Define rules for Individual Time Trials

Comments about this discussion:

Started 23 Feb 05:36

Right now, 3D.10 mentions the following about ITTs:

"If this is an Individual Time Trial format race, use individual start."

3D.10.1 Individual Start
Each rider is individually started at a fixed time interval, such as every 20 or 30 seconds. Riders are sorted by speed with the fastest rider going first. (Except in the case of an Individual Time Trial, where the race can start with either the fastest or slowest rider.)

Apart from the starting configuration, as far as I know there are no further definitions about what an ITT is. I suggest to create a new section to define such a race format and especially create rules for rider behavior during the event (i.e., generally no drafting and efficient overtaking of other riders).

Here are discussions from last year that proposed ITT for the 10k event:

https://iuf-rulebook-2022.committees.unicycling-software.com/discussions/22
https://iuf-rulebook-2022.committees.unicycling-software.com/discussions/23

At this point, I would rather introduce it as a general way of running a competition and not limiting it to a certain distance.

Comment 23 Feb 05:46

Thank you for taking up this topic again from the last Rulebok Committee. In the discussion on the restructuring of section 3B, I already suggested introducing a section in which the disciplines are described. We could therefore discuss in detail what exactly should be included in this section for the Time Trials.

For the purpose of clarity, I would like to see the rules that apply during the race integrated into the proposed Racing Rules section. For example, the existing rules on passing could be expanded to include a paragraph for races in which drafting is allowed and a paragraph for races in which drafting is not allowed.
But the integration into the existing rules can be done in a second step - first of all, of course, it must be clear which rules should apply to the time trails at all.

Comment 23 Feb 06:18

This sounds good to me. Maybe as a starting point, here are the UCI rules for ITTs (Chapter 4): https://assets.ctfassets.net/761l7gh5x5an/6FEzFHeA2oKMBGb5sdIvQ7/9ad8344aef0741a4fdaa85fcd0eab00d/2-ROA-20250101-E.pdf

Racing procedure
2.4.017 If one rider is caught up by another, he may neither lead nor follow in the slipstream of
the rider who caught up.
2.4.018 A rider, upon catching up with another shall leave a lateral gap of at least 2 metres
between himself and the other rider.
After 1 km, the rider caught up shall ride at least 25 m away from the other.
2.4.019 If necessary, the commissaire shall force the riders to leave the 2 metre lateral gap and
the distance of 25 metres respectively, without prejudice to the penalties provided for in
the scale of penalties (article 2.12.007).

Comment 23 Feb 12:18

I think it's always a good idea to have a look at what is used in other sports that are comparable.

@Simon did you also have anything prepared based on the discussions in the World Record Committee regarding rules for Time Trials? We coud bring everything together in this discussion.

Comment 24 Feb 10:44

I thought about it, but didn't come up with a formal proposal. My main difficulty was to identify at which level of the rulebook “time trial” could be integrated into the rulebook.

I think that the definition of fixed time trial distances for WRs should be discussed separately from the rules for a time trial competition.

A time trial competition can be organized over a fixed distance or a free distance. And as I mentioned in the discussion on fixed-distance races, I think it's a format that's best suited to relatively short distances. It's possible to organize very long time trials, but in practice this doesn't seem ideal to me, either for the competitors (significant fatigue), or for the organizers (heavy organization), in an event where there are numerous competitions.

This format has a major impact on drafting, which is particularly prevalent in the unlimited category. One option for making the organization of a time trial realistic in terms of organization would be to reserve the time trial for at least wheel sizes of 29” or more (or bigger ?). What will 24” riders think if the race format differs according to wheel size?

This would have an impact on the number of participants, which might be more favorable to a realistic organization of a time trial.

Comment 25 Feb 01:46

> This format has a major impact on drafting, which is particularly prevalent in the unlimited category. One option for making the organization of a time trial realistic in terms of organization would be to reserve the time trial for at least wheel sizes of 29” or more (or bigger ?). What will 24” riders think if the race format differs according to wheel size?

I would assume that the interest of 24” riders in a time trial is rather low - although there has never been a race in this format for this category. But I think it would be okay to define the rules and reserve time trials for the bigger wheels.

Comment 10 Mar 07:39

Here are the parts I propose to discuss:
1/ Starts
2/ Drafting and overtaking
3/ Unicycles
4/ Distance
5/ Number of participants

This doesn't mean that I'm proposing these subsections, but it may be a starting point for a discussion and building a proposal.

