Chris was a great sport and it was an amazing event....but actually it was Craig McClean who won the Rollapaluza at the Salford Nocturne...destroying the 500m record in the process.

We'll update the site as we process the hundreds of photos and results from the public, but first of all check Chris and Craig's race movies...Craig's is a real masterclass in roller-racing.....an amazing start, he's up to full speed within 1.5 revolutions!

http://www.rollapaluza.com/?p=132

videos are lower down the page for now

Wow!

19 secs is broken.

nice

shit man, that is amazing.

Hoy in rolled up jeans :)

Wowser. Did you see the video?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jgyq8Zkp10Y

That's how to do it. Instantly at top speed and then constant throughout. Truly amazing stuff.

what do you expect?

Hoy to beat Craig?

craig, turned up early, had a proper warm up and was wearing his cycling gear, he is/was still in training.

chris, on the other hand turned up in civvies to make a public appearance and was made to jump on the rollers straight away with no preperation, the fact that he got so close to craig's time shows how fast he is. also note how quickly craig gets away, it's almost a false start.

Craig Maclean would also probably be a household name now but for the Kilo being dropped and Jamie Staff being chosen as the lead out man in Team sprint.

Breath-taking and awesome.

Jason Queally, Ross Edgar, Matt Crampton, Craig McClean...Chris Hoy, Jason Kenny, Jamie Staff...all world-beating athletes....but there's only three places on the team.....Britain could potentially have won with any combination of the above seven....

he's cheating and starts before winston says go.
and what with the human error of timing his 'record' is dubious.

Being as close to a false start as possible is exactly what they practise week in and week out .....Craig was spot on...possible re-encoding issues with youtube?

anyway his margin was huge so his record is clear......

Caspar and I have timed about 2000 races each in the last year....we may not be a good as an electronic start gate but we're pretty experienced and we follow the same technique.

Craig was 3.69% quicker than the previous record, 15 meters if you put that in to distance, a huge winning margin in a sprint race.

Winston has the reactions of a fighter pilot and is well drilled with the stop watch....approaching 6000 riders in the last year on our rigs. Even so it was clearly an easy win.

This puts the dutch couriers couriers effort into perspective, he isn't a professional racer and he still got very close to one of the fastest track sprinters in the world.

the interesting thing watchin maclean live was that he did slow a fraction towards end. poor hoy, looked really tired and it showed on the bike, but he would of wiped the time if he prepared like mclean.

one of the kids rode 20.xxx as well ;)

That is a quality roller race :0)

Awesome.

what was the record set by the dutch couriers??

i guess Chris Hoy will have to somehow console himself with the 3 gold medals. they're not the same, though...

19.47

http://www.rollapaluza.com/?p=106

He did win a head to head contest with Geoff Thomas. Geoff had a significant head start too.

Craig Mclean had already been on stage and done his faster TT though. As you'd expect the press weren't there to see him.

I keep watching that clip of Craig's....it's amazing.....apart from the fact he chooses to ride on the drops (we usually recommend people have their hands on the tops) his technique is flawless, look how still his body is and how little the wheel moves form side to side (ok it's a sideways shot but it's pretty clear) all his power is directed into the turning of the wheel and not wasted in wrestling the bike and flexing the frame....no wonder he's so quick on the track.

That is bloody amazing. Do you think he'd do it again but lycra'd up and fully prepped?

Wow.

just like you back in the day? ;)

They may seem similar things, but unloaded spinning eg rollers is very different to being able to produce proper power at high rpms, so the carry over from rollers to track sprinting is minimal.

It is very different.

I was just trying to put the difference in their speed into a visually quantifiable measure.

then why are you monsters all so good at roller-racing then????

you are right though....

Because we have to be able to pedal very quickly, i guess my point is that all sprinters should be able to pedal quickly, but also lots of eddurance riders can too, so they look quick on rollers. What sorts the men from the boys is being able to output big power (1500-2600 watts) while hiting 140-170 rpm!!

I've just shown these vids to a guy in work and he was blown away. He asked about gearing - what gear ratio is used on the bikes. (I think I've seen it on here somewhere but can't be arsed to search for it :-P)

*edit* just found it on rolla's site

Craig is keen to race in a Rollapaluza again....Chris was a really nice chap, we only got a chance to exchange a few words....everyone wants a piece of him including Max Clifford!

Brilliant!

you reckon he had the medals on under his shirt?

:D