Battle for 2023-2025 WT licenses

[pastronef]

How much money did Sylvan Adams 'donate' to the UCI to make that one happen? Absolutely disgraceful.

what you on about? fantasy

 

[Tim Cahill]

I was just thinking last night we need 20 teams, minimum, maybe 25, with 10 riders per race.

Shorter time trials as well(maybe scrap them entirely), with short, action packed stages for the casual viewers like T20 cricket but with cycling, and better communication devices too certainly.

 

[tobydawq]

Oh I genuinly thought those decisions were made because of safety reasons. But that definitely hasn't helped at all so...

It hasn't? Have you been doing statistical analysis?

 

[saunaking]

SERIOUSLY UCI???

Even as a LTS fan, what a fking joke. You've made teams doing horribly stupid things for months now for this??

I know there has been a a lot of teams lobbying for this for a while but I also thought UCI always said no.

Just to be clear, the article just says UCI is thinking about having 20 WT teams, not that it has been confirmed.

If anyone is surprised by this they havent been paying attention for the past 20 years
this was almost always going to be the outcome

 

[tobydawq]

I was just thinking last night we need 20 teams, minimum, maybe 25, with 10 riders per race.

Shorter time trials as well(maybe scrap them entirely), with short, action packed stages for the casual viewers like T20 cricket but with cycling, and better communication devices too certainly.

There may be a few posters like LS, Netserk and Bavarianrider who agree with that but I don't think there will be unanimous excitement about those proposals.

 

[Samamba]

It hasn't? Have you been doing statistical analysis?

This is a forum I really don't need some significant statistical evidence to state something. I really don't have the feeling 2 teams more or less does anything to safety no.

 

[tobydawq]

This is a forum I really don't need some significant statistical evidence to state something. I really don't have the feeling 2 teams more or less does anything to safety no.

It sounded more like you thought that crashes had gotten worse which I really don't think is the case.

 

[Netserk]

There may be a few posters like LS, Netserk and Bavarianrider who agree with that but I don't think there will be unanimous excitement about those proposals.

Huh? I welcome 25 teams in races.

 

[BR2]

I am struggling to understand which posts here are serious and which are sarcasm.

 

[tobydawq]

Huh? I welcome 25 teams in races.

But scrapping time trials and only doing short stages?

 

[Izzyeviel]

So, what happens when in the next cycle we have 21 teams battling for the top 20 & Lotto are 21st, do we just keep increasing the number of WT teams to save Lotto?

 

[Samamba]

So, what happens when in the next cycle we have 21 teams battling for the top 20 & Lotto are 21st, do we just keep increasing the number of WT teams to save Lotto?

You do realize Israel is deadlast and not Lotto right? If you honestly think this is to save Lotto, the only team that probably somewhat survives being PCT, you're just straight up dumb. It's not Lotto that's threatening the UCI with legal action.

 

[Samamba]

UCI ontkent dat WorldTour zou uitgebreid worden tot 20 teams

Volgens Cyclingnews overweegt de UCI het promotie/degradatie-probleem op te lossen door het aantal WorldTeams uit te breiden van achttien naar twintig. Zo zou een einde aan de felbesproken degradatiestrijd komen. Maar vanuit de UCI wordt dit nieuws ons ontkend. Volgens onze bronnen zou er zelfs...

www.wielerflits.nl

UCI denies the Cyclingnews article.

 

[pastronef]

You do realize Israel is deadlast and not Lotto right? If you honestly think this is to save Lotto, the only team that probably somewhat survives being PCT, you're just straight up dumb. It's not Lotto that's threatening the UCI with legal action.

every team and sponsor in DANGER of being relegated could threatening UCI with legal action. too much at stake. sponsor and riders could leave if the team is relegated, jobs are in danger. do you think Israel alone is ready to go with legal action? open the focus.
also, Israel has no money problem if they get relegated. Lotto could have

 

[Sciatic]

Cycling has always struggled to secure long term funding for WT teams with many teams coming and going over the journey. Now that we have 20 teams who have the money to invest in the WT it seems crazy for the UCI to say we don't need your money and possibly lose investment in the sport.

That’s interesting—I didn’t think of that perspective.

 

[Sciatic]

There may be a few posters like LS, Netserk and Bavarianrider who agree with that but I don't think there will be unanimous excitement about those proposals.

Ha-ha.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Well, the other thing is that Israel probably have more invested in salaries and so on for next year at this stage as well as being more dependent on their WT status than Lotto I guess, Lotto do at least have the ability to fight back via the large number of French, Belgian and Dutch smaller races if they really go nuts on them, like Vacansoleil did in 2010 but I can imagine that they can fall back on the domestic and regional races to their sponsors more readily than Israel-PremierTech.

