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| Monster step-up jump on Rio BMX Olympic track. photo: bmxnews.com |
You can find the details on the full story as it was all over the BMX internet channels (link here). The gist of goes like this: Elite Trax, the most well known and progressive track builder in the world (who is also responsible for most of the builds on the BMX supercross world cup circuit), was contracted to build a show piece for the BMX racing event in Rio. The world's top BMX racers were invited to test-race it. After 15 minutes of inspection the riders called it off. Too big. Too steep. Too fast. The margin of error was just too small when racing 8 riders across and elbow to elbow. They were lambasted in the Brazilian media and (as you can imagine) social media circles. The UK's Liam Phillips became the spokesperson for the athletes, and put together an eloquent argument which you can listen to here.
His comments regarding what the track builder, event promoter, and organizing body wants to see (bigger air, more air time and less pedaling) and what the athletes are willing to race on are insightful. A "race-able" track, according to Phillips, lets them hit everything at 60kph and still have some room to over or under jump the big features, and allows for passing through out. Make mistakes, in other words. The Rio track was steep for big air but had equally steep landings. Miss it by six inches either way and it would be a high speed over-the-bars, injury inducing wreck. Phillips called in "totally ride-able but not race-able".
This has obvious links back to the Vancouver Olympics where the luge track was the biggest and fastest to date, and promptly killed an athlete in training runs. It also reminds me of ski cross racer Nik Zoricic, who was tragically killed in world cup competition on a go-big track that was spectacular for spectators but allowed for no room for error (see my comments on this event here). It took the loss of life to rein in those sports.
What is different here is that the athletes called stop. Phillips comments on how up to this time they have just sucked it up and went for it, risking their own safety in order to hold on to coveted national team slots and world cup points is an honest look at the tension of performing in extreme sports. I've got to think this happens in X Games big air (here, note this athlete failed to land the previous 18 attempts, nailed the 19th and won), free ride mountain bike and a long list of others. Who is in charge? I believe the pressure to suck it up and go for it, from the athletes' perspective, must be huge. Is it realistic to say no? Fly all this way to compete and then jeopardize your career and income by saying 'no thanks'? Not likely. It would create an existential crisis. The event organizers are in charge, choosing the risk level for athletes who take their safety (or life) into their own hands to put on a show and hopefully reap some kind of reward. Many don't.
That the BMX athletes took charge of their sport is surprising and earns my great respect. Who is in charge? In this case the BMX athletes. Does it 'hold back the sport' as their critics charge? Perhaps, but whose sport is it? TV wants to push to more spectacle. The racers just want to race, but importantly race again the next day and the day after that. This shows great maturity for a young action sport. I hope to see this catch on across other sectors.