Great bike handling skills, fast reaction times and a large dose of bravery are just some of the skills a professional cyclist needs to possess to survive in the peloton.
An Post’s San Bennett shows what it takes to chase back onto the peloton in this video, jumping from one team car to another, using their slipstream to tow himself along. Chasing back on like this is a regular occurence for many riders, either from suffering a puncture or mechanical requiring assistance from the team car. The peloton doesn't stop and wait for anyone, so it's a case of chasing back on.
On the packed roads of Devon on stage 6 of the race, there’s little space for the large entourage of motor vehicles and huge crowd bulging on the pavements, so when the medical vehicle slows dramatically on a tight bend, Bennett calls on all his skills to avoid landing in the back seat of the car.
Sam Bennet won stage 5 of the Tour of Britain, he finished 43rd overall and 4th in the points classification.
17 thoughts on “Video: Supreme handling skills, fitness… and bravery. Sam Bennett shows all three in ToB”
Gasps of the crowd as he
Gasps of the crowd as he slides. Gasps of me. Cooooool.
Quality.
Quality.
My immediate reaction was:
My immediate reaction was: ‘Oh, nice!’
I stand by my reaction!
hummm I could see that coming
hummm I could see that coming a mile off, well held but could have maybe snuck up the inside and not had to brake?
titusrider wrote:hummm I
There was no room for him up the inside and it was a blind corner (he couldn’t see round it for the crowd).
brilliant – team mates would
brilliant – team mates would only have slowed down his return to the peloton!
In fact, to spice things up a bit, why don’t they start races with the team cars up the road and have the first intermediate sprint after 10K.
On most mornings you see this
On most mornings you see this kind of stuff being undertaken by commuters!!!
Pro handling skills ???!!!
Perhaps a series of short
Perhaps a series of short videos on the dodging of traffic arterial routes of Manchester? … or monkey tennis
That’s not good handling,
That’s not good handling, that’s locking the back wheel up in panic and nearly stacking it.
I’ve done that and I’m crap!
Run an article on Vincenzo Nibali descending if you want to highlight handing skills. Or Cancellara (apart from the olympics last year!)
therealsmallboy wrote:That’s
At 40+ mph? On a bend? I think he held it brilliantly.
garysan wrote:therealsmallboy
At 40+ mph? On a bend? I think he held it brilliantly.— therealsmallboy
garysan – you are clearly very new to cycling and don’t know that the pros are merely doing adverts on behalf of all the actual good riders who are doing recovery days on the internet.
At least if he hadn’t avoided
At least if he hadn’t avoided it it was the doctors car
In other circumstances ie
In other circumstances ie commuting. It would be looked on as riding without due care and attention.
Love all the ‘experienced’
Love all the ‘experienced’ advice from the Road.CC Snug bar.
If that had been me, I would
If that had been me, I would have just bunny hopped the car, and kept going at 60mph. Thats how I roll.
he’s got to get back to the
he’s got to get back to the peloton, so that’s the kind of handling they’re paid for …..
Yeh, of course we all do it
Yeh, of course we all do it on the commute on the way to work… but about 15kph slower.
For the newer people here, also see Cancellara’s descent http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxXqQqAc2pA from a few years back. As pointed out, other pros may descend a little bit faster but not always caught so well on camera.