'Marketable' Cyclists: Stage/one-day racers vs GC riders

[MatchstickMan]

I thought the Hitch and Galic Ho's (increasingly heated) discussion on the Vuelta thread (http://forum.cyclingnews.com/showthread.php?t=13803&page=65) does pose an interesting question: which cyclists have a higher commercial value?

My thoughts would be that those cyclists (e.g. Cav, Canc + Phil) who win 'regularly' across the year, and therefore fill more headlines and column inches, would be worth more to a sponsor than those who's presence on GCs (Cadel, Contador, Schlecks et al) are arguably visible to those outside the cycling community for less than a month a year.
Sponsors are surely more interested in the quantity of times of their product/brand is exhibited, rather than a one-off mention (outside the cycling press), whatever the quality?

Galic Ho's point on cyclists' wages being an accurate measure of 'marketability' is also an interesting one:

That list had Evans, the Schlecks and Gilbert on it as well as Contador and Cav.

Are you attempting to be a fully certified flaming imbecile? Wigans is paid more than Cav, triple in fact. Use your brain before writing balony. Cav above everyone in pro cycling! Bahahaha!

If that were the case, he'd earn more, but he doesn't. Contador reportedly earns six times what Cav gets. Evans, Gilbert and Contador will all earn more than Cav will in 2012. Your smoking crack if you believe otherwise or think his market value is worth more. Crazy English...come back down to earth champ and keep it real for a second or two. Wigans earns more at Sky than Cav has received the past four seasons. Not that hard to rank them on worth then is it? Don't be thinking either that his new contract will put him above everyone else...his market value will be akin to that of Wigans, aka, meaningless outside of England and other parts of Britain.

I've assumed this point relates solely to Wiggo's vs Cav's contracts?
The link between cyclists' wage and their 'marketability' is complicated the need for cyclists to negotiate deals in advance, and therefore the value represented by a contract dating back a year or two may not accurately reflect a rider's current value a green jersey later?

Quite apart from that, I'd assume that, like other sportsmen, riders also derive a large part of their income from sponsorship outside of their salary from their team (Cav's deal with Oakley springs to mind).
Someone like Cav, willing to give HTC-themed celebrations etc etc, and in the press for his bad-boy image almost as often as for his wins, makes him more attractive to outside sponsors, and therefore he may well earn as much as Wiggo?

In fact, I'd say that Cav's behaviour, combined with his more frequent success makes him more 'marketable', and to a wider audience, than someone like Contador who'd be limited to selling shoes etc within the cycling community.

I'm aware though, that I'm seeing this through the anglophone prism.
How do stage-racers compare for visibility in other countries? Is Rojas more marketable than Sastre (probably a fairer comparison than Rojas vs Contador?) in Spain, or is success the only factor within the home market?

Thoughts, peeps?

 

[icefire]

Those who win in July have less competition from athletes in other sports, as July is off-season for almost everything

 

[ingsve]

I think it depends a lot on the market. In a country like Great Britain, where no one cares about the rest of the year, what happens at the Tour is more important than anything and if you were to have someone fighting for the win in the Tour it would be worth a lot more in that market than if you had a rider win all the ardennes classics simply because the intended audience has no idea what the ardennes classics are and what an accomplishment it is to win them.

Using Cav as an example is not fruitful since he has not had a marketlevel salary since he has been stuck with a contract that hasn't been at the level of his recent success.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Risk/reward.

The Tour GC, and to a lesser extent the other GTs; certainly outside Europe the Tour GC, is more important than anything else. People still have to be explained what the points classification is sometimes.

For the sake of this argument I shall use Team Sky. Aiming for a Tour GC is very good, but very dangerous. If you base your entire marketing strategy around a GC man, you are taking a risk. If your GC man disappoints (Wiggins 2010) or crashes out (Wiggins 2011) you will be forced to re-assess your goals. Hence why after 2010's disappointing performance you found Wiggins actually trying in other stage races this year; last year he hadn't done anything to suggest his 2009 performance wasn't a fluke, because he had been soft-pedalling everywhere except the Tour. This year, he's proven it wasn't by podiuming Paris-Nice (albeit on the worst parcours in living memory) and winning the Dauphiné (not on the worst parcours in living memory by any stretch of the imagination) - but those don't really make a ripple in the non-specialist press in comparison to the Tour, and so crashing out after week 1 ruins the whole thing again.

