How many cars do you need for a bike race?

Club ride this morning up to Glen Trool to see the Girvan Race come
through. Good cake at the Glen Trool visitor centre, yum. *Bloody* cold
in the wind so rather than hang about at Glen Trool we cycled on along
the route of the race down the A714 towards Newton Stewart. A motorcycle
outrider came past, waving us off the road. Then a car with
loudspeakers, giving us a race bulletin, then ten minutes of nothing,
then a local bus, then another motorcycle, and another, and half a dozen
more, and the judge's car, another long gap, some more motor bikes, then
a group of about seven more official cars, then some more motor bikes,
another commentary car, a couple more official cars, a police car with
blue flashers, a car with orange flashers, then the peloton; then,
immediately behind the peloton, a confused mess of impatient motor
traffic clearly nothing whatever to do with the race, with amongst it a
rider swearing loudly and angrily as he tried to get back in touch; then
team cars, and more riders, and more team cars.

The road cleared; there was silence. After another five minutes or so of
shivering we got back on our bikes and rode on towards Newton Stewart,
but we'd only got a few hundred yards when there was a shout of
'riders!' from behind and we got off the road to let the next group
through, a dozen or so riding fast and sharing the work well but with
enough spare energy to shout a friendly appreciation of our clapping.
There were three of these little grupettos in the next ten minutes, and
then nothing for about five miles, and then a little group of three
struggling desperately in front of the broom wagon.

So.... what?

It seemed that there must have been one official motor vehicle for every
two riders in the race - an extraordinary number of official motor
vehicles. And yet, even so, they were completely unable to keep
undisciplined motor vehicles safely away from the back of the peloton,
and there seemed no real attempt to provide safety cover for the chasing
groups. Clearly the climb up over the border from Ayshire had split the
bunch, which, considering they had a lot more climbing to do today, is
tough for the back markers. But frankly once you'd been dropped by the
peloton the sheer traffic chaos meant that your chances of getting back
in touch would have been small. Even in the quieter parts of remote
rural Scotland, it seems that British drivers are too ill-mannered and
ill-disciplined to make road racing at all easy to stage.

Oh, and if you're going to cycle to see a bike race in Scotland in April,
take warm clothes. In winter-weight cycling gear, it was perishing!

--
(Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/
Wannabe a Web designer?
URL:http://userfriendly.org/cartoons/archives/97dec/19971206.html

A minimum of two per bike rider.

Alan

Simon Brooke wrote:

But frankly once you'd been dropped by the
peloton the sheer traffic chaos meant that your chances of getting back
in touch would have been small. Even in the quieter parts of remote
rural Scotland, it seems that British drivers are too ill-mannered and
ill-disciplined to make road racing at all easy to stage.

From time to time we get cross-posts from petrol head groups that
reinforce that impression.

--
Dave...