Great rule rummaging by Inrng regarding Alex Rasmussen’s three Whereabouts errors. As you may know if you follow this blog, although I don’t like many rules I find it even worse when they aren’t followed. Especially by the organizations who write them. In my experience this often isn’t even intentional, organizations simply don’t know their own rules very well. At any rate, it’s worth a read.
One note, There is some confusion whether or not the last sentence of rule 110 actually trumps the first sentence or only refers to the middle part. To me it seems the intention was that the UCI primacy applies to the middle part, the “if not” scenario. Hence why it refers to “as of that date”, which is a date mentioned in the “if not” scenario.
But this is a typical example of poorly written rules which leave them open to interpretation. Organizations often do this in order to give themselves wiggle room. However, under administrative law, wordings are usually interpreted against whoever drafted them, so if you take this to court you have a pretty good chance – provided of course that the court is unbiased.
gerard.cc 
September 16, 2011 at 14:31
Let me tell you a story about UCI rules, their interpretation, and their application to UCI events…
September 16, 2011 at 16:20
It continues to show how irrelevant and overpaid the UCI has become, and wants to stay that way.
September 19, 2011 at 11:03
Hi Jim, long time no speak. Thanks for the comment. I’m not sure this is a UCI issue, it seems that 2 warnings were from the Danish Cycling Federation, in which case it would be up to them to start the process (and it is unclear how much time they are allowed to take to start it)
September 17, 2011 at 22:23
Having just read Rasmussen’s ‘explanation’ for the problems he is experiencing I’m afraid that I don’t have a great deal of sympathy. All the rules stuff mentioned by you Gerard may well be poorly written, and equally poorly enforced, but when you read explanations such as that given by the rider to Cyclingnews it doesn’t really help the cause. Of course, it may be poor journalism / translation, but on face value looks pretty lame to me.
If I’m wide of the mark or missing something then please someone let me know. Anyway, back to the argument above – it looks like the UCI etc could benefit enormously from a big dose of common sense and re-write the rules in a simple to understand way. Basically, ban all the lawyers from teh room and write up some rules and regulations that make stand up to the light of day.
September 18, 2011 at 14:48
You could be right. I don’t really have an opinion on what Rasmussen has done or not done, my point is that having proper rules and following them is a first an necessary step to give people confidence in the sport. With all this confusion, it’s really hard to achieve that. And fewer lawyers in the room, or at least adding some with common sense writing skills would benefit in many situations. That said, having lawyers with understanding of what is really going on and the gift of the words can be very powerful (I’ve dealt with my share of bad but also very good lawyers).
September 19, 2011 at 21:54
Unfortunately it appears that the lawyers employed by national federations and the UCI appear to struggle with common sense or even an appreciation of the sport in hand. Certainly from my reading (admittedly sparse) on anything ‘official’ from the UCI on either rules or equipment appear to have undergone some harsh, and often hideous, ‘google-translate’ process rendering them essential meaningless / impenetrable.
But, centrally and crucially I agree and am glad that you are shedding some light, and drawing to our attention, some of the peculiarities and oddities of the professional peleton with these blog posts. Keep going! You have made some great bikes and I only hope you can influence those in power over cycling as much as you have those producing equipment. My ’07 R3 is still fabulous, good looking and better than me!
September 19, 2011 at 17:49
Hi Gerrard. Yes, long time. no time to reminence about long crowed car drives to wind tunnels. I agree the rules and how they are implimented has always been a confusing issue. It is most confusing for people wanting to aspire to more, inspire to greatness and innovate.
September 27, 2011 at 16:55
Chiming in here again, and I hope it’s not out of turn or too much off-topic. In my personal opinion, the UCI struggles across borders and oceans with federations to enforce a somewhat obscure and immutable global architecture that cannot ever be fully adapted locally. There are simply too many layers of bureaucracy. From a race director’s perspective (my own, as the director of the Tour of the Battenkill), the rules are clearly written for Europe and they’ll never inspire a consistent and long-term schedule in North America, for example, as the federations themselves are bound to adhere to this structure if they would like to be represented on a world scale. I cannot speak from a UCI team’s perspective, but from my observation they are somewhat blinded by the singular objective of getting to Europe to race, sometimes at the expense of common sense, economics, and simple logic. It’s certainly at the expense of continental calendars. They too play a large role role in the lack of consistency with non-European calendars (and their own longevity). There are others. What’s the solution? I am not certain, but I do know what does not work. Perhaps that knowledge and experience are valuable.