1/ Starts
Individual start:
Just because the start is individual doesn't mean the course has to be narrow. It's preferable for the course to allow overtaking over most of its length.
If it's possible to overtake on most of the course, I think it's best to have the slowest start first, with a start every 20-30 seconds.
If the course isn't ideal for overtaking, the only option would be to have the fastest start first. But I can see 2 problems: 1/ if there are seeding problems, there could be traffic jams (a slow competitor entering a fast seed time could get in the way of the other competitors) and 2/ making the slowest start last could considerably increase the overall duration of the competition.

Timing:
This type of event is generally run with an automatic “Netto time” start. Netto time is not a stationary start, as Brutto time is. Brutto time” would require a regular automatic countdown and validation of each participant's start by the timekeeper. I have the impression that “netto time” is easier to implement (to be checked with a timekeeper).

2/ Drafting and overtaking
We can base ourselves on the UCI but I think we can be more flexible. The link between speed and the effect of drafting follows an exponential function. Between 25 and 50 km/h, the effect of drafting doesn't vary by a factor of two, it's closer to a factor of 1 to 10.
In any case, it's always interesting to objectify distances and times between 2 competitors, but the marshals won't necessarily have the right tools to objectify these distances and times.
I think judges/marshals will be more comfortable judging a rider's intention to draft. You have to bear in mind that a faster runner who has caught up by 20 or 30 sec (or more) should have little interest in staying behind a competitor who is obviously slower.
I see 2 cases to avoid:
1/ the most frequent case: a competitor who is being overtaken tries to follow the one who is overtaking him.
2/ a rare case: a competitor sets off at full speed to catch up with the competitor ahead of him (who has a similar level) and take his drafting to rest.
When a faster competitor catches up with a slower competitor who set off earlier, the slower competitor should be warned (by the faster competitor or/and by a marshal) so that he knows what to do (e.g. squeeze right).

3/ Unicycles
Should we limit the range to unlimited? Should the 29” category be included? If a time trial is organized over a free distance, it seems to me that it would be better for it to be a time trial for every competitor. For the competitors, it seems to me that it would be better if a free distance race offered something extra.
That's why my initial proposal (2 years ago) was for a 10km time trial. This would enable unlimited competitors to do a time trial and standard competitors to do a fixed-distance race on the same course.

4/ Distance
As I've already mentioned, I think that time trials are better suited to short distances. There are several reasons for this:
1/ over a short distance, you can concentrate on your individual effort, without being distracted by a strategy.
2/ since you're not riding in a group, there's no rest phase (the fastest riders benefit from riding in a group for drafting), so the effort is potentially more intense.
3/ even over a short distance, there will be time gaps of several seconds between competitors who on long events could ride together for hours and be separated by less than 1 second at the finish.
4/ the shorter the distance, the fewer overtakes (less interference between competitors).
5/ the shorter the distance, the easier it is for the organizers (shorter race duration, fewer marshals).

We could recommend that time trials should be run over distances of 5 to 20 km (I'm proposing a range from 10/2 to 10x2 in reference to 10km... it's just a suggestion), without however prohibiting longer formats.
For formats other than the fixed 10km distance, classes would have to be defined. I'd be inclined to propose 2 classes: 29” standard and unlimited.

5/ Number of participants
We need to consider the number of participants. Without even mentioning setting a limit, it's easy to see that this can be a blocking factor in the organization of a time trial.
If there's a start every 30 seconds, we can get 120 competitors off every hour. Moreover, it would be easier to opt for a start every 20 seconds for the standard 29” and every 30 seconds for the unlimited.
For a time trial to be realistic, it would have to be organized over half a day (like most road races today).
If there are over 200 competitors and the slowest have to start last, it can start to take a long time. That's why I think it's particularly interesting to have a course where it's possible, at almost any time, to overtake and start the slowest riders first.

Comment 10 Mar 10:38

I basically agree with all these points.

Starts: yes, I think reverse order starts would be good. There must be enough space for passing in any case. With live timing, it could be also really exciting to watch, with riders continuously improving the time and going into the lead. Besides that, I think we can mostly use already existing rules (also from muni DH).

Overtaking: While the UCI values are too high for unicycling speeds, I still think we should mention some values as a guideline for judges/course marshals. 5 m front/back, 1.5 m lateral would be reasonable I think. Sure, no one can check this exactly during the race, but a rule purely based on intention might leave a bit too much freedom for interpretation.

Unlimited + 29" categories make most sense to me.

Distance: indeed, something around 10k would be ideal (5k would be really short though, so I would rather say 8-20k), assuming that there is also a longer road race available (free distance of 40k+ or marathon).

Comment 12 Mar 02:56

Thank you for all the good points. From my point of view, this looks like a really good basis.

