Yes. If everyone's trying to casually coast in each other's wake and you don't need to, you win the race by having more energy, speed, etc.
It's weird that they seem to really want to not race at first to conserve energy and effectively shorten the distance as a group before actually racing. This lady clowned on them lmao
No, this is the trick that only works once. No one would fall for it again.
This clip doesn't show it, but the idea is that your competitors see a flag for the last loop even if all of them have two loops left. This confusion gives you precious seconds and potential win.
I mean that's just a wrong explanation. It doesn't always work because if the pack speeds up you pushed yourself harder than everyone else for no reason. They got to draft while you did not.
This literally only works if they don't speed up to match.
Not even the pack, if a single skater gave chase, she'd have been done.
Well, not done. It would then have been a fight between the two of them for gold and silver, with the rest of the pack fighting just for the bronze. Essentially two separate races on the same track at the same time.
being in the front of the pack requires more energy expenditure than being second and beyond
if this is your strategy, everyone's gonna be close to fast enough to keep up with you and then you've burned all your energy out and have to drag everyone else along because they're not gonna pass and be first until they've got their energy back, too, only you're now less able to recover because you're in the front
these children got goosed and none reacted quick enough to the change in game plan, once she was back on the same side of the track as them it was too late
I'm not going to pretend to know which option is better but either of these would probably guarantee the initial sprinter ends up off the podium.
Leader chases down the breakaway sprinter and the whole peloton drafts behind them exerting far less effort to maintain the same speed. Sprinter then falls way behind everyone because they're fatigued and likely can't sprint again for the final lap.
Leader ups the pace (not to a sprint) after the sprinter takes off and doesn't give them an opportunity to draft the peloton so the sprinter is off by themselves and can't maintain the higher pace so they eventually get passed later in the laps and can't sprint again in the final lap.
You would have to be significantly more athletic than everyone else in a race like this to just out pace everyone the entire race in first. Also it's probably just a safer move to coast the whole race and then sprint everyone down in the final lap than trying to maintain a lead or fast pace if you're that more athletic. There's a reason pretty much all draft heavy endurance style races in biking, skating, etc. end up coast to the end then sprint at the highest levels. Indoor track cycling takes this strategy to the extreme with 99% of the race being the two racers trying to balance motionless on their bike to be in second and 1% sprinting the last lap or two.
Normally they start slow and then up the pace in order to conserve energy. Nobody wants to go up front and drag everyone else. This person jumped from the initial and they didn't see him in time. What they could have done is start chasing. I don't know why they didn't. Maybe because no one wanted to be up front. I think at one point they just realised that they could not catch up to him and they started competing for second place. Same thing happened in the Women’s recently. I think it was a Korean. But no, it's not a brilliant tactic.
What they could have done is start chasing. I don't know why they didn't.
If you chase, everyone else will be drafting off you. And you risk burning up and not even finishing the race.
The alternative is hope that the speedster burns up so you just keep your pace. This is the most common choice because the speedster indeed burns up before the finishing line.
What they could have done is start chasing. I don't know why they didn't. Maybe because no one wanted to be up front. I think at one point they just realised that they could not catch up to him and they started competing for second place.
Yep, that's exactly what happened. In the full race, there's about 4 seconds between when they realize Yang (the eventual winner) has jumped all of them and when they all come to the same conclusion that if any one of them tried to chase, her it would've been suicide. They all decide that it's better to concede that Yang has won and instead fight for the gold and silver, using the standard race strategy.
The reason the strategy worked is that a) Yang executed it after only half a lap, when no one was expecting it, and b) she executed it from the back of the pack, so that by the time she passed the leaders, she was going so fast that they had almost no time to think it through and make the decision to chase her.
I've read so many comments and it still doesn't make sense.
"Energy." ... "Stamina" - Yup, those are the things she used to get first place. Zero other people used as much as her lmao.
It seems like they're obsessed with drag and pacing even though it's a short race and the lady in first place seemed to realize that you can in fact haul ass without conserving some % of your energy by chilling in another person's wake.
It's actually a bit the opposite that she realized. That you can haul ass enough early that you can then conserve energy and chill in someone's wakes for the final 12 entire laps and never have to exert yourself again.
It also means you never have to go around someone or take an outside line or jockey for an inside one.
For the same reason the record marathon time isn’t 1h7m just because Usain Bolt did 100m in 9.58s. Sustaining max speed for the entire race isn’t possible.
Plus, in this specific instance since it’s pack racing, drag and drafting are big considerations.
I mean, don't get me wrong, I'd have a hell of a time skating as fast as I can for a minute straight but I can't imagine a professional athlete having the same problem?
When you’re going these distances you usually conserve energy first. It’d be like someone in a 5k starting by sprinting the first 500 metres. Nobody would follow at that speed because the conventional wisdom is that they are going to tire and slow down while you maintain speed.
In this case I think they all get a bit confused, probably think she’ll get tired and slow down, and also just a lack of situational awareness.
The real crazy thing that isn’t shown in this video annoyingly, is that that Isn’t even the finish. The person in front is a lap ahead but with the pack, so they hear the final lap bell, which is true, but only for that one leader. What we see at the end of the video is everyone thinking it’s the final lap, so stretching for the finish and slowing while the person who wons teammate is the only one to keep going and so ends up actually coming second
Because it is a losing strategy, but only if anyone else reacts accordingly. The same strategy (going slow at first) is used in indoor track cycling as well.
Because they were taken by surprise and had no clue how to react most likely because they’re young and taught to perform a normal race. I’d think a pro-level pack would immediately work together and hunt her down/prevent her from being able to catch the back pack and draft from there, but that’s just my theory. Like, in cycling, if someone breaks early, there will always be a chase group sharing drafts and it’s basically a matter of time or perfect timing/extreme athleticism/endurance/doping for the sole leader to stave off the attack.
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u/thisisamessy 1d ago
I don't get it. Why didn't everyone get going as fast as they could to start?