Petition to ASO to allow women's teams to race the Tour

[scholar]

Apologies if petitions etc. are off-topic here (I wasn't able to find out from a quick search). Emmy Pooley drew my attention to this petition to ASO to allow female professional teams to race the Tour, which seemed worth sharing here.

 

[Boeing]

Apologies if petitions etc. are off-topic here (I wasn't able to find out from a quick search). Emmy Pooley drew my attention to this petition to ASO to allow female professional teams to race the Tour, which seemed worth sharing here.

Why not. Maybe BMC can find riders who actually want to ride with and for Cadel.

 

[bikeit]

Sorry, thats just ridiclulous. How long before the peoloton dropped them?

Im all for equal representation of women's sport but this doesnt make sense.

 

[Ferminal]

Probably do a better job than Cofidis.

 

[scholar]

Given that the authors talk about the women's races at the Ronde and the Flèche, I don't think the aim is for a mixed race, but for a women's race along the same route, on the same days as the men's.

 

[manafana]

it could work on shorter route but i think womans racing needs to focus on getting tv cvoerage and more one day racing.

 

[murali]

I think women's races should be held on the same day as men's races in the same course (probably length shortened to accomodate for UCI regulations). In fact, iirc, T20 cricket world cup held in Sri Lanka had sufficient support and TV coverage for both men's and women's team. One of the famous male commentators seemed to be quite surprised at the level commitment displayed by women's cricket team.

A good idea to encourage women's cycling, and for UCI to make a bit more money.

At least if the men's race turns sour like last TdF, we could watch the women's race.

 

[Hugo Koblet]

Why bother? No woman would ever be good enough to follow the men.

 

[theyoungest]

Why bother? No woman would ever be good enough to follow the men.

I don't think the idea is to let them compete with the men. But I could be wrong.

It should be perfectly possible to let them ride at the time the publicity caravan usually comes along, for instance.

 

[diorgen]

There is no compelling reason to watch womens cycling. It shouldn't be forced upon TV or races when there is no market for it.

 

[The Sheep]

There is no compelling reason to watch womens cycling. It shouldn't be forced upon TV or races when there is no market for it.

I would watch it so there's at least a small market for it.

 

[mackie]

It's not that the women's ride whit de men but have there on race. les km's. but same finishing place's en almost the same track. Example the Guys ride a stage of 170/200 Km's start at 13.00 finish at 17:30. the women ride 110/140 and start at 11:00 and finish Around 15:00. People along the road see 2 race's instead of 1. when the tv registration start they can start whit showing the last 30/40 km of the women's.

 

[theyoungest]

There is no compelling reason to watch womens cycling. It shouldn't be forced upon TV or races when there is no market for it.

'Unknown makes unloved', as we say in Holland. Women's racing is often more entertaining than men's.

I agree that you shouldn't force it upon an audience, but what's wrong with a little bit of promotion?

 

[Hugo Koblet]

I don't think the idea is to let them compete with the men. But I could be wrong.

It should be perfectly possible to let them ride at the time the publicity caravan usually comes along, for instance.

Oh, OK then I misunderstood.

 

[del1962]

Given that the authors talk about the women's races at the Ronde and the Flèche, I don't think the aim is for a mixed race, but for a women's race along the same route, on the same days as the men's.

What is the typical time differnce between Men and Women as a percentage over the same course, would the Womens race be shorter?

 

[murali]

Why bother? No woman would ever be good enough to follow the men.

I don't think anyone wants a mixed pelaton. Probably the women's race is held before the men's race or after the men's race.

There is no compelling reason to watch womens cycling.

I think you guys should watch the replays of RR of london olympics. The women's race was more animated than the men's.

At least, in women's races you don't have a single person/team looking like the only option. The weakness of the current men's pelaton can be channeled to popularize the women's sport.

Those who don't want to follow women's racing at all are simply going to switch channels when the women's race is being aired.

 

[JetSet]

What is the typical time differnce between Men and Women as a percentage over the same course, would the Womens race be shorter?

Hard to say, but in Athletics and swimming women's world records are 10-15% inferior to men's. Women close the gap a bit on ultra events like cross channel swimming, 100k running as they have more fat to burn. I can't find any climbing records for women except for Mt Evans and the difference there was around 20%


Pete

 

[l.Harm]

Good idea. Start halfway or something, maybe some changes in tough mountain stages. Last stage would be a problem though

 

[murali]

No problem with the last stage. They can just have an ITT in Champs Ellisys. At least all the people waiting for the pelaton to come will have something to watch.

 

[GPdesAmeriques]

There was a Tour de France Féminin (also organised by the Société du Tour de France - now ASO) which ran between 1984 and 1989. I don't have details but apparently it ran alongside the men's race during the last two weeks (over shorter distances.)

The first winner was Marianne Martin (1984.) The other winners were Maria Canins (1985-1986) and Jeannie Longo (1987-1989 .)

I think something like this would be ideal. It would be longer than the Giro d'Italia Femminile and most importantly have the prestige and press coverage of the Tour de France. ASO organise the Flèche Wallonne Féminine and the Ladies Tour of Qatar so I don't see why they don't also have a women's version of their main race.

 

[Viking]

it could work on shorter route but i think womans racing needs to focus on getting tv cvoerage and more one day racing.

Cycling in general needs to focus on more one-day racing. And in some areas of the world (the US, if I may be greedy) it needs better tv coverage - especially for the one-day races.

I'd love to see women's cycling get better coverage, and am interested to see if anything comes of the various US women's teams efforts. They seem intent on working together to increase the sport's profile.

 

[hfer07]

Apologies if petitions etc. are off-topic here (I wasn't able to find out from a quick search). Emmy Pooley drew my attention to this petition to ASO to allow female professional teams to race the Tour, which seemed worth sharing here.

Bring back the Female TDF-but NEVER ever mix men with women.

 

[karlboss]

Bring back the Female TDF-but NEVER ever mix men with women.

In all sports I support women competing against men if they are good enough. In cycling I don't think there are many, any good enough. I think even Vos would struggle to take a place on a TDF team. I think she could keep up without much of an issue, but she isn't going to be competitive in a sprint, climb, TT, pulling back a break etc.
I like the idea of women's races alongside men's if the UCI wants to expand the appeal of cycling, why limit it to Africa and Asia? why not women? In a 4 hour telecast of a men's race surely there is time once the break has been formed to show highlights of, and discuss the women's race, which often involves racing more like days gone by that we, as fans, claim we'd like to see again.

 

[TourOfTexas]

If there was a viable market, there would already be one.

 

[silverrocket]

The TdF is already an incredible logistic puzzle, and it's already amazing that they pull it off each day. They might not be in too much of a hurry to add to that by running an entire woman's race in parallel, particularly since I don't see a whole lot of extra potential income.