The shutter speed was chosen to get a little motion blur. I find for fast panning shots on the downhills and flats about 1/200 -1/300 sec. works pretty well. I can handhold and still get motion in the wheels, background and feet but keep the main subject pretty sharp.
This shot was near the top of a hill. Riders were not going very fast. With the 300 f/2.8 I use a tripod most of the time. Not so much to keep things steady but dang that thing gets heavy. A tripod would work but panning a nd moving gets a little tough.
Great capture, Bill. What expression, looks painful. I'm curious about the exif data, especially that you went with such a long shutter speed at 1/125s. I'm guessing that's what you have found to work best to capture a sense of motion. I know that in other bicycling pictures you have commented that you like to blur the spokes, but this is head on. Is this the 300Lf/2.8? Monopod? Tripod? Handheld? Ok, enough questions... :-)
