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Voigt was met with more applause on the podium than the stage winner or the race leader. Photo by Casey B. Gibson.

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colorado (VN) — In the end, it really didn’t matter if he’d won or lost.

Jens Voigt, the 42-year-old German whose career has spanned two decades, was off the front, alone, battling against the wind, the peloton, and his own inner demons, one last time.

In his final race, in what has been a season-long farewell tour, the fan favorite from Trek Factory Racing was doing what he’s done best since the Clinton administration — suffering, tempting fate, attempting to defy the odds.

After making it into the day’s 12-rider breakaway, Voigt attacked with 40km remaining on stage 4 of the USA Pro Challenge in Colorado Springs Thursday, on the third of four 25km circuits that included a steep climb leading into the red-rock wonderland of the Garden of the Gods, followed by as a short kicker 2km from the finish line.

Voigt’s advantage was never more than 90 seconds over his former breakaway companions, but topped out at a good three minutes back to the main peloton, which consisted of an odd mix of motivated sprint teams and GC contenders.

Teams that missed the move, such as Optum-Kelly Benefit Strategies and Garmin-Sharp, chased early, while teams with top sprinters, such as SmartStop, Hincapie Sportswear, and Cannondale, drove the effort late, despite the efforts of Voigt’s Trek teammates to slow the chase at the front.

On a day that wasn’t expected to impact the general classification, there was little question as to what the thousands of fans along the course hoped to see. Signs proclaiming Voigt’s catchphrase, “Shut Up Legs!” were abundant. T-shirts reading “Jens! Jens! Jens!” lined the finishing straight. Voigt had won a race at least once in every one of his 16 years as a pro, and had been winless, up to this point, in 2014. Twitter was ablaze with support for the old man who could, the hard-working father of six; there was a nearly universal desire to see the cagey, charismatic Voigt go out on top.

Within the final 10 kilometers, it was anyone’s guess as to whether the veteran breakaway specialist would hold off the hard-charging pack. The gap had fallen to one minute, and it was coming down quickly.

With 5km to go, the gap was 35 seconds. With 2km to go, and one short, steep climb remaining, the gap was under 20 seconds. Would he hold it, and win one last time? Or would he be absorbed by an unsentimental peloton? And in the end, did it matter?

Voigt’s performance, a month out from his 43rd birthday, had already been a victory of sorts. The oldest rider in the pro peloton had, once again, put on a show. He’d brought the drama. He’d given it everything, against all odds, alone, again. He’d accomplished what he’d set out to, what he’d said was his main objective coming into the race, when he hoped only to have the opportunity to “try one of my stupid breakaways one last time.”

In the end, Voigt was caught inside the final kilometer, steamrolled by hungry, younger bike racers looking to create their own legacies. Cannondale’s Elia Viviani won the stage ahead of Martin Kohler (BMC Racing). Voigt finished 67th, 52 seconds down, completely spent.

Yet during the podium celebration, where Voigt was awarded as the stage’s most aggressive rider, the cheers were, by far, the loudest of the day.

With a hard mountain stage looming on Friday (Voigt said he’d likely hide in the peloton and recover), an uphill time trial on Saturday, and a likely field sprint on Sunday, Voigt had taken his final opportunity, and he’d given his all. And in that sense, he’d gone out on top.

After the stage, VeloNews asked Voigt if — even though he hadn’t taken the stage win — he had been able to soak up the experience of one final, odds-defying breakaway, and if that wasn’t a victory in itself.

Voigt’s response was, like the man himself — energetic, entertaining, and filled with emotion.

“Despite the fact that I was hurting, yes, I was also soaking it up,” he said. “I saw all the signs on the roads — ‘Shut up legs,’ and ‘Farewell, Jens.’ I could hear the people on the road, the fans. And it felt like it was my home crowd. I wanted it like that, one more time in the last week of my career. I felt obliged to show it one more time, to try to win in the fashion they would expect.

‘Maybe, in a bizarre way, it was fitting it ended like this,” he continued. “This is the story of my life — from 20, 30, even 40 breakaways, maybe one works. This was the typical breakaway, you give it all, and you get caught. It was a perfect example of my career — you put it all on the line, you’re taking risks in looking stupid.

“I like today. It was a good day, and I’m really happy that I had it. To be honest, I was a little emotional on the podium. I think I had maybe more applause than the yellow jersey, and I was the closest to crying since the birth of my first child, 19 years ago. I was really close to having tears in my eyes. It was a beautiful and emotional moment for me, and I am happy to one more time be on the podium, with these other amazing riders. I’m happy. I feel like I accomplished something, in my last race. It was a success. I was operational today. I was a force to reckon with. I made it hard for those guys to chase me down, and they only caught me with 800 meters to go.”

The post Voigt’s final hurrah: Not on top, but does it really matter? appeared first on VeloNews.com.

