Please UCI, let's try reduced teams.

[El Pistolero]

Re:

I love races with small teams, but the problem is that it will lead to unemployment for many riders. Logistically, it's not as simple as making teams smaller but inviting more of them to a race.

I'm all for it but we must be aware of the serious drawbacks.

The UCI added ten new WT races to the calendar. With smaller teams the riders could be spread more equally across different races. This would ultimately be beneficial for some smaller races to have a decent field as well.

 

[veji11]

Re:

7 man GT teams would mean no GC team carrying a sprinter - possibly sensible - but also vice versa. I.e. no Dan Martin at Etixx. Not sure if that matters.

Smaller teams (and short stages) happen already in women's racing, and while the racing tends to be much less predictable, you do still get the richest teams dominating.

More to the point, unclear how you could get this idea through the UCI/ASO/teams clustercuddle.

with smaller teams sprints wouldn't work as they do now, with each sprinter having 4 to 5 teammates pulling him along 5k from the finish line, we would go back to smaller sprinting trains : 1 pursuit track type of cyclist to pull from k5 to k1, 1 pilot fish for the last 700 and then you do it yourself.

Regarding rich teams dominating, of course they still would : A 7 riders Sky team is still awfully strong on a TDF : Say you have Froome - Thomas - Stannard - Poels - Henao - Nieve - Rowe... That's still scary as hell. The salary cap is another issue, otherwise you end up with a situation like in football where you always see the same teams in the final stages of the champions league. But that's another issue.

Regarding smaller teams I would go with 7 for GTs (I find it really hard to go below, its 21 stages after all you want a team to sill be able to sort of function after a pair of DNFs) and 6 for the rest of the calendar (from 8 days stage races to one day races) to begin with, but would consider going 7 - 6 - 5 with only 5 riders per teams on one day races.

Give us Liège Bastogne Liège with 5 riders per team and you will see a lot more action and quite possibly GC riders coming back to it because now where longer type of efforts can be needed (if the race gets going 70 or 80ks from the line) they have more of a chance against punchers. Same for more flander type of classic riders actually : a GVA or a Sagan or a younger Cancellara would have had their chances because as opposed to today, a more open race doesn't boil down to how explosive you are for those last 2 hills after 250k of racing.

With reduced teams you would probably see more Aquila 2010 Giro type of stages where a breakaway takes lots of times and throws the GC into a bit of chaos as well. It would basically open things up a bit.

 

[veji11]

Re: Re:

i'm all for it.

how many riders should there be in each team?

7 for GTs and 6 for classics?

For GT, still 9 but only 5 will be allowed to race per stage. So riders on going for GC can have a day off and participate only in stages that they can contribute a lot.

Imagine the carnage in every stage.
Say Team Sky, Froome, Poels, Thomas, Henao and Landa will line-up for the mountain stages while Froome, Stannard, Rowe, Thomas and Kiri line-up for flat stages.

Honestly Asero your idea is really completely contrary to what riding a stage race is about ! It would turn into some sort of crazy relay race...

 

[Billie]

The idea of having riders ride different stages in stage races is bad.

 

[ice&fire]

Those who put big money on big teams want predictability. Any attempt of team size reduction will result into a war between UCI and teams/sponsors. Which side will race organisers take?

 

[Jonhard]

Re: Re:

7 man GT teams would mean no GC team carrying a sprinter - possibly sensible - but also vice versa. I.e. no Dan Martin at Etixx. Not sure if that matters.

Smaller teams (and short stages) happen already in women's racing, and while the racing tends to be much less predictable, you do still get the richest teams dominating.

More to the point, unclear how you could get this idea through the UCI/ASO/teams clustercuddle.

with smaller teams sprints wouldn't work as they do now, with each sprinter having 4 to 5 teammates pulling him along 5k from the finish line, we would go back to smaller sprinting trains : 1 pursuit track type of cyclist to pull from k5 to k1, 1 pilot fish for the last 700 and then you do it yourself.

Regarding rich teams dominating, of course they still would : A 7 riders Sky team is still awfully strong on a TDF : Say you have Froome - Thomas - Stannard - Poels - Henao - Nieve - Rowe... That's still scary as hell. The salary cap is another issue, otherwise you end up with a situation like in football where you always see the same teams in the final stages of the champions league. But that's another issue.

Regarding smaller teams I would go with 7 for GTs (I find it really hard to go below, its 21 stages after all you want a team to sill be able to sort of function after a pair of DNFs) and 6 for the rest of the calendar (from 8 days stage races to one day races) to begin with, but would consider going 7 - 6 - 5 with only 5 riders per teams on one day races.

Give us Liège Bastogne Liège with 5 riders per team and you will see a lot more action and quite possibly GC riders coming back to it because now where longer type of efforts can be needed (if the race gets going 70 or 80ks from the line) they have more of a chance against punchers. Same for more flander type of classic riders actually : a GVA or a Sagan or a younger Cancellara would have had their chances because as opposed to today, a more open race doesn't boil down to how explosive you are for those last 2 hills after 250k of racing.

With reduced teams you would probably see more Aquila 2010 Giro type of stages where a breakaway takes lots of times and throws the GC into a bit of chaos as well. It would basically open things up a bit.

In principle I don't disagree. The Tour of Britain has six man teams, and that has provided unpredictable racing in the past.

I think ASO is in favour too, although I think the suggestion there was eight man teams and for logistical as well as sporting reasons. Perhaps a proper ASO-UCI divorce could see something like this happening...