Somebody who gets results all year round is solid, dependable, will get you a handful of column inches here and there, but won't get the same level of press as a TDF GC rider. Unless they're filling column inches with Tour wins, of course, like Mark Cavendish. But even then, when you have to explain to people the way the sport works, you're opening up the prospect of disappointment when they're informed that actually he's 164th and never going to win the race in a million years.

Unless you're talking to a sponsor who understands cycling, then stage wins are pretty meaningless; their prestige is quite alien to somebody who takes the simplistic view that "it's a race, our guys aren't close to winning, therefore we suck", less willing to accept that a GT is 21 consecutive races, and winning one of those constituent races is more important than coming 11th in the combined race.

Perhaps the way to explain it to a manager like that is to say that, say an F1 team scores 10 points in the season. Would they rather that come from one win (I know the points system has changed but I'm going back a couple of years, bear with me here), or from 10 assorted 8th places through the season?

There aren't many other sports that have an independent one-off event as a star attraction, but I'll try and illustrate with an example of another sport which illustrates the "GC riders in big show vs. stage racers/one-day racers in other races" paradigm:

Would a sportscar team owner trade an overall title in the American Le Mans Series, the Le Mans Series and even a class victory at Sebring for victory in the 24h du Mans? You bet they would.

 

[wirral]

http://www.cyclingweekly.co.uk/news/latest/345779/cycling-on-tv-in-2008-how-many-people-were-watching.html

These somewhat dated TV viewing figures show the relative lack of a viewing audience in the UK for a lot of very high level cycling races.

In the UK, it's still all about the Olympics for Joe Public, the non-cycling enthusiast, hence Bradley Wiggins & Chris Hoy are your marketing tools (no slur intended) for the mass market.

 

[spalco]

One thing about the Cavendish comparison: I don't think this is entirely accurate since as far as I know (correct me if I'm wrong) his current contract doesn't really reflect his market value as he signed it before really coming out as massively as he has in recent years. I think Galic Ho is probably right anyway, but I would wait until it's revealed how much he'll get paid next year to really judge what the "market" says he's worth compared to the GC guys.

 

[El Pistolero]

One thing about the Cavendish comparison: I don't think this is entirely accurate since as far as I know (correct me if I'm wrong) his current contract doesn't really reflect his market value as he signed it before really coming out as massively as he has in recent years. I think Galic Ho is probably right anyway, but I would wait until it's revealed how much he'll get paid next year to really judge what the "market" says he's worth compared to the GC guys.

He signed a contract in 2007 for 3 years with an option for an extra year(which he took). So he's indeed earning money based on what he did in 2007 and never got any bonuses. Cav's own fault for signing such a contract though, the Muppet.

 

[Forunculo]

Tour de France is an event in the league of a FIFA World Cup, Olympic games and F1 season. A TdF is disputed by GC riders and casual fans probably discovered riders like Gilbert or EBH this July.

An example would be Leopard Trek, Cancellara is a bigger rider within cycling but people know him through Schleck brother, almost Andy who only have a LBL.

A pre Tour time is the perfect example. You can see the hype of media for a top10 (Schlecks, Cadel, Contador, Wiggins, JVB, Gesink, Samu Sanchez, Basso, Velits, Cunego the Radio four, even riders like Vino and Karpets etc. For sprints only Cav exists, and maybe Farrar or Greipel.

In Spain the Grand Tours are the crowns, the classics and the worlds are only for "hardcore" fan of cycling. Freire is 3 times winner of worlds and people like JRod, Anton, LLSanchez are more popular. I bet few people outside hardcore know Flecha is a beast in coblestones. Sastre is better known than a young Rojas. He won a Tour, but his attitude is sometimes strange for many people is not a marketable rider in my opinion.

This TdF with Contador 5th the audience reach 4,5 million people, very high for spanish standards. You see that even without a spaniard fighting the yellow there was a loyal mass watching cycling. The Vuelta next weeks the same, people like JRod, Anton, Menchov and current winner Nibali are enough to catch people to tv. All of them GC riders.

But I recognized that doping problems hurt tv audiences, but suddenly a young spaniard in an american team directed by Bruynell appeared. But Tour 2007 wasn't recognized like a success because all big guns banned in operacion puerto and the Rasmussen leave out. But the Giro 2008 totally out form was the key moment for me and many that he was something different, the Vuelta 2008 and Tour 2009 against Armstrong mind games boost tv audiences. The Contador success in overall GC was the X factor you find. Of course the gold medal of Sanchez or Valverde wins in classics help the sport.