1/ Starts
I would agree that an individual start is the only option for a race like this in any case.
As long as the course is wide enough for overtaking, the option of starting with the slowest drivers seems to make the most sense to me. But I think the course should be wide enough even if the starting order is reversed, otherwise it will be really difficult to prevent drafting. Some riders will always catch up with those ahead and the course has to be designed for that.

1.1/Timing
I don't think an automatic start every X seconds would be a problem either. Most electronic starting devices have an interval mode in which they automatically trigger a start every X seconds. This means that the use of brutto times would also not be a problem.

2/ Drafting and overtaking
Good ideas - the World Record Committee discussed whether it might be easier to judge distances in seconds rather than meters? I don't know how this is viewed here. But I think if you look for a fixed point, you can actually judge quite well how big the time gap between two riders is.

3/ Unicycles
I would be open for both.

4/ Distance
I'm not an Unlimited rider, so I might be wrong, but 5 km seem to me to be a little bit to short for Unlimited races?

5/ Number of participants
If a competition organizer only has a limited capacity for participants, he is free to limit the number of participants. This also happens regularly in other disciplines at many competitions. I don't think this needs to be regulated by the rulebook.

I would add one more point:
6/ Venue
The World Record Guidelines currently stipulate a circuit as the competition venue for Time Trials. This works well for a single participant and makes it easier to measure the course - but for competitions with several participants this limitation seems difficult to me, as it would certainly increase the number of overtakes considerably.

Comment 17 Mar 04:57

I agree with most points except for 3/ unicycles. Of course the standard class has to be included. Whether it is 29" standard or 24" standard would depend on the distance.

In terms of 4/ distances, I think we should leave it as a free distance event for organisers to decide. The most fun (and only) time trial race I've done on a unicycle was at Ride the Lobster. From memory the top riders took over 40min on a combination of 36" ungeared, 36" and 29" geared unicycles. I don't think I would enjoy a 5km race that is essentially like a prologue in a bicycle stage race. You are concentrating on your effort whether it is 5km or 50km. It's just that you will pace it differently. eg Do you save yourself for the climb near the finish, or go hard on the flat? A short race means you go hard from start to finish.

In terms of Jan's point on venue:

"6/ Venue
The World Record Guidelines currently stipulate a circuit as the competition venue for Time Trials. "

I mentioned in the WR committee that what we refer to as time trials for world records are referred to as track records in bicycling. I think for world record purposes, the intention is to have a closed circuit (track) that you do multiple laps on; whereas for a time trial race, it can be point to point or a single loop.

Not sure whether the best option is to rename the time-trial records in the WR guidelines (and call them track records), or if we should stipulate that a time-trial races do not have to be on a circuit.

Comment 19 Mar 03:14

Regarding the point 6/ Venue:

I understand your point, but I also think that we should make sure that world records and competition disciplines go together. If we offer time trials at competitions - which I think would be a good development - then these should also be included in the world records.

However, I can see that no “maximum distance” competitions are likely to be offered at any event; in my opinion, closed courses on which several laps are ridden are essential for this type of time trail.
For the fixed distance time trial records, however, I think it would also be possible to allow point-to-point races or single loop races. This format would then also be what could be offered at competitions and where world records could also be set in the competition.

So my suggestion would be to keep the current rules for the course for all “maximum distance” competitions (perhaps we should rename this to “fixed time” to avoid confusion with free distance time trials?) as before and allow all courses for all fixed/free distance competitions that are also permitted for other road races (The start and finish points of a course, measured along a theoretical straight line between them, shall not be further apart than 50% of the race distance and the overall decrease in elevation between the start and finish shall not exceed 1:1000, i.e. 1m per km (0.1%).).

Comment 20 Mar 04:04

>I'm not an Unlimited rider, so I might be wrong, but 5 km seem to me to be a little bit to short for Unlimited races?

A short race would allow you to go fast without having to worry about race strategy. This is a problem with the unlimited 10km today. It's very difficult to strategize over 10km, you have to rely on the spectators' reactions. Personally, from an unlimited rider point of view, I'd rather do a timed 5km than a 10km race.

> I think we should leave it as a free distance event for organisers to decide.

I think it's a good thing to make recommendations. In my opinion, there are enough arguments for preferring a short distance for time trial in most situation. The organizers can propose something else, but in that case, I think it's up to the organizers to justify their choice.

> I don't think I would enjoy a 5km race that is essentially like a prologue in a bicycle stage race. You are concentrating on your effort whether it is 5km or 50km.

