BikeHugger has a post on an unfortunate crash involving a rogue bike rider at the Redmond Derby Days criterium last weekend. The comments queue sheds a bit of light, particularly the posts by an injured rider, but this thing needs to be sorted out. (Another blog post calls the rider a kid who “just wanted to have fun.”)
First off, I’d suggest a shift in nomenclature. This guy is not a mountain biker, he’s a bike rider who either doesn’t know what he’s doing or is conducting some kind of joke.
What he is riding is not a mountain bike, either. It’s a shitbike. It says Huffy on the head tube and even if that is not authentic (a joke), its components are from the 1980s. I’m not exaggerating. Thumb shifters haven’t been around for two decades. I cannot identify the caliper brakeset but it looks pretty antediluvian too. The stem even looks to have a 1-inch, threaded headset. Sheesh…when did those things exit the biking landscape? This thing is a mountain bike the way a tape deck is an iPod.
I’m a former roadie and current mountain biker and am well aware of misconceptions on both sides of the fence. To get a factual airing of the incident, it will help to avoid snap terminology.
Someone needs to track down the rider in question and find out what he was up to. And then ask race organizers how it was allowed to happen.
We’ll try to keep you posted on further details…
I’ve been following this on BikeHugger for the past couple of days. Very sad. It looks like Chris is home from the hospital. I wish him a speedy recovery.
It will be interesting to see if/how rules & procedures are changed for future races.
So, you’re saying my 1984 Stumpjumper 650b conversion isn’t a mountain bike because it has a 1″ threaded headset?
I agree with you that the bso the guy was riding is not a mountain bike, but not for the reasons you state. It wasn’t a mountain bike even when it’s components were current issue.
I wasn’t there, but I get the gist. I’ve seen this scenario set up dozens of times. The kind of crap bike the guy was riding is mostly irrelevant.
I’ve never been involved in or seen a crash that wouldn’t have been avoided by one rider (bike) or another not being present.
It happens here in Oregon, too. I’ve made a concious effort to avoid certain types of races because of organizers and riders behaving in a cavalier manner. Bike racing is dangerous and it makes sense to treat it that way – we don’t. Until the participants demand smarter risk management (including exculsion of dangerous riders), there won’t be any.
http://meettheroad.wordpress.com/2009/05/26/racing-and-safety/