It's something related to spanish history in cycling, the first good ones were climbers, Bahamontes, Delgado and Ocaña remained in the memory because their Tdf win. Until Indurain revolution, a TTer who can climb with the best. From there the spanish GC riders are at least decent in TT except Anton or JRod. But climbers like Contador, Sastre,Samuel Sanchez or JRod are the arquetype of a marketable spanish rider.

 

[Boardslide]

He signed a contract in 2007 for 3 years with an option for an extra year(which he took). So he's indeed earning money based on what he did in 2007 and never got any bonuses. Cav's own fault for signing such a contract though, the Muppet.

In fact it was just before the 2008 TDF that he signed a 2year deal with an option for a 3rd. He then went on to win his 4 stages and as they say the rest is history. However it was thought the option was mutual when in fact it lay only with Stapleton which he took up last year hence the outburst at the coomonwealth games. Stapleton had a very good deal for the last 3 years paying only the minimum and was reluctant to pay market value now.

 

[bicycle_rack]

The idea that there is a direct correlation between salary and 'marketability" value is ridiculously flawed. This comes from the fact that contracts are negotiated prior to the work performed. Its safe to say that Cav is way more marketable then when he signed his contract and Wiggins is less so. Also I think some teams look for sporting performance as well as marketability. It's also tough because marketability for aficionados vs. laymen is so different.

In the USA I think TV time during the TDF and being an American are the two most important factors to being marketable. Most Americans have no idea there are any races other than the Tour unless thy live near a race that occurs regularly, California or Philadelphia for example.

Check out this mainstream article from the US for yucks, we got a lot of the same song and dance about Vandevelde in 2008. Danielson isn't close to the best American road racer but 9th in the latest Tour makes him "Lance's successor" just that in the eyes of the mainstream media.

 

[Swabian Lass]

I think that it depends where, and to what teams and sponsors.

In the UK, USA, and maybe Australia, I suspect that most people haven't heard of cycling outside the TdF and if your rider isn't winning at the TdF they're considerably less marketable.

If you're talking Belgium of the Netherlands though, sure the GTs are big, but a rider who does well in the Northern Classics is going to be very attractive to a local sponsor. Heck, in Belgium I believe that they've even got a soap opera set around cycling! Frankly, I don't know why they haven't asked Phil Gil to form a government yet.

In Italy, obviously the Giro and the GTs are big, but Classics like MSR and Lombardy are much better known by the average Italian, than (say) the Tour of Britain is in the UK. Riders who do well in these races are going to be marketable in Italy.

So it depends on the context and the market.

 

[icefire]

This TdF with Contador 5th the audience reach 4,5 million people, very high for spanish standards. You see that even without a spaniard fighting the yellow there was a loyal mass watching cycling. The Vuelta next weeks the same, people like JRod, Anton, Menchov and current winner Nibali are enough to catch people to tv. All of them GC riders.

If you had read last year the forums on digital editions of Spanish sports newspapers you would have never written the bolded statement. The average sports fan in Spain doesn't care about the Vuelta if Contador is not riding. Purito, Antón and the rest are nobodies. Not even Valverde or Samu escape that invisibility. And they watch the Tour because there's nothing else to watch in July.

 

[Nielsa]

Are online forums really representative, though? My experience with newspaper forums is that they attract a lot of very negative people.

 

[maltiv]

Most of my friends had no idea before this TDF who Gilbert were. They all knew guys like Schlecks, Evans, Contador, Cavendish and even some domestiques like Jens Voigt and O'Grady etc. Shows how much more attention the TDF gets than anything else in most countries.

 

[Forunculo]

If you had read last year the forums on digital editions of Spanish sports newspapers you would have never written the bolded statement. The average sports fan in Spain doesn't care about the Vuelta if Contador is not riding. Purito, Antón and the rest are nobodies. Not even Valverde or Samu escape that invisibility. And they watch the Tour because there's nothing else to watch in July.

It's not opinion is tv rating, cyling is important sport in Spain. A forum of a digital edition like as or marca is everithing but a solid proof. Maybe you want claim Messi or Ronaldo are the worst players in the world, one of the five-stars disccusions in these forum.

Most of avarage fans will see the vuelta. Also the entire football season because there's nothing else

 

[icefire]

Are online forums really representative, though? My experience with newspaper forums is that they attract a lot of very negative people.

You may be right, but I didn't read as many negative comments during the Tour in the same forums. Assuming they're the same people in July and in August/September gives an indication of how different is the perception people have from those races. Chats on the subject with friends and workmates also confirm that most people only watch cycling in July and they do it because there's nothing else to watch. And a race like the Giro has been for years absent from Spanish TV channels other than in the Basque Country.

