Full contact road racing (w/video)

[Koke]

Video below.
From AdelaideNow.com:
"DISGRACED Italian Elia Rigotto has revealed he broke down in tears after being thrown out of the Tour Down Under for headbutting.

The Italian rider left Australia's Matthew Hayman with a broken collarbone. But yesterday he maintained it was an accident and had written a letter of apology to Hayman.
Rigotto also said he should not have been the first rider to be ejected in the tour's 10-year history.

He was sent packing from the race by chief commissaire Michael Robb when video replays showed the Milram rider deviating from his line to headbutt Hayman, who hit the tarmac at full speed 300m from the line.

"I cried two hours (after the race on Friday)," Rigotto told Italian newspaper La Gazzetta dello Sport.

"I have been a cyclist for 18 years and never done anything wrong."

Hayman had surgery to repair the damage on Friday and the Rabobank rider is expected to hop on his bike in four days.

The gun rider had a plate and pins inserted in his collarbone after he hit the tarmac at an estimated 70km/h in the final bunch sprint.

Germany's Andre Greipeln then won the most dramatic stage in the 10-year history of the tour.

Hayman was discharged from hospital yesterday morning and made his way to Willunga to watch the race.

He said he held no grudge against Rigotto.

"I'm not going to be looking for him in an alley in the near future," he said.

"I raced with him for many years. But I can't say that I've talked to him very often and we're friends in the bunch.

"But he's part of the Milram team and I can't imagine that he would have done it 100 per cent on purpose.

"I haven't seen the footage. I've seen a couple of photos and it's scary at the time. But he's probably feeling pretty bad at the moment, too."

Hayman preferred not to comment on Mr Robb's decision to put Rigotto out of the race. "I was behind, (fourth in line) for the bunch sprint finish," Rigotto said.

"Allan Davis and Graeme Brown passed and I was behind Hayman.

"He stopped (racing), I had my head down and when I looked up I was close to Hayman.

"I tried to evade him and I lost balance. I hurt him.

"Immediately after (Hayman's fall) I went to Brown (Hayman's Rabobank teammate) to apologise.

"I'm concerned about Hayman."

But the Italian said UCI's sentence appeared to be extreme and he had not expected to be banned from the entire race.

"I can understand the decision by Robb," he said. "But maybe the exclusion from the entire race is too much."

Rigotto said he was keen to leave Australia as soon as possible, hoping to catch the first flight out of the country today."

[Pain Freak]

I watched that a dozen times and couldn't see it.

[katonk]

'Roid rage?

[Rob]

Looks like he was just looking back. Looked like an accident.

[Pain Freak]

stunts
since were doing Utube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5S2l9nlIkn0

[Pain Freak]

fastest rider in the world

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5V2FgwN_re4

[Tortuga]

Hey Mike try this link. Much better res. i think. Plus you get Phil's banter in the re-cap. Accident is yoward the end of this clip. Scroll down the home page till you see something titled "dirty finish line crash"

http://www.steephill.tv/

[dirtmistress]

Originally Posted by Tortuga

Hey Mike try this link. Much better res. i think. Plus you get Phil's banter in the re-cap. Accident is yoward the end of this clip. Scroll down the home page till you see something titled "dirty finish line crash"

http://www.steephill.tv/

MAN!! That was great! My heart was pounding! Where can I get this stuff? Is it live over here somewhere on the internet??
Anyway, it looked to me like he deliberately butted him.
Just a quick bam and then moved on. He didn't even look back! Adreneline in action! Like he wanted that line and that was it! WOW! Great footage!

[SheDevil]

Bad news...and more grief for the sport....sigh. Def head butt tho...I don't recall ever looking back by dropping my ear to my shoulder....but thats just me

[SheDevil]

http://video.sbs.com.au/player/news/...id=12&tabid=17

scroll down to stage 4 crash and sprint finish....yeh proof in the puddin...(or in this case, camera angle)

[katonk]

Wow. That video from steephill.tv really make it's obvious that he did it on purpose. There's no way he can say he was just looking over his shoulder.

[MTBMaven]

Originally Posted by Pain Freak

stunts
since were doing Utube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5S2l9nlIkn0

I really want to do this kind of stuff. It seems really fun. I just don't think it will happen at this point. But man it looks like fun.

[Jslow]

wow this thread is sucknig me in... the link by shedevil was awesome! Wish there was more cycling on the tube... or maybe I can keep checking back here and yall will give the heads up.

[No Peench]

It would be nice to see more cycling on the 'tube.

[Koke]

Joost has a cycling channel, download and watch on your computer (Mac & Windows).