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Original source Several readers sent word of research into the cost of internet content without ads. They looked at the amount of money spent on internet advertising last year in the U.K., and compared it to the number of U.K. internet users. On average, each user would have to pay about £140 ($230) to make up for the lost revenue of an ad-free internet. In a survey, 98% of consumers said they wouldn’t be willing to pay that much for the ability to browse without advertisements. However, while most consumers regard ads as a necessary trade-off to keep the internet free, they will go to great lengths to avoid advertising they do not wish to see. Of those surveyed, 63 per cent said they skip online video ads ‘as quickly as possible’ – a figure that rises to 75 per cent for 16-24 year olds. Over a quarter of all respondents said they mute their sound and one in five scroll away from the video. 16 per cent use ad blocking software and 16 per cent open a new browser window or tab.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Original source New submitter GammaKitsune writes: “The Player’s Handbook for the fifth edition of Dungeons and Dragons, formerly known as “D&D Next,” released today to major bookstores and online retailers across the U.S. The Player’s Handbook, which contains core rules for gameplay and character creation, is one of thee core rulebooks that developer Wizards of the Coast plans to release in 2014. The Monster Manual is scheduled to release in late September, and the Dungeon Master’s Guide will release in mid November. Also out today is the first of two adventure modules in which players team up to battle against the dragon goddess Tiamat. Fifth edition has a lot to prove following the highly-controversial fourth edition, the rise of competing roleplaying game Pathfinder, and two years of public playtesting. Initial reviews posted on Amazon appear overwhelmingly positive at the time of writing, but more skeptical gamers may wish to take a look at the free “Basic Rules” posted on the official D&D website. The basic rules contain all the bare essentials needed to create a character or run your own adventure, and will serve both as a free introduction for new players and as a holdover for long time players until the remaining two rulebooks are released.

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Original source An anonymous reader writes: The Electronic Frontier Foundation has updated its guide for protecting yourself and your cell phone at a protest. In addition to being extremely powerful tools (real-time communication to many watchers via social media, and video recording functionality), cell phones can also give authorities a lot of information about you if they confiscate it. The EFF is trying to encourage cell phone use and prepare people to use them. (The guide is based on U.S. laws, but much of the advice makes sense for other places as well.) Here are a few small snippets: “Start using encrypted communications channels. Text messages, as a rule, can be read and stored by your phone company or by surveillance equipment in the area. … If the police ask to see your phone, tell them you do not consent to the search of your device. Again, since the Supreme Court’s decision in Riley, there is little question that officers need a warrant to access the contents of your phone incident to arrest, though they may be able to seize the phone and get a warrant later. … If your phone or electronic device was seized, and is not promptly returned when you are released, you can file a motion with the court to have your property returned.”

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Are rim brakes’ days numbered? The industry agrees that it’s only a matter of time before discs become standard on road bikes. Photo: Brad Kaminski | VeloNews.com

(Editor’s Note: This article previously ran in the August issue of Velo magazine.)

It’s misting in Belfast; it’s wet everywhere, but not quite raining. Water oozes out of the air and condenses on Garmin-Sharp’s boxy mechanic truck, on the bikes leaned against it, on the tools, and on the broad shoulders and black and blue Park Tool apron of the team’s head mechanic, Geoff Brown. He is poking and prodding at one of the team’s Cervélo time trial bikes, bleeding a hydraulic rim brake.

His team is about to set off on three days of wet racing through Northern Ireland and Ireland, the first stages of the Giro d’Italia. The conditions are, and will be for much of the first week of the race, ideal for disc brakes: wet, cold, and hilly.

But Brown doesn’t want discs in the pro peloton, not now, and maybe not ever.

“I have nothing against the technology,” he said, squeezing hydraulic fluid into the bike’s brake levers, already very much at home with the bleed process that hydraulic road discs would bring with them. “I think the technology is absolutely, 100-percent correct. It works, it’s proven, it’s great. It’s just not an appropriate technology for this application, not for our kind of bicycle racing.”

There are more questions than answers in the road disc debate, with as many opinions as there are riders, mechanics, team owners, bike companies, and engineers. The technology sits in a woolly expanse between the absolute truth of its technological superiority and the absolute truth of its inadequacies and challenges. It is simultaneously one of the most exciting new technologies in road cycling and one of the most frightening, even dangerous.

Whether disc brakes belong in the pro peloton, well, that depends on who you ask.

More questions than answers

Brown’s opinion is common in the pro cycling world, his criticism aimed not at the technology itself, but at its application within pro road racing in particular. Many feel that discs simply don’t belong, and their arguments are many: They are too heavy, or not aerodynamic enough; they’ll slow down wheel changes and are unnecessarily dangerous in big pileups.

Few argue that rim brakes are superior, or even equal to, disc brakes in pure stopping performance — power, modulation, and consistency are all clear advantages of discs. But arguments based on the specific logistical and safety requirements of road racing then to hold water.

Safety is a genuine concern. Disc rotors are sharp, like spinning knives that have been heated in a 500-degree oven. They can easily slice flesh, and will burn on contact after a hard stop (“at least you’ll get cut and cauterized at the same time,” Brown joked).

Riders are understandably concerned, as it is their flesh that is on the line. For Garmin’s Nathan Haas, safety is the only factor that really matters. “Do you know how hot a disc brake gets under braking? If you crashed on one with your face, your face is going to melt,” he said. “Keep it out of the sport. It doesn’t belong. Just don’t do it.”

