Penalties at Kinetic Half

I'm not sure I follow your logic.

Just because athlete behavior hasn't changed (and this is a big assumption) it doesn't mean that existing behavior did not involve drafting that was simply not called.  In the 3 years I've been racing, I've seen TONS of drafting...most of which goes unpenalized.  I think it's rather refreshing to see the penalties called more often, and unless you have a specific instance to reference, I'm not sure why you assume that the rise in penalties is due to "overzealous" officiating or blown calls.

Over the past couple of years, there has been more of an emphasis to call traveling in the NBA.  The increase in calls doesn't mean that officials are being overzealous and blowing calls...it's simply that their is stricter enforcement on players who were breaking the rules and getting away with it before.

Maybe your argument has some merits...but the logic you have provided to support that argument is a head scratcher to me.

STOP Cheating! and there will be fewer penalties. Not complicated.

Eh, I don't really have a horse in this race but I saw plenty of people out there drafting. This isn't to say that any one person was or was not cheating or that this penalty or that penalty was justified, but the raw numbers don't surprise me or seem out of line. 

X2.  Call it every time.

X3 

Mark

Huh? Can you clarify this statement? Too easy to read it like you are saying you draft every race so it should be okay.  That can't be right.

I completely agree with issuing penalties for intentional drafting to cheat. My problem with some races though is that often times it's almost impossible not to draft. The last race I did had 1200 competitors. For those who rode in the 21ish+ mph range drafting would most likely have been intentional cheating for them as there wasn't a ton of racers maintaining those speeds. However, for those of us in the 16-20 mph range, it was the majority of the racers. We had a very small lane to ride in and it seemed like we were packed in worse than sardines. Several times  I had to slow down to almost snail pace not to draft and not to block. It was extremely frustrating. I don't believe in cheating at all but when you ride the speed that the majority of riders are at, it's not so cut and dry.

Now I did my absolute best not to draft , but I'm sure there were times when I wasn't officially three bikes back and could have been given a penalty, along with about 600 others in the race. I would have been peeved if I had because it certainly wasn't ever intentional. So I'm glad that the officials seemed to use some common sense discretion and not issue a drafting penalty every single time they could have.

If RD's are getting increasing complaints about drafting penalties not being issued, they of course should instruct officials to pay attention and get stricter, but they also really need to look at their course, size of riding lane and number of participants. I know it's about them making money but if they are allowing so many participants that there isn't enough riding room, that may be a problem as well.

Shelly

The one penalty I got was at St. Anthonys. I was passing a line of folks that were all bunched up and everyone was drafting due to number of athletes on the course at the same time.  I was trying to follow the rules and I was the one penalized.

I do agree with above poster that number of athletes in the race and the spacing of waves can make drafting inevitable.

The half I did earlier this year was point to point on open roads and drafting was abundant and not called at all that I know of.  A fellow racer told me she called about 6 guys out on it and their response was "don't worry you aren't in our age group" so she chicked all of them...

Kinetic half is listed as a 2 loop bike course with a wave start and limited to 700 participants, not sure how crowded this would make it but I don't think it would be an issue honestly.  I agree some races it is almost inevitable or unavoidable but the flagrant drafting that I've seen can be a turn off for an event.

I raced the Kinetic as well this year. When looking at the results, I did notice more penalties than usual.

The course was crowded in places. I did witness a fair amount of intential drafting. At one point I thought I got a penalty, as I was dropping back when the ref came by. The refs seemed to be very active all day.

My take on drafting penalties is that half are deserved, the other half are not, and 90% of the drafting goes unnoticed. Not a perfect system.

THIS.

And its the reason I'm choosing not to do a certain race this year. Its frustrating to pass people early in the bike course only to have them pass you later on riding in an echelon.