Personally, I can’t see it happening within 2020 as much as I’d like to get back to it. There’s only two ways I’d feel comfortable and those are 1) with a vaccine (best) or 2) an antibody test coupled with definitive understanding on how much / how long those antibodies convey immunity.
#2 may actually be only 3-4 months out, but I can’t see the US population submitting to the selective freedom such a social regime implies. Lest you think I conjecture, this is exactly the path Italy is trying to go down to get their economy at least back on one leg.
Skimmed the thread, so my apologies if this is redundant
I don’t think we’ll see any large scale (arena) sporting events until there is a vaccine and it is distributed to the majority of the population - call it summer 2021
I think this will create a huge amount of peer pressure on ‘smaller’ events like marathons and world tour cycling races and they will stay shut down until that point as well
Likewise, I expect this pressure to push all the way down to our local type events and it will be a non-starter to hold those types of events until that same point
Unrelated to races and sports - I think this will be cyclical - so we’ll all (staggered times based on where you are in the world) be set free over the July-September time frame, start to see a rebound in cases, and then perhaps another social distancing period in the October-December time frame. Possibly as many as three or four total social distancing periods before a vaccine is developed and delivered
Edit: Forgot to answer the other question in the title - I’ll probably race as soon as they start holding sanctioned events again, but not before. Will be dependent on conditions though - if hospitals are still overwhelmed and not able to deal with me in case of a crash I won’t race. So really, hard to answer without knowing how things will look when racing starts up
Hoping for CX season like others have stated. I’ve already given up on my road season and completely redid my training with plan builder. Just went ahead and deleted all of my spring/summer races. My first scheduled race for plan builder is September. So I’m back in Base.
Yup, Lumberjack. I’ve never done Mohican but that’s on my todo list. I doubt that will go in May. If they move it to the fall I may do that as well this year.
Yet, individuals like Pink, Chris Cuomo, Tom Hanks & Rita Wilson, Idris Elba etc…the list is long including professional athletes, politicians…who are not front line healthcare workers have tested positive. It seems here in the states, if you have enough money you can get tested.
I’m hoping some late summer/fall events may happen (I’m in the US), but my expectation is that they won’t happen. For the events that I have paid for I plan to defer my entrance fee to the future, as asking for a refund is basically asking to bankrupt most organizers.
The physical distancing/shutdowns are slowing the spread, but that’s all they are doing - slowing it, and if those precautions stop it will run wild again. I have not yet seen any description of how we can loosen the restrictions in the near term without increasing the number infected, with this increase being hard to predict or control.
Regardless of what governments or sanctioning bodies allow, I don’t think I would feel comfortable participating in any kind of group sporting event until the area that I am in has COVID-19 under control.
At a minimum, control to me means that all area hospitals have enough protective gear, medicine, and spare capacity to handle injuries due to optional, risky recreational activities. To be clear, this means that the nurses and doctors at the front lines are satisfied with their protection, not some proclamation from from a politician or health care exec that everything is OK.
I don’t know how/when we get to that point, but I think this is a pre-requisite for any kind of normalization.
If only it was just in the US. Money talks no matter where you go and having a personal physician on hand can’t hurt.
To be fair to Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson, they were both supposedly tested after being in direct contact with a confirmed case and subsequently falling ill. I can’t speak to the rest.
My personal experience on testing in Aus went smoothly.
On Wed morning I got a call from my mother in tears. She’s running a fever and her sore throat is getting worse quickly. There’s a cough developing. She’s locked in her car out the front of my brothers house thinking she’s exposed both our families.
She then tells me that her building manager told everyone that the contractor working in her apartment, and others, days before had tested positive.
The process for getting tested was simple enough and we had a result within 48 hrs. I went on a warpath before the test came back and found there was no official positive test result for the contractor. The dickhead had lied.
In that 48 hr period my mother had a skull and crossbones drawn on her door and the women who rents her spare room moved out in the middle of the night. All that in an upmarket joint.
There’s more than the virus itself that people should be worried about.
Don’t most sanctioned races require a UCI-approved license? And if so, couldn’t the UCI simply postpone issuing new licensees until they see fit to resume events?
I could also see insurance playing into this - not sure what kind of liability policies are required and how COVID-19 would fit into that, but insurers might start excluding COVID-19 related claims, or just not issue event coverage to avoid this liability.
My wife produces mass gathering events (music festivals, public celebrations, etc.), she has to have insurance for all the events. I asked her about what future insurance coverages might look like and she said it would be just as you stated – excluded claims and non-issuance.
Basically, put a lot of insurance companies into your 401k cuz they ain’t gonna pay out for anything ever again!
Given that contact tracing and tracking sources of infection is going to be important to relaxing the lockdown, this increases the likelyhood that there could be evidence that an event was in fact the source of specific infections. If a government health authority identifies an event as the source of specific infections, I could easily see lawsuits happening, especially now that we should ‘know better’.
And in the US, those getting infected could have significant medical bills to pay. It’s possible that even their health insurance could go after the event - they already do this for other 3rd party liability cases.
It’s sad that in the US (my perspective) many things come down to lawsuits…
