this post was submitted on 15 May 2026
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The race organizers really fucked that one up. But women catching the back of the men’s peloton is a “problem” that happens from time to time, and it can be hard to tell when it’s incidental or intentional strategy. It has been a tactic for some women to push extra hard at the start to try and catch the men’s field to draft behind them until the finish, which is an unfair advantage. Which is explicitly illegal in most racing series.
Though that gets complicated when it’s a woman catching a large men’s peloton that the female rider can’t ride alongside, and would have to just ride awkwardly far behind the pack to avoid running afoul of the rules.
I don’t know the details of this race in particular, but it seems the organizers halted the race to avoid this once they realized they really should have started the women’s race later. Was she intentionally trying to catch the men’s group? Maybe. Starting a breakaway from 2km in is almost certainly unsustainable, so if she wasn’t planning on catching the men’s field, it was either gross overconfidence or terrible strategy. She was very likely going to get caught by the women’s peloton regardless, and passed since they’ll be on fresher legs when they do catch her.
Edit: I should add that stopping the race for a few minutes with a neutralized restart is not entirely uncommon in pro cycling. For example, if part of the field has to stop and wait for a passing train, they’ll stop the front of the race as well, and restart them with the approximate gaps between groups they had before the train.
This article is clickbaity, making the situation sound like misogyny to the uninformed, but I wasn’t aware of the profound effect of slipstreaming in cycling, so TIL.
Misandrist society as always
Hi nimrod and welcome to WomensStuff! We're a trans inclusive women only forum and ask cis men don't comment. Please check out the rules ❤️
While I don’t agree with nimrod, I do think the entire premise that cis men aren’t allowed to comment is misandrist.
To illustrate this, let’s change the groups a bit:
Or…
Or…
Etc.
It will always be discriminatory and, depending on what group you’re excluding either sexist, racist, misogynist, misandrist, transphobic, etc. to exclude certain groups based on what they were born as. Excluding men isn’t any better than excluding trans people, especially if you claim to be inclusive.
So don’t just claim to be inclusive, be inclusive, and don’t ban other human beings from posting. I don’t care whether you’re a man, woman, trans person, or about the colour of your skin. You’re a human being.
So why can’t I post in a community simply because I was born a certain way?
Let me flip that around.
Why do men (and let's be honest here, almost always specifically white men) simply have to comment where:
Doesn't that just make you cringe a little, being so fucking whiny and so fucking self-centred that you can't stand a single fucking space that doesn't want you?
Note: these questions are for you to ponder, not reply, because:
Let me rephrase that:
Note: I simply replaced your misandrist remarks with racist remarks, these are not my opinion.
Why would you treat one group of humans differently than others? Why would you be racist, or misogynist or misandrist? Absolutely appalling behaviour.
Even now your comment is absolutely filled with derogatory remarks towards me and other men. I don’t think this is the case you want to be making if you’re trying to convince me this is not all just misandry.
And don’t flatter yourself. I have no interest in a conversation with a racist, misandrist or any other kind of -ist. I’m simply posting this to show others how horrible you treat other human beings.
Thanks for your thoughts! We are women only because we need a safe space. Due to you repeatedly breaking the rules we've banned you, but please enjoy your weekend ❤️
I’m sorry but that is just not okay.
Imagine
Why can I be discriminated against because of what other men have done?
Why is it okay to do this to a man? You wouldn’t do this to any other group. What makes you think any of this is alright?
Wow, thanks for the insight! In this clickbait world, it's nice to get other perspectives.
Taken from common wisdom, but doesn't mean it's always true. Maddy's recent record setting is a prime example:
https://www.cyclingnews.com/pro-cycling/15-000-calories-burned-three-toilet-stops-one-faint-maddy-nutt-breaks-down-her-remarkable-debut-victory-at-traka-560/
Yeah it’s a little different for ultras. Drafting isn’t allowed, so they play out very differently from road races, they tend to spread out. But absolutely incredible result from Maddy!
Good point on the draft requirements, I'm more commonly watching women's gravel or MTB. So people like Maddy and Syd who commonly push past large contingents of the men's groups.
I'm fairly sure in this race in particular the men were going slow enough for me to keep up, so yeah, they shouldn't have held her back as many other women would've eventually done so too.
They paused the entire women's race, so it wasn't like it was just her who got "punished". They probably should have noticed the gap was decreasing way sooner and intervened before it got so bad that a headline like this can come out.
Without all the details this seems really bad. Even with more details than the headline it seems awful that she had to stop and then ended up losing the race by a lot. It almost seems like she stopped while the race continued behind her. But with all the details, it seems like she may have lost the race due to her strategy. She was pushing way too hard early on and the women who paced themselves better ended up passing her later in the race.