Whoever got into the danger zone, they were always likely to challenge it though; given the years it was covering, the number of cancelled races in 2020 and 2021, the way being based in or having riders located in particular towns or countries significantly impacted rider availability and indeed riders' ability to train and hold form, and rider withdrawals from races enforced by Covid that could award free points to other teams (as well as other circumstances outside of teams' control like the cancellation of the Tour of Britain), meaning that teams didn't have the same level of control over their own destiny that they would in an ordinary period.

At the same time, I do have some sense that, you know, lots of these teams have chosen to go a different way around resolving the problem and it seems Adams' group have been somewhat caught out. BikeExchange and Lotto have farmed points at small races. EF to a lesser extent, but they've also spammed breakaways and targeted a few races that other teams aren't travelling to. Movistar have buried their heads in the sand pretending it won't happen to them until very late in the day, but have now doubled down on Mas at the Vuelta and started scattergunning their top riders around everywhere possible to pick up points. ISN got into a very poor position and while yes, some of the issues like Hagen crashing out of the Vuelta GC right at the start is unfortunatey, they also had the problem that they'd spent a lot of money on the likes of Froome who were not contributing points at anything like the level they would have been hoping for when he was signed, and so this limited their options to respond to the points crisis unless they threw even more money at the problem, with things like the Dylan Teuns transfer being a desperation move and only coming when they were already well down on 19th place, and I think they've done too little too late; Movistar reacted too slowly but they seemingly had enough banked that once they took action they could do enough fairly quickly (plus getting that huge slice of fortune in Britain of course, handing Serrano 200 points and moving him into their top 10), but Lotto and BEX were taking action way before Israel recognised the need to.

That’s interesting—I didn’t think of that perspective.

Well, at the same time, you've got to look at the enormous parallel shrinking away of investment in the ProTeam level. It has been something of a PremierLeagueification of the sport, there's now more investment in the top level, but it's then concentrated all of the talent into a small number of teams and reduced the ProTeams to largely being irrelevant break fodder with only one or two teams as exceptions, whereas if you look at the late 2000s/early 2010s you can see a large number of very competitive ProConti teams who were contributing favourites to every Classic (this is the one area they do compete similarly here, with Mathieu van der Poel) and almost every major stage race, with the likes of Voeckler, Scarponi, Garzelli, Marcato, Mosquera, Sastre, di Luca, Petacchi, Visconti, Hoogerland, Pozzovivo, Leukemans, Carrara, de Waele, Tondó, Hushovd, Haussler, Moncoutié, Taaramäe, Keukeleire, Evans, Hincapie, Ballan, Kristoff and Rujano all riding at that level in a short period of time.

 

[triley36]

Just mentioned on GCN broadcast of Quebec that UCI just released a press statement saying the rules will stand.

 

[Samamba]

UCI declaration concerning the awarding of UCI WorldTour licences for the 2023-2025 period

www.uci.org

So Cyclingnews just made something up. Nothing new.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

UCI declaration concerning the awarding of UCI WorldTour licences for the 2023-2025 period

www.uci.org

So Cyclingnews just made something up. Nothing new.

Either that or somebody fed them the story to try to pressure it, a bit like when someone at AquaBlue prematurely leaked merger information and caused said move to fall apart.

 

[Eddy Evenepoel]

As UCI says game is still on:
Matthews 2nd and Cortina 5th in Québec tonight. Big points for BEX and Movistar.

No Lotto or Israel in the top 20.

 

[Valv.Piti]

As UCI says game is still on:
Matthews 2nd and Cortina 5th in Québec tonight. Big points for BEX and Movistar.

No Lotto or Israel in the top 20.

I really like this relegation battle. Its adds some much needed spice for lots of races. Now, we can argue it could have been done a lot different, but its super interesting to follow and has been for a while now. I like it.

 

[Samamba]

So that was it. As expected, after this weekend the battle is done and dusted.

The difference between 18th and 19th place will be a 1000 points.

 

[yaco]

I doubt Stephen Farrand would write the article without solid sources and at the same time of course the UCI will deny the contents of the article.

 

[Eddy Evenepoel]

I really like this relegation battle. Its adds some much needed spice for lots of races. Now, we can argue it could have been done a lot different, but its super interesting to follow and has been for a while now. I like it.

It should happen every year! Or atleast every second year. Then it wouldn’t be such a disaster to be relegated as you quite quickly could bounce back. Now with a 3 year perspective I think that looks more overwhelming for teams and sponsors getting relegated.