 

[RedheadDane]

Unless you're talking to a sponsor who understands cycling, then stage wins are pretty meaningless; their prestige is quite alien to somebody who takes the simplistic view that "it's a race, our guys aren't close to winning, therefore we suck", less willing to accept that a GT is 21 consecutive races, and winning one of those constituent races is more important than coming 11th in the combined race.

Or that a GT has several races going on at once. Such as some teams will be going for the GC, others for stage wins, green jersey, polka dot jersey, white jersey, team classification and some teams might even be satisfied with simply getting into breaks for TV time maybe getting the fighter's prize.

 

[The Hitch]

I think it depends a lot on the market. In a country like Great Britain, where no one cares.

Fixed it for you

Of course there are some great fans from the British isles, many of them on these boards, but even the Tour gets almost no coverage. Just one news story per year - on the day of the 21st stage announcing the nationality of the winner (not mentioning the podium, the margin or the manner of victory) and that Cav won the last stage.

The fact that this story comes after one about golf and one about f1 shows just how much the British media hates cycling.

If you had read last year the forums on digital editions of Spanish sports newspapers you would have never written the bolded statement. The average sports fan in Spain doesn't care about the Vuelta if Contador is not riding. Purito, Antón and the rest are nobodies. Not even Valverde or Samu escape that invisibility. And they watch the Tour because there's nothing else to watch in July.

To be fair Veo7 bought the rights for the Giro this year which is pretty big as its the same channel that brings Barca vs Real Madrid.

Also i checked every day and every newspaper in Spain had the Giro as one of its big stories usually 1st or 2nd, though obviously thats a lot thanks to a Spaniard winning every 3rd stage and Contador doing something of note in every one.

El Pais actually, which is the main Spanish paper does have a lot of cycling on its website. Usually they only have space for about 4 or 5 sports stories on there and when theres a major cycling race going on (not just gts but also classics and some WT) cycling takes up one of those slots more often than not.

I always worry that the Spanish media makes a bigger story of cycling than the fans want. I never met any Spaniard who cares much about cycling, and i was impressed when one actually knew what the Giro was but in the media its there.

The infamous Marca of course just doesnt give a ****. Theyd sooner have the Real Madrid under 11s team on their front page than Igor Anton and they are the main sports/ tabloid daily but other than that there is media interest. Dont know about fan interest though.

You may be right, but I didn't read as many negative comments during the Tour in the same forums. Assuming they're the same people in July and in August/September gives an indication of how different is the perception people have from those races. Chats on the subject with friends and workmates also confirm that most people only watch cycling in July and they do it because there's nothing else to watch. And a race like the Giro has been for years absent from Spanish TV channels other than in the Basque Country.

Veo 7

 

[taiwan]

FWIW the only cyclists' faces I can remember seeing this year in the British mainstream press have been TDF stage winners' and Cav's in general.

 

[Michielveedeebee]

In Belgium every cyclist that wins big races and a lot of big races is marketable, wether it is in the Tour or Giro or a one day race. We rule

EDIT: Belgium = Cycling Heaven/Origin of cycling/everything cycling related

 

[Forunculo]

You may be right, but I didn't read as many negative comments during the Tour in the same forums. Assuming they're the same people in July and in August/September gives an indication of how different is the perception people have from those races. Chats on the subject with friends and workmates also confirm that most people only watch cycling in July and they do it because there's nothing else to watch. And a race like the Giro has been for years absent from Spanish TV channels other than in the Basque Country.

I told you before cycling dropped from spanish tv because all doping case from festina to operacion puerto and the poor prestige or low profile of riders post-Armstrong era. Think about Pereiro win, a decent rider.

Contador filled up the slot, and the feel of cleaner cycling did the rest. Alongside Contador there are more spanish riders who did good performance.

The feeling today is spanish rider have a superb profile. The cycling was/is/will be important in Spain. Even in rural areas is very extended sport. All of this riders we talking come from little towns.

 

[Mellow Velo]

Have to say that I find Galic Ho's posts in the Vuelta thread to be aggressively offensive. Seems to be his style, when backing up lack of substance.
On the Cavendish, Wiggins pay scale, we have this:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/more_sport/cycling/article6954505.ece

The figures are unofficial but the one quoted for Wiggins’ salary is £4m over four years and as well as thanking team manager Dave Brailsford and his backers, the rider should thank his lucky stars.