Disc brakes increase aerodynamic drag and add weight, somewhere between 100 and 300 grams, depending on the frame, wheel, and brake manufacturers in question. If the additional braking power and improved modulation are not truly needed — and many say they are not — then these drawbacks exist without a real upside.

Then there are the logistical concerns. An industry that has never been particularly good at setting standards, or sticking to them, would need to come together to decide on a few key points — things like rotor size, whether to use thru-axle or quick releases, even basics like hub width. Without such standards, neutral wheel service would be impossible.

Even with such standards, wheel changes will be slower. A few seconds can make or break a race, so both racers and mechanics are understandably concerned. New thru-axle designs, which lock in place with single motion, similar to a normal quick release, could help alleviate this problem but will never eliminate it entirely.

Discs would change road racing, of that there is no doubt. But plenty of other technologies have done the same in the past — aero bars, deep-section wheels, clipless pedals, indexed shifting. Change itself is need not be feared; change for the sake of change, on the other hand, is more suspect.

Amateur hour

The world’s best cyclists can’t always ride the world’s most technologically advanced bikes. What’s even stranger is that some don’t even want to.

Technology in sport tends to be led from the front. Traditionally, top riders act as guinea pigs for the rest of us, testing and proving equipment at the highest levels before it trickles down into the realm of the mortals. High-profile professionals are key to the marketing efforts of their equipment sponsors, helping to move new and innovative product.

Road discs, and the sport’s governing body, the UCI, have reversed the flow. The technology is trickling upwards, from the amateur realm, and from the dirt, to the upper echelons of road racing.

The opinions of professional racers are distinctly mixed, and without any clear demarcation. One might assume that younger riders, or those originally from mountain-bike racing, would be keener on the new technology. But there is no consistent distinction.

“I’d love to have road discs some day,” BMC Racing’s young climber Peter Stetina told Velo; his opinion was opposed to that of Garmin’s equally young Haas. Among the old guard, Fabian Cancellara (Trek Factory Racing) couldn’t care less about discs, while Tom Boonen (Omega Pharma-Quick Step), an avid motorsports fan, is in favor.

Even those professionals in favor — riders like Stetina and his BMC teammate Taylor Phinney — aren’t putting any real pressure on the powers that be to bring discs into racing. There is no organized push from riders to force the UCI into allowing disc brakes.

Despite a vocal opposition and somewhat tame advocates, the move to discs is coming. Why?

“The people actually buying bikes, they are the ones who are interested in discs,” said Trek’s road product manager, Michael Meyer, whose product line includes the Domane Disc 6.9, a disc-brake version of the bike on which Cancellara won the Tour of Flanders.

That interest, at least for now, is mostly in non-racing applications. “We don’t see a big demand for a race bike with disc brakes in the marketplace,” said Meyer. But that could change, particularly if the pros began using the new technology.

Consumer interest translates into brand interest. Brand interest equates to sponsor interest, particularly in this age of endemic team sponsors. Sponsor interest results in team adoption, however begrudging that adoption may be.

The opinions of the riders, mechanics, and the rest of a team’s staff have little to do with the decision. These teams exist to sell brands, and sell bikes, and if the industry believes that consumers want discs, that’s what they will be given, on a podium and wrapped in a yellow jersey.

Will it happen this year? Or next? No, said Meyer, and other industry insiders polled by Velo unanimously agreed.

“I don’t think the technology is there yet,” Meyer said. “I don’t think the racers want it, at least until the technology is perfect and there’s compliance across all three platforms. [The UCI] needs to make a calculated decision. Until it’s dialed on our side, I don’t think they can make a decision on their side.”

It is coming, though

The UCI will run Paris-Roubaix as a road disc test event in 2016, according to sources within the UCI and the cycling industry. The governing body was originally shooting for 2015, but Campagnolo’s slow movement toward discs and SRAM’s recent recall moved that optimistic timeline back. Even 2016 may be overly optimistic. “If the answers aren’t here today, I don’t think the UCI is a year or two away,” Meyer said.

The UCI, and in particular its new technology officer Dimitris Katsanis, has made it clear that it believes that a wholesale swap is the safest route, when the technology is ready. This would prevent riders from running into each other due to a huge disparity in braking power, especially on high- speed descents.

Professionals seem to be on board with this approach. “I think it’s something you have to do all at once, to make sure everyone is all on disc brakes. Not so much in the dry, but in the wet … it changes a lot of ability to brake, to slow down,” Phinney said.

Teams already use special bikes for Roubaix, so using the Queen of the Classics as a test event makes economic sense for sponsors as well. And Roubaix is flat, so overheating is not a concern. It’s a safe place to bring discs into the WorldTour.

After Roubaix, the future is murky. These same debates surrounded the adoption of discs in mountain bike racing in the early 2000s, and discs definitively won that battle. One has to believe that the superior technology will win out; the best riders in the world should be riding on the brakes that stop them best. The logistical hurdles are just that: hurdles, ready to be jumped. The cycling industry is full of engineers who are, no doubt, eager to do just that.

The post Stopping progress? The debate over hydraulic disc brakes in the pro peloton appeared first on VeloNews.com.

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