Quote: Cats13 "I thought straight away at the time when she didn't move at all that she had broken her neck, was awful viewing. I fully agree the course should be difficult for the Olympics - but not so barbaric that any mistake not just costs you the race but potentially your career. I do however think she got the speed and angle of entry into that particular turn all wrong, she was far too narrow for the tight bend under no pressure from other riders - I guess they will have ridden the course many times before the actual race (?) so that turn shouldn't have been a surprise.... however mistakes like that should cost time allowing the pack to catch up somewhat, not have you speared into a concrete wall fracturing your back!'"
I've seen a lot of discussion on this in the cycling forums I hang about, and there is various discussions about how they could mitigate against this, maybe hay bales but if it rained this could have caused flooding, and its not possible to have a net here (like that which caught Richie Porte the day before)
I can see from her Strava she had been down this same descent 3 times last week, maybe many times before. How many of those would be at the same intensity & pressure as leading the race for Olympic gold, with a decent gap back to second (caught with 150m to go & finished 4th)?
She's done thousands of similar corners while descending before, but got caught up in the pressure of the moment. Its the equivalent of passing the ball to Tony Clubb on the 5th tackle, in a Grand Final.