The most decisive thing is that it has to fit into the Unicon program (or another event).
We discussed this in the topic on fixed-distance races.
It hasn't yet been proposed and voted on, but we seem to be moving towards a recommendation of 3 road races, one of which should be a fixed-distance race (which I think is more likely to be the 10km), and there's also an expectation for a long, confrontational race (mass start or, failing that, heat start): marathon or longer distance (free). And there's also a wait for a criterium.
If a 10km race is organized, I don't see any point in organizing a 5 or 10km time trial in addition to a classic 10km race. I think it would be more appropriate to organize an individual start (time trial) for unlimited rider in 10km.
And if a 50km time trial is organized, I think it would be a shame if it were to replace the long race with a confrontation.

Comment 20 Mar 04:40

> Of course the standard class has to be included. Whether it is 29" standard or 24" standard would depend on the distance.

Of course, there's a psychological impact to riding alone rather than in a group. But the main specificity of a time trial is the absence of drafting.

According to Jan, most 24" riders don't see the point of a time trial, which doesn't surprise me. Organizing a 24" time trial seems to me to be of limited interest.

The advantage of doing a time trial over the fixed 10km distance is that you can organize a classic 24“ race, a time trial for unlimited riders (and possibly for 29” riders too). On a free distance, the interest may be less for the 24".

Comment 20 Mar 13:22

I can definitely understand your thoughts.

Maybe I am wrong in my assumption about the interests of the 24” riders, but personally I think the nice thing about the race is definitely that it is a race against each other and I would like it to be started more often with a mass start to strengthen this character even more.
I therefore find the idea of holding the 10 km race as a classic race for the 24” class and as a time trial for the unlimited riders interesting. But, as I said, I'm not an unlimited rider either, so I can't assess what the interests are here.

Comment 24 Mar 04:35

"According to Jan, most 24" riders don't see the point of a time trial, which doesn't surprise me. Organizing a 24" time trial seems to me to be of limited interest."

We've never had one, how would you know? Is it any different to an unlimited time trial?

Yes, drafting effect is less for a 24", but it is not zero, particularly into a head wind. However, the point of a time trial is not to get rid of drafting, but to race against the clock rather than against other riders.

There are no standard class time-trial records. If we hold the standard class to the same level as unlimited, then there should be. I would love to see standard class time-trial world records- for the Hour and even the 24 Hour. What you are seeing with these world records is not athletic progression, it is technological progression. I consider Stefan Gauler's 1991 24 Hour World record to be one of the greatest feats in our sport, yet no one is going to challenge it by attempting to ride a 26" unicycle for 24 hours and be denied a world record.

Standard Class time-trials (fixed distance or fixed time) will allow unicycle performances to be comparable across different eras and generations of riders. To have this, we need to allow time-trials in the rulebook for standard riders.

Comment 24 Mar 08:34

> We've never had one, how would you know? Is it any different to an unlimited time trial?

It is true that there has never been a time trial for 24“ at any competition - but I know a lot of 24” riders who ride the 10 km precisely because of the head-to-head race, i.e. the race format. My assumption was therefore that these riders would not necessarily be interested in racing against the clock.
Personally, I also like to ride somewhat longer distances than the 800 m on the track and I find a comparatively short road race on the 24”, which I have from the track races anyway, a very nice addition to the racing program on the track.
But if it was simply a race against the clock, I wouldn't take part on a 24”. With the comparatively long cranks and the small wheel diameter, it's simply not a unicycle I would want to race against the clock on.
Based on these considerations, I found Simon's idea of holding the 10km for the 24” as a head-to-head race in the current format and going more in the direction of a time trial for Unlimited interesting. It seems rather unrealistic to me that there is a time trial and a normal 10km race at a competition.

> There are no standard class time-trial records. If we hold the standard class to the same level as unlimited, then there should be. I would love to see standard class time-trial world records- for the Hour and even the 24 Hour.

I'm not sure whether it's really an advantage if all classes are offered in all disciplines - there would be an incredible variety of possible classes (Standard 24“, Standard 29”, Unlimited Ungeared, Unlimited Geared). I have the feeling that not all classes are equally suitable for all disciplines and with an already not too large base of athletes, we make the individual classes even weaker.

> I consider Stefan Gauler's 1991 24 Hour World record to be one of the greatest feats in our sport, yet no one is going to challenge it by attempting to ride a 26" unicycle for 24 hours and be denied a world record.

I don't know if it's really just the lack of a world record that stops people from trying to beat it - I think for many people it's just not attractive to ride such long distances on a small unicycle with comparatively long cranks, when there has been so much technical development and unicycles offer completely different possibilities in terms of size and gearing.

