for the time trial on Wednesday.

If your at an Olympic standard, then i suspect that who puts the most pressure on the person going for gold, is them selves. There is definitely pressure from the media, but maybe they are just highlighting the best of British, since we tend to be a nation where coming first just isnt that common as it should be. If you compare other countries that put a lot more emphasis on sport, and therefore have more winners. Therefore coming first is almost expected from some nations.

I hope with the Olympics being in our country this time around, that it highlights the importance of sport into future generations lives, and then maybe the media wont put all their focus into one or two people, since there will be dozens of people who have a very likely chance of getting gold.

I do think that the media have a nasty habit of building people up, then knock them down a bit later. They hype up everyone who has the slightest chance of doing well, even if a medal is not realistically on the cards. Then Joe Public (like me) thinks that they are really  in with a chance, even when they are not. Of course, when someone does stand a chance, they are treated as if it is a dead cert - totally disregarding the fact that anything can go wrong on the day (or in the run-up to the event).

I don't follow cycling, so I didn't understand 1) why the GB team were sitting so far back from the leaders or 2) why they should have expected anyone else to help them. So thanks to PhilPub for that explanation. Cav was rather graceless when being interviewed afterwards. I understand that he must have been gutted, but it just came across as poor sportsmanship.

Interesting reading about team tactics in the road racing - can any one say then if it is all open for so many to win through their tactics then why did tha KAZ winner get silver last Olympics? Luck or just better than us?

I don't bother reading any newspapers as (IMHO) they are always so full of crap to make it a waste of time.

(Edited due to stupidity - beware, there may still be some left!)

I came in to watch the cycle road race at a late stage, and just wondered why if there was a group of 30 riders further up the road, why were the Brits in another group following. Lets face it, if you know that you're not going to get any help chasing down an escape group, then you don't allow an escape to form in the first place. Assuming 'they'll come back' is just arrogance

This comes back to the percentages thing.  Cycling road races are a bit of a lottery; compared to your average athletics event where there may be only a handful of realistic medal contenders, the result is open to a very complex set of possible circumstances, and very few of the 100+ riders would fancy their chances of repeating a victory if the race was run again.

 

Being such a massive lottery then, i don't see why Cav was so hyped up, with even he himself giving it a bit in the press.

Supposedly being the best sprinter is all very well and good, but surely is of litttle relevance when the race is a monster 155 odd mile distance? In running terms, I'd fancy myself beating a few of the guys at the front end of local half marathon races over 100-200metres, but the point is over a half marathon i wouldn't be anywhere near close to have the opportunity to...

Generally to be hyped up as a gold hope and come 29th is a real shocker. No wonder he was so gutted.

I saw him snap at some "stupid"  question about whether the Tour De France had wiped him out. Surely a fair question, and not in any way stupid at all.

Stevie G . wrote (see)

 

I saw him snap at some "stupid"  question about whether the Tour De France had wiped him out. Surely a fair question, and not in any way stupid at all.

To be fair, it's not the sort of question a 'cycling' journalist would have asked and for people who know the sport could be seen as stupid, I guess Cav was a little on edge and responded as such.

Cav was lucky he didn't have to listen to the race on the BBC, he'd have been a lot more frustrated 

RicF wrote (see)

I came in to watch the cycle road race at a late stage, and just wondered why if there was a group of 30 riders further up the road, why were the Brits in another group following. Lets face it, if you know that you're not going to get any help chasing down an escape group, then you don't allow an escape to form in the first place. Assuming 'they'll come back' is just arrogance

 

OK Ric - lets go for a bike ride. I'll bring say - 10 of my friends that are about your level. Thats 10 to 1.  The odds yesterday were what - 40 to 1 ?

Lets see if you can peg back my pals when they attack constantly.

Its a bit like looking after 40 kids really - if you havent the help - you'll end up losing a kid somewhere along the way. 

The idea that the GB team ''arrogantly'' sat back assuming the break would come back is laughable.  I was watching from near the top of Box Hill, and each of the nine times the peloton came by it was the GB riders at the front pushing the pace, usually Wiggins right at the front.  Some of the lesser riders were dropped, unable to even hang on to the group.  During the hilly circuits the gap to the first group was chipped away, but when the second break provided reinforcements the task became somewhat more difficult.  When Chris Froome finally called it a day he looked absolutely spent.

Stevie G . wrote (see)

 

Generally to be hyped up as a gold hope and come 29th is a real shocker.

 

It was an all-or-nothing tactic.  You either manage to control any break-aways or you don't.  Once it was clear that Cav wasn't going to get the chance, final position is irrelevant.  It's not like it was a time trial.  Not surprised he was gutted, but I agree he can be a bit stroppy when it doesn't work out for him.

The interview with Dave Brailsford on the TV today was really interesting. At the top of Box for the last time they were just about on schedule to do what was needed. They had a tactic and they executed it. That they gambled & lost is surely better than never having been in with a shout.

I can't say I follow cycling closely, but I spent 2 consecutive summers redundant and so got into the Tour de France (yes, I do hold my breath until july is over ). It seemed to me that very few stages (unless positively mountanous) actually end in a sucessful breakaway winning - almost always the group chase them down and catch them.