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The Explainer - Of rules and regulations
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Dear Explainer,
A few years ago, the UCI banned a time trial position which was dubbed the "Praying Landis," named after its originator. It seems to me that Levi Leipheimer's current position on his time trial bike is very similar to that used by Floyd Landis. What am I missing?
Joseph Welsh
Banner Elk, North Carolina
Dear Joseph,
The UCI’s love/hate relationship with aero’ positions in time trials has had me scratching my head for more than 20 years. After permitting the use of handlebar extensions and their variants back in the late 1980s, the UCI has struggled with the question of how to regulate rider positions ever since.
While clearly not a question of extensions, the UCI’s real issue with handlebars and positions probably began with Graeme Obree’s homemade pursuit bike, “Old Faithful.” You might recall that when Obree first set the world hour record in 1993 — and again in 1994 — the powers that be at the UCI went ballistic and banned the bike and the crunched-up-but-aero position on the grounds that it was unsafe.
Innovative fellow that he is, Obree went back to the rule book and figured out that a new position, fully extending his arms, would comply with UCI dictates and promptly won the world pursuit title in 1995. The resulting “Superman” position survived for a bit more than a year and was used by Chris Boardman in one of his own successful hour record attempts.
Well, whether it was safety or just the fact that Obree seemed to get under the UCI’s craw, the regulatory body issued something known as the “Lugano Charter.” The charter declared that the UCI was “aware of the potential dangers and problems posed by a loss of control over the technical aspects of cycling” and the men in the gray jackets turned to a fellow named Jean Wauthier for guidance.
Wauthier, an expert in “industrial ergonomics,” produced a set of universally applied rules, limiting “the distance between the vertical line passing through the bottom bracket axle and the extremity of the handlebar” to 75cm. It was a weird rule in that it applied the same to a small rider like Leipheimer and to a taller rider, like Magnus Bäckstedt. You can imagine the resulting differences. It seemed an odd set of rules to emerge from the brain of an ergonomics “expert,” but I digress.
Creative types began playing in wind tunnels and, with an eye to the rule book, came up with ways that produced aero positions, but stayed within the parameters.
Landis came up with the the “Praying Landis,” a position that was quite aero’ but prompted the UCI to issue a “clarification” that effectively banned it. The clarification sought to avoid the possibility “that the elbows (or forearms) would give the rider an extra point of support, which is not permitted.”
As you can see from the accompanying photos, Landis’s position is considerably more radical than that now used by Leipheimer, who as recently as 2007 used something much closer to the old “Praying Landis.”
Earlier this year, the UCI issued another edict … err… clarification, noting that riders and teams are again pushing the envelope as to the way they interpret the rules and greater enforcement may result in riders having to adopt further revisions to their positions.
Charles
Dear Explainer,
I am sure you're going to be inundated with mails on the UCI's sunglasses ban but I thought I'd ask the question anyway. Why has this ban gone ahead? Who does it benefit? Judging by what I have read it seems to be good news for photojournalists and few else. If this is going to cause loss of jobs, loss of funding in cycling and annoy the athletes themselves, why do it? I am at a loss. Is this just my compatriot (Pat McQuaid) trying to flex his muscles or prove a point? Surely there must be some subtext that I'm missing.
Yours in perplexity,
Ronan O'Connor
Dear Ronan,
Shocked, too, I immediately asked the first question any responsible cycling journalist needs to consider when reviewing any new development in the sport, namely, "How will this affect Lance?" I then turned to the “legislative history” of the rule. Aside from the mentioned opposition by photographers like Graham Watson, I could find nothing. Searching through piles of rule books, technical manuals, UCI commission minutes and other documents, I finally found the answer by looking at the calendar.
Charles
