On Bicycles, and.... what else is there?

Team results after the women's road race, including the men's race, where results go 30 deep, starting with 150 points for first, down to 1 point for 30th. I extended it to 30th due to the strong presence of third-tier cycling nations in the men's RR results in the 21-30 positions, and surely these are still quality placings on this selective course in such challenging conditions. Team USA, I am sure, hopes to improve during the time trials over the next two days. pl team # points 1 Italy 4 203 2 Spain 3 180 3 Britain 2 158 4 Sweden 3 119 5 Switzerland 3 115 6 Russia 3 85 7 Denmark 3 67 8 Austria 2 62 9 France 4 59 10 Netherlands 2 57 11 Australia 3 53 12 Lithuania 4 51 13 Luxembourg 1 42 13 Poland 2 42 15 USA 3 41 16 Canada 2 38 17 Colombia 1 30 18 Belgium 1 27 19 Kazakhstan 1 22 20 Germany 2 21 21 China 1 15 2...

The Olympic Road Race shares an otherwise rare trait with the World Championships in that, as a professional bike race, members of the same team don't each ride the same bike. National teams are typically composed of members of more than one trade team, where riders use the bikes assigned by their trade teams. So an analysis of results by bike goes beyond an analysis of teams. I used the following formula for points for a placing, rounding to the nearest integer: points = 21 - place + 80 [ exp([1 - place] / 2] - exp(-10) ] In other words, for places 1 - 20: 100,68,47,35,27,22,18,15,13,12,11,9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1 The results: despite missing out on the gold and silver, Cervelo takes the top honors over Orbea. With 4 Orbea-sponsored Webcor/Alto Velo women in the women's race, Orbea has a good chance to take the road overall, but Cervelo sponsors the powerful Cervelo-Life Force team including Team USA's top rider Kristen Armstrong, so could well hold onto its top place. Of cou...