How the race was won - Men’s World Championships Road Race

I’m excited, proud, and honoured to announce our collaboration with Cyclocosm to feature his ‘How the race was won’ videos (and many others) with CyclingTips. Nothing has changed except that we’re now able to keep Cosmo Catalano out of an office job for a while longer.

If you’re not familiar with Cyclocosm’s “How the race was won”, you’ll be pleasantly surprised. The video series takes a look at the weekend’s racing and explains the tactics at play as well as the tiny details (with Cosmo’s quick wit) that nobody else is able to pick out. It’s infinitely more than simple race highlights.

I hope you enjoy the first of many in our collaboration. There’s lots more to come in addition to “How the race was won”.

UPDATE: For those of you who get an error when trying to view this video, please use the direct link here to view.

Mobile users: we’re working on getting this functioning properly on mobile devices. If you cannot see the video at the top, please use this link to view the video, or view the desktop version of our site. Thanks for your patience.

Copyrighted material has been used under Fair Use. If you are the copyright holder and believe your material has been used unfairly or if you have any feedback or suggestions, please contact editor at cycligtips.com.au. Thank you.

Tags: 2014 world road race championships, Cyclocosm, How the race was won

Damien P.

Yay! Great to see.
Raymond

Cosmo’s presentation and editing is top notch.
Nick

This excites me beyond any measurable scale
Tim

Excellent collaboration. I was kind of hoping that you might somehow employ Cosmo since he was having trouble finding ongoing sponsorship. It’s a match made in heaven.
- http://www.cyclingTipsBlog.com cyclingTips
  
  that’s the idea!
scottmanning

I often wondering if this guy watches the race at half speed because picks up the littlest things! Funny too!
Help meeee

is this georestricted? Can’t watch it on chrome, safari, or firefox in the US.
- http://www.cyclingTipsBlog.com cyclingTips
  
  It should not be. I’ll look into it
  - All good
    
    Watching from the US is fine, no problems.
Cameron

My two favorite cycling websites, together! W00t!
Esky_J

Some weird quality issues with this video. Lots of freeze-framing and frame-jumping. Maybe something to look into - or maybe my computer just sucks today
- Ming
  
  Another American who can’t get the video to play. Chrome, os x. everything current.
  - toyboata
    
    me either. using safari, os x all up to date, in the us.
    - http://www.cyclingTipsBlog.com cyclingTips
      
      Thanks guys. I’m looking into the issue right now.
  - http://www.cyclingTipsBlog.com cyclingTips
    
    Try this link while we’re working out the problem: https://vimeo.com/cyclingtips/review/107651038/2470e5169a
    - DJR
      
      Just watched it in the US, excellent quality delivery. MaxCDN has added a POP to Australia if CloudFlare is giving you delivery problems. They’re typically faster globally and their EdgeRules give you some more control over delivering content like this.
      
      Top notch vid. Best cycling site around.
Mark Blackwell

Sooooo happy about this. Great job CT. As you already know, Cosmo is in his own league… no-one else comes close IMHO.
Ripper, you little!

Best news ever! Now just bring back The Bike Lane and the world would be perfect. Just watched the The Bike Lane blooper reel for old times sake.
http://cyclingtips.com.au/2014/02/the-bike-lane-blooper-reel/
Waldemar Waldemar

Kwiatkowski pedalling while seating on the top tube.

that was fast!
Cosmo fan and Safari user.

Sound playing but blank screen. Could you please re-upload this in a recognised video format?
- http://www.cyclingTipsBlog.com cyclingTips
  
  Sorry about the problems. Can you try another browser to see if it works so I can narrow down the issue?
  - Nitro
    
    Sounds like a Safari issue - I’m a Melbourne based Safari user (v7.0.6) - Plays ad, but then just a black screen with spinning video wheel…
  - Cosmo fan and Safari user
    
    Thanks so much for the Vimeo upload, great watch as always.
- http://www.cyclingTipsBlog.com cyclingTips
  
  Try this link while we’re sorting out the problem: https://vimeo.com/cyclingtips/review/107651038/2470e5169a
Johnny

Can’t watch the video neither with Firefoy nor with Safari (OS X). Why don’t you continue to use Cosmo’s Youtube channel or your Vimeo account?
- http://www.cyclingTipsBlog.com cyclingTips
  
  Unfortunately we needed to use our own player because there are restrictions with youtube and vimeo with what we needed to do.
Mike Hayward

Great to see this collaboration.