As opposed to this, from Sky:
http://road.cc/content/news/37397-mark-cavendish-set-join-team-sky

The contract that has reportedly been offered to Cavendish reportedly sets his value at £1.5 million a year.

So, that's 6 million over 4 years.

TBH, I think the balance of this argument varies from nation to nation.
No doubt Contador or Evans is more valuable than Rojas, or Goss in their respective countries.
However, no one will convince me that JVdB gets a bigger Belgian payout than Phil Gilbert.

In terms of media UK marketablity, Cavendish is way ahead of Wiggins. Outside the UK, this only increases, in countries where cycling a major sport.

 

[Ragerod]

There isn't a definitive answer. Markets can be defined geographically and the marketability of every cyclist will vary between them. The TDF is the only race with global exposure that reaches beyond cycling fans but that doesn't necessarily make a rider marketable. Cadel Evans won it this year but I'd be surprised if anyone other than cycling fans and Australians know he cycles for BMC.

The statement that wages accurately reflects a cyclist's marketability is hideously simplistic and naive. There are many variables that have to be considered and the comparison between Wiggins and Cavendish highlights most of them.

The first thing to consider is the time lag between a rider becoming marketable and increased wages. This is usually related to strong performances but there are expectations such as Johnny Hoogerland. The time lag for Cavendish has been years and it was about six months for Wiggins.

Then there is negotiating power. Sky considered it a necessity to sign a British cyclist capable of leading the team and there were only two options, both were under contract and HTC was unwilling to sell Cavendish's contract whilst Garmin was happy to negotiate. This could be viewed as evidence that Cavendish has greater market value because Wiggins was cheaper but the sponsors' objectives would have to considered for a meaningful comparison. In short, Cavendish meant more to HTC than Wiggins did to Garmin. Anyway, Sky therefore had no alternatives which gave Wiggins all of the power when negotiating a contract that ultimately would be far greater than his market value. His marketability to the British public was a factor but it wasn't the most important factor when negotiating his current contract.

A sponsor's objectives and team philosophy must also be considered. A less marketable rider may be able to negotiate a better contract because of circumstances and criteria that a team considers important, that aren't relevant to marketability.

Then there are other factors that affect wages. A Cavendish may settle for a lower wage if the team sign Renshaw and Eisel, this is ignored if we simply assume that wage = marketability, it does not.

Another thing, a cyclist can only do so much through his performances and to achieve his potential marketability requires active involvement from the sponsor. A sponsor that isn't related to cycling and has interests in several markets globally is best for this but Armstrong proved that it's possible to achieve without one. Lewis Hamilton is probably the best current example in sport. Vodafone have used him in global advertising campaigns which has sent his marketability soaring because almost everyone now knows who he is, that cannot be said for any other equally successful racing driver.

Basically a cyclist's marketability varies between markets and I'm confident that an analysis of wage compared to market value would prove to be statistically insignificant.

 

[Mambo95]

A few months ago Sports Pro magazine did a list of the 50 marketable athletes in sport (still active - so no Jordan etc).

Their criteria was simply "The list comprises the 50 athletes deemed by SportsPro to offer value for marketing money if signed today to a long-term global endorsement deal." 1. Usain Bolt, 2. LeBron James, 3. Cristiano Ronaldo

One cyclist made the list (at no.35 - one of the Beach Boys seems to be at no. 34) :

http://www.sportspromedia.com/sportspro_blog/usain_bolt_is_the_worlds_most_marketable_athlete/

Make of it what you will.

 

[rgmerk]

Stages are probably more valuable than a top 10 GC

One cyclist made the list (at no.35 - one of the Beach Boys seems to be at no. 34) :

http://www.sportspromedia.com/sportspro_blog/usain_bolt_is_the_worlds_most_marketable_athlete/

Make of it what you will.

In Oz, there's the Tour, and then there's daylight. And, yes, Cadel's yellow jersey has received more publicity than any other cycling result, ever (and rightly so).

However, it hasn't always been completely focused on GC. O'Grady, McEwen and Cooke got a reasonable amount of publicity back when they were racing for stage wins and the green jersey.

Sprinters who are winning stages would be worth more to an Australian sponsor than somebody getting 10th overall, in my view, not least because they would actually be featured in highlight clips that get shown on the TV news.

Cadel's World Championship win also got a fair amount of publicity, because even the most casual sports watcher can grasp that a World Championship must be pretty important.

I think the word is gradually filtering out about Paris-Roubaix (it's now telecast live on SBS), but I think a Tour stage would likely garner more publicity for a sponsor than a Roubaix win.