Specific Race Questions...

[Eden]

Please forgive me if this isn't true across the board, but here, even if you start at the same time as another field, you are NOT ALLOWED to work together, and can be DQ'd for it. So, if it is a men's 4/5 field, and someone from the women's 3/4 group can catch, they wouldn't be allowed to work together.

SheFly

We may be talking semantics? I don't mean being on the course at the same time - that happens all the time (we usually have 3 to 4 fields running at a time on road race courses - with starts staggered by 5 -15 min) and no you can't work with other people out on the course if you catch or are caught by them, but if you actually start together - at the same time with the same lead/follow cars and officials then you are considered to be one field and they can' tell you to not work together. The organizer is obligated to provide enough support for each different field that they start - they're not allowed to tell any group to fall behind the cars intentionally...

Of course mixing the men and women doesn't happen much out here. Very occasionally they'll start the 1,2 women with the masters A,B men to give us 3's our own field. Generally the woman have an agreement to let the boys alone to race their race, so they let the guys start a break before they start to play themselves. What ends up happening though is as soon as the women start up, the boys who missed the break jump on them with the hopes they'll get pulled back up..... They drag the pack along and it begins to be very hard for the women to run a tactical race.

[aicabsolut]

We may be talking semantics? I don't mean being on the course at the same time - that happens all the time (we usually have 3 to 4 fields running at a time on road race courses - with starts staggered by 5 -15 min) and no you can't work with other people out on the course if you catch or are caught by them, but if you actually start together - at the same time with the same lead/follow cars and officials then you are considered to be one field and they can' tell you to not work together. The organizer is obligated to provide enough support for each different field that they start - they're not allowed to tell any group to fall behind the cars intentionally...
.

This is correct. I raced on Sunday with 3 different fields (2 collegiate, 1 USAC), and we were all 1 field, rolling out at the same time (not staggered). If the field that started 5 min behind us had caught us, then the 2 groups could not work together.

Things also can get complicated in crits where there are lapped riders.