Category VII Cycling

Thought I should write something about Michael Rogers winning the World Time Trial Championship for the third time, but in all honesty, I hate time trials.

That’s not entirely true. There is the drama, mystique, romanticism, what have you, in a “race of truth” in the midst of a longer stage race. For the majority of that race, you’re “protected” by the peloton, albeit also being tested over varying terrain. But the race against the clock is just another obstacle in the ultimate sort out in the peloton.

But for riders to come together on some random day just for a free standing time trial leaves me completely cold. Not that I can’t admire their abilities or their performances, but a time trial on its own merits also seems to go against my own sense of racing – that is that the “protection” of the peloton in the stage races (or one-days) is in reality where the tactics of racing play out. And the tactics are what makes racing exciting. That and the crashes.

A common complaint heard by the losers at the one day race is “well, the strongest man didn’t win today.” (Luckily, the winner of Liege-Bastogne-Liege is usually excepted from this common complaint, as the consensus view is the winner is always the strongest rider.) My own response, though, would be so freaking what? Racing isn’t about determining who is the strongest, but who is the best. And often the difference between the strongest and the best is brains and heart. Not legs.

A free-standing time trial takes these elements out. Or at least greatly reduces them. And though Maitre Jacques may be rolling in his grave, to me at least it does not represent the essence of what I’d call racing.

And let us not forget that time trialing is all too often the gateway vice to triathalons.