For those who haven’t yet seen:

http://www.strava.com/activities/200661439/overview
Red Ostler

Great news, but having problems viewing on Safari on a Mac in the UK. Just getting the ad at the start and then nothing.
Rodge

doesn’t work for me in Australia on Chrome, get a “can;t load M3U8, no levels to play” error
- Johnny
  
  Same for me on Firefox (OS X). Safari even does not show an error while refusing to work.
  - http://www.cyclingTipsBlog.com cyclingTips
    
    Thanks guys. Looking into it.
- http://www.cyclingTipsBlog.com cyclingTips
  
  Try using this link for now until we get the problem sorted:
  
  https://vimeo.com/cyclingtips/review/107651038/2470e5169a
Alex

Cosm, thank you for beautiful Polish anthem ! :)
Eddie Groves

Great watch, first time I’ve seen this. FYIW video functioned perfectly using Chrome on Windows 8.1
Bo London

Cosmo is great. Cyclingtips just made a very good decision.
Marc Evans

Now you just to get Inner Ring on here and it’ll be a one-stop-shop. No need to go to any other sites ever again!
JamesC

Awesome partnership! Cosmo’s attention to detail and CyclingTips’ following-base will undoubtedly prove to be a smart move going forward. Couple this with what CT is building with Sufferfest, and you really won’t have to go anywhere else at all.
John_Irvine

Glad to see this here. Can somebody explain how national team squads are selected, in terms of number and personnel? Cosmo mentioned at Cyclocosm that Majkas 241 UCI points helped beef up the Polish squad, though he was not on it, as far as I can tell. Google has so far failed me. Thanks.
- Dave
  
  It can be found on the UCI website at
  
  http://www.uci.ch/mm/Document/News/NewsGeneral/16/52/04/QUALIFICATIONSYSTEMFORTHE2014UCIROADWORLDCHAMPIONSHIPS-MENELITEROADRACE_English.pdf
  - Dave
    
    To break it down as a worked example:
    
    Poland were inside the top ten (8th) of the WorldTour national rankings at the qualification date in August, which qualifies them to enter a team which is sized at the greater of either the number of Polish riders in the WorldTour individual rankings or six. Three Polish riders with WorldTour points gets them six riders in the race.
    
    Poland were also 9th in the UCI Europe Tour at that date. Nations ranked 7th to 14th on the UCI Europe Tour get to start three riders, and if the nation is already qualified via the WorldTour points system they get to add these three to the number already qualified via the WorldTour to make up a full team of nine.
    
    —-
    
    For Australia, our top ten WorldTour ranking (7th at 15/8/2014, now 5th) qualifies our team. Because we have 15 riders (more than nine) with WorldTour points, we get a full team of nine riders on the road.
    
    If there was a year where Australia was in the WorldTour top ten but had fewer than nine riders with WorldTour points, we would be able to get the extra places up to a full team by way of being first in the UCI Oceania Tour to qualify three more riders.
    
    Interestingly, it’s in the best interests of New Zealand that Australia stay in the WorldTour top ten. If we missed the top ten this year, the Kiwis would have been stuck with just one rider on the start line!
- Abdu
  
  It’s basically based on UCI World Tour points for the year to August, with the top 10 countries by total points being allocated a team of 14 and from that a starting list of 9 riders. Countries with less than 9 riders qualifying on UCI points, ie. NZ, can still get riders through Conti, etc.
  
  Check it out in full here:
  
  http://www.uci.ch/mm/Document/News/NewsGeneral/16/52/04/QUALIFICATIONSYSTEMFORTHE2014UCIROADWORLDCHAMPIONSHIPS-MENELITEROADRACE_English.pdf
  - Abdu
    
    Each country can make their own selection from within the 14 obviously, which is always the contentious thing…
    Technically, there is still the potential for a rider from a small country to win, although the big Italian teams have tended to dominate the race over the years. I’m pretty sure LeMond would have won from a small US team at the time.
    - Dave
      
      I approve of allowing free selection being allowed for all teams.
      
      The qualification system is about assessing the strength of nations, not individual riders. If it was about the strength of individual riders you would just take the top 100 in the WorldTour rankings and 100 from the five Continental circuits.
      - Abdu
        
        Cheers Dave, I meant contentious within the countries themselves. I’m talking Kathy Watt, etc. etc.
        There’s the story about in-fighting such as the year Cadel won, at the Aussie team meeting prior, the riders were asked to nominate who the leader was to be (who the team would ride for).
        8 voted for Gerro, including himself. 1 voted for Cadel, himself.
        Cadel naturally cracked the shts with team management (who may have been finally smart enough to reaslise it was dumb to let the riders nominate) and was allocated one rider to assist him (might have been a Suzlberger, not sure).
        History shows Cadel linked up with his former Lotto team mates and some Russians I think, made the break and won. Gerro was hugely assisted by his 7 Aussie team mates and came 8th.
        Goes to show how great Cadel’s win really was…
Frank

Awesome work … great video.
Informative and entertaining … much like everything on the site Wade you and your posse have outdone yourselves. Please make this a regular feature come Grand Tour time even for the quessn stages.
- http://www.cyclingTipsBlog.com cyclingTips
  
  Thanks Frank. We aim to post two videos per week. While the race season takes a break it’ll let us be creative in what Cyclocosm puts together. There’ll probably be lots of CX stuff in the coming months.
  - Cameron Harris
    
    will we be seeing Cosmo engaging through comments in the same way that you and Matt do? That would be fun :)
Kevin M.

This is a fantastic collaboration! I’m so excited to see both of these entities together.
Shane

Great merge tks guys