This is not to say that I would vote against integrating a standard class into the Time Trails, but I think we should think carefully about whether this really makes sense and fits in to the development of unicycles and so on. I think where there are historically grown disciplines for the standard class, it is one thing to continue to offer them, but “new” disciplines may not necessarily have to be based on the history, but rather on the expected development.

Comment 28 Mar 17:14

"But if it was simply a race against the clock, I wouldn't take part on a 24”. With the comparatively long cranks and the small wheel diameter, it's simply not a unicycle I would want to race against the clock on."

There are several standard class wheel sizes. For a longer distance time-trial, it would be a 29" standard class.

Based on these considerations, I found Simon's idea of holding the 10km for the 24” as a head-to-head race in the current format and going more in the direction of a time trial for Unlimited interesting. It seems rather unrealistic to me that there is a time trial and a normal 10km race at a competition.

I'd like to know what other unlimited riders think of the 10km TT proposal. I can see Simon's argument that the 10km is now essentially a sprint race, getting dangerous, difficult to pass, and challenging for organisers to find a wide enough track. On the other hand, people like racing against each other.

If we are making a generic rulebook proposal (not just about about 10km), then we have to be sure we're not excluding standard or unlimited class from participation. I don't want to see an organiser offering, say, a 30km time trial without including standard class.

We don't need every possible format, but the main difference is between standard and unlimited. One allows progress to be tracked across time/eras, the other is a measure of technological progress.

If you take bicycling- there are human powered vehicles which are much faster than bicycles. The UCI limits this by specifying what a bicycle should look like. Someone attempting the bicycle Hour record today can compare themselves to Eddy Merkx in 1972:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hour_record

Currently, there is no unlimited class record that cannot be done comfortably on a 29" standard.

It's smaller than a 29" standard, but is legal in that class. If we establish a standard 29" TT records for 24hr and 1hr, it would be a pretty solid record for anyone trying to beat, even with a 29". Right now I have no idea whether I could have beaten Stefan Gauler's 24hr record. Someone on a geared unicycle in future will have no idea how they compare to Sam Wakeling/Lars Clausen/Myself a 36" ungeared unicycle.

The other advantage is that Unicon is perfect opportunity for world records to be beaten (400m athletic track, timing system, witnesses are all available). It means those who travel from the other side of the world don't have to carry a geared 36" unicycle if they race in standard class.

It could be one day we even have a recumbent unicycle with an aerodynamic fairing and multiple gears, which is what the human powered vehicle records are set on. It would be highly customised and allow only those with the money and technology to set world records.

Comment 30 Mar 12:41

The discussion of world records in the standard category is another matter. I think world records are great, but we shouldn't let that stop us from making improvements to the rules.

> I'd like to know what other unlimited riders think of the 10km TT proposal. I can see Simon's argument that the 10km is now essentially a sprint race, getting dangerous, difficult to pass, and challenging for organisers to find a wide enough track. On the other hand, people like racing against each other.

I've talked to other unlimited 10km competitors, many of whom don't have an opinion on an TT individual start on 10k, but others, especially the fastest, do. In any case, no one told me that they thought it was a pity that the 10km was no longer confrontational. Competitors like confrontational races, and fortunately so, because at the moment all races are more or less confrontational - they're wave starts races, not mass start races. I think it's very important to have a long-distance race in confrontation.

If we can organize time trial races with an interesting format (the fastest start last and hot seat). I'm sure that unlimited competitors will be happy.

Comment 01 Apr 02:42

>>"But if it was simply a race against the clock, I wouldn't take part on a 24”. With the comparatively long cranks and the small wheel diameter, it's simply not a unicycle I would want to race against the clock on."

>There are several standard class wheel sizes. For a longer distance time-trial, it would be a 29" standard class.

However, my argument was explicitly related to the 24" class. The fact that a 30 km Tim Trail could be interesting for the 29" standard class was not up for discussion from my side. So I was only concerned with the race format for 10km, where in my opinion a time trail for the 24" class would be rather uninteresting.

And when we talk about fixed distance time trials, then it's also about explicitly mentioning the corresponding distances in the rulebook - this would be the distances where world records can be set.

> It could be one day we even have a recumbent unicycle with an aerodynamic fairing and multiple gears, which is what the human powered vehicle records are set on. It would be highly customised and allow only those with the money and technology to set world records.

To be honest, I would personally think that such custom-made products should not be allowed in competitions, even in the unlimited class. Yes, the class is called unlimited, but of course we have to make sure that a fair competition is still possible. Otherwise, at some point the class will no longer have any place in a competitive sport.