Predictions 2012

[nbonaddio]

It's not built well enough to go much faster. They will need a better build to take advantage of their beastly push teams.

Sounds very familiar.

[shafeeq]

I'm still waiting on that SDC forward trike "penalty", they must be doing something right with prep to keep that traction. A bit of slide is the worst that they ever seem to get.

I think their drivers and whoever is training them could take credit for that. Over the last few years, they seem to be getting better and better at staying on the edge without falling off. With all the electronic gizmos that one can stuff into a buggy these days, there's the potential for getting better feedback than the old-fashioned eyes & ears in the chute that were all we had to work with.

[McCue]

Hill 2 Push (the single most underrated factor for a free roll)

This isn't the case if you go through the exercise of comparing a women's A downhill to a men's A downhill. I remember men's times being something like 4-5 seconds faster with the same buggy/driver and (one would assume) comparable wheels.

[Elmo Zoneball]

Hill 2 Push (the single most underrated factor for a free roll)

This isn't the case if you go through the exercise of comparing a women's A downhill to a men's A downhill. I remember men's times being something like 4-5 seconds faster with the same buggy/driver and (one would assume) comparable wheels.

And in an amazing coincidence, I made exactly such a comparison Friday -- based on admittedly fuzzy hand timing the heats in real time from the streaming video, I came up with roughly 4 seconds as the average deficit for the Womens vs. Mens teams FR times for the same buggy.