Monday’s Mailbag: The changing Tour and accident investigations

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Dropping time bonuses may reduce Tour’s drama
Editor:
While you have to applaud Tour de France organizers for seeking more pure racing by eliminating time bonuses, the consequence may be less drama. This removes the incentive for top contenders to sprint at the finish.

Why waste the effort when the payoff isn’t 20 seconds but maybe one second? Unless the leader is strong enough to crush a challenger on the approach, he need only finish on his challenger’s wheel, knowing his time gap wouldn’t change significantly by sprinting.

Eliminating the prologue, however, is necessary. Although 200-odd riders could carry the same time into the first time trial, that longer fourth stage will separate the men from the boys more than the fractions of a second that a prologue would.

Jeff Domingues
Centennial, Colorado

Tour keeps shedding most entertaining aspects
Editor:
“Vive le Tour” is an exultation I no longer proclaim with the same gusto, not because of constant doping scandals, but because organizers continue to remove the race’s most entertaining aspects.

First they punished the great time-trialing teams by limiting the amount of time they could gain in the TTT, my favorite stage. Then they removed the TTT entirely. Now Christian Prudhomme removes the prologue and time bonuses.

The prologue has always been a fantastic kickoff to the race, awarding the first yellow jersey for an individual effort. It also creates quite a lot of excitement in the first week of flat stages to watch the maillot jaune try to defend against the great sprinters. Have we already forgotten Fabian Cancellara’s amazing defense of the jersey last year?

As for time bonuses, they have led to fantastic finishes, something we may see less frequently without the hope of shaving a few precious seconds off one’s time.

In the aftermath of another great race tarnished by scandals, don’t ruin it further by the elimination of aspects which make the race so enjoyable to watch.

Ben Scherer
Madison, Wisconsin

Ben, VeloNews editorial director John Wilcockson tells us that the 2008 Tour couldn’t have a prologue because a region (Brittany) paid for the grand départ, so all three parts of the region had to have an equal share in the opening stages — hence three road stages. To squeeze in an early individual time trial, it had to be placed in the first week. All this left no room for a TTT, which has to happen early on when the teams are at full strength. But take heart: “The consensus in Paris was that the TTT wll be back next year,” says Wilcockson. “In modern times the the TTT was absent until 1976, it was absent four years from 1996 to 1999, and it has now been absent for three years, 2006 to 2008.” — Editor

Not guaranteeing Tour starts could hurt sponsorship
Editor:
I give all the credit in the world to Christian Prudhomme for declining to guarantee Tour de France spots for ProTour teams in an effort to ensure that the 2008 Tour is drug-free. However, this may cause problems with sponsorships.

We have seen and will continue to see sponsors leaving the sport (e.g., Discovery Channel, Unibet,.com Cofidis, Gerolsteiner) and teams closing up shops and riders left without contracts. Not guaranteeing spots in the Tour might be great in the fight against doping but will have a negative impact on sponsors being attracted to the sport. European companies that might want to sponsor a team or be a partial sponsor might be turned off because they won’t have that guaranteed TV time during the Tour de France.

I understand that there is a doping problem. I understand that there is a power struggle between ASO and the UCI. But there has to be a solution for all the problems that won’t completely alienate the sponsors. They are the lifeblood of this professional sport.

Jason Mukavetz
Phoenix, Arizona

Accident inquiries require time, patience
Editor:
Bob’s Mionske’s October 25 column begins by listing a long string of tragic deaths of cyclists. My sympathy goes out to the friends and families of all of those killed.

All of these cyclists were killed between September 12 and October 22, 2007, and the article was published on October 25. In many cases, he writes that no charges have been filed in association with the deaths. I feel this is misleading and tends to inflame cyclists into thinking that they are treated as disposable. In reality, there may be detectives furiously working to put together cases in some of these deaths.

As somebody who has investigated many traffic fatalities I can tell you that many investigations are very time-consuming, requiring a lengthy and rigorous process to build up enough evidence so that a case can be filed. In cases that are not clear cut, this process can take weeks or even months. In some unfortunate instances, there is not enough evidence to file charges even when we believe we know what happened. Also, in California a misdemeanor case has a one-year filing window; felony cases have various multiple-year or unlimited filing windows.

Rushing a case can lead to sloppy investigations and either dismissals, mistrials, or acquittals of parties who might otherwise have been found guilty. A thorough investigation can lead to the filing of a strong case and a guilty plea because the defendant knows that he or she will lose at trial.

Again, I have the utmost sympathy for those killed but I think it would be better not to inflame issues that don’t need to be inflamed. I appreciate the service Bob provides in his columns and look forward to reading many more.

Matt Gunnell
Glendale, California

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