That sounds about right. For whatever reason, the author, who is also the stronger cyclist, agreed to pull his competitor to 2nd place. The weaker racer also d

That sounds about right. For whatever reason, the author, who is also the stronger cyclist, agreed to pull his competitor to 2nd place. The weaker racer also did some pulling. I think the author allows his bias to show too much, because even having a weaker racer pull you for short intervals is a huge advantage compared to riding solo. More importantly, the author obviously factored staying ahead of the pack while agreeing to the deal. As far as I can tell, we wouldn't know if the pack would have caught the author and whether they would have all attacked, leaving him in 8th or 9th place. If the author wasn't likely to get caught by the pack, why even agree to the deal?