 

[veji11]

Re:

Those who put big money on big teams want predictability. Any attempt of team size reduction will result into a war between UCI and teams/sponsors. Which side will race organisers take?

This is indeed the key. What is essential is for the stakeholders to discuss and realise that what matters overall is for the show to be good to draw viewers, sponsors, interest, etc. But race organisers are most certainly clearly on the reduce side. I don't think ASO is happy with how la Doyenne plays out every year nor how uncontested the Tour de France was this year...

 

[Randy Savage]

I have been reading stuff on this forum for years but this is my first post... More than smaller teams, I believe that the key to make cycling more exciting and less predictable is the introduction of a salary cap for World Tour teams. That would avoid the concentration of the best talents in a handful of teams, which would lead for more balanced rosters and force teams like Sky or Astana to think carefully on who they pick in their team (instead of just buying all the good riders).
Taking his further, we could even think about the potential introduction of a Draft for the young upcoming riders, with a format similar with what is done in the North American Pro leagues such as the NBA or the NFL.

 

[veji11]

Re:

I have been reading stuff on this forum for years but this is my first post... More than smaller teams, I believe that the key to make cycling more exciting and less predictable is the introduction of a salary cap for World Tour teams. That would avoid the concentration of the best talents in a handful of teams, which would lead for more balanced rosters and force teams like Sky or Astana to think carefully on who they pick in their team (instead of just buying all the good riders).
Taking his further, we could even think about the potential introduction of a Draft for the young upcoming riders, with a format similar with what is done in the North American Pro leagues such as the NBA or the NFL.

A salary cap would indeed be a good thing but it requires massive changes in the economy and the management of the sport : for a salary cap to be enforceable you need a situation where teams are stakeholders in the value brought in by the sport (tv revenue etc). Here the teams are private entities supported by a sponsor, they get no direct revenue from TV deals nor paying spectators of course. To have a salary cap you need basically to have money sharing between organisers and teams...

 

[SKSemtex]

Re:

I have been reading stuff on this forum for years but this is my first post... More than smaller teams, I believe that the key to make cycling more exciting and less predictable is the introduction of a salary cap for World Tour teams. That would avoid the concentration of the best talents in a handful of teams, which would lead for more balanced rosters and force teams like Sky or Astana to think carefully on who they pick in their team (instead of just buying all the good riders).
Taking his further, we could even think about the potential introduction of a Draft for the young upcoming riders, with a format similar with what is done in the North American Pro leagues such as the NBA or the NFL.

Impossible to control. This can work probably in USA, probably in some smaller league consisted from countries like Sweden, Norway, Denmark,Belgium, Netherland, Germany, Austria, Finland. Than we would have some teams from Italy, France, Spain and teams from Russia ( ho ho ho ha ha ha :lol: ). How on earth can you control the salary cup.

Europe just cannot do the sport as business. Only USA and Bernie Ecclestone can.

Europe has a lot to learn from USA in terms of sport business. What is possible in USA is and always will be almost impossible to achieve in Europe. (unfortunately)

The only thing we can take from their model (in certain level) is system of drafting but it would require complete structural change of World Tour, something Oleg Tinkoff was always dreaming for.

 

[myrideissteelerthanyours]

I thought they already had a reduced team size for this wacky event called ITT

Personally I am all for making the races more entertaining but I think first you gotta start with holographic paint jobs on the team cars and maybe some ramps that let you jump through the air, through a flaming hoop, then shortcut the rider close to the finish like in mario kart racing.

 

[myrideissteelerthanyours]

Re:

I have been reading stuff on this forum for years but this is my first post... More than smaller teams, I believe that the key to make cycling more exciting and less predictable is the introduction of a salary cap for World Tour teams. That would avoid the concentration of the best talents in a handful of teams, which would lead for more balanced rosters and force teams like Sky or Astana to think carefully on who they pick in their team (instead of just buying all the good riders).
Taking his further, we could even think about the potential introduction of a Draft for the young upcoming riders, with a format similar with what is done in the North American Pro leagues such as the NBA or the NFL.

What about the huge discrepancies in tax rates? You are going to have a big team purchase a license in the cayman islands or some other tax free zone and they will have a massive advantage over nations where the riders are taxed 40% or more on their income.

 

[Randy Savage]

Re: Re:

I have been reading stuff on this forum for years but this is my first post... More than smaller teams, I believe that the key to make cycling more exciting and less predictable is the introduction of a salary cap for World Tour teams. That would avoid the concentration of the best talents in a handful of teams, which would lead for more balanced rosters and force teams like Sky or Astana to think carefully on who they pick in their team (instead of just buying all the good riders).
Taking his further, we could even think about the potential introduction of a Draft for the young upcoming riders, with a format similar with what is done in the North American Pro leagues such as the NBA or the NFL.

Impossible to control. This can work probably in USA, probably in some smaller league consisted from countries like Sweden, Norway, Denmark,Belgium, Netherlander, Germany, Austria, Finland. Than we would have some teams from Italy, France, Spain and teams from Russia ( ho ho ho ha ha ha :lol: ). How on earth can you control the salary cup.

Europe just cannot do the sport as business. Only USA and Bernie Ecclestone can.

Europe has a lot to learn from USA in terms of sport business. What is possible in USA is and always will be almost impossible to achieve in Europe. (unfortunately)

The only thing we can take from their model (in certain level) is system of drafting but it would require complete structural change of World Tour, something Oleg Tinkoff was always dreaming for.

You have a point, it would not be easy to implement... but it would make the sport so much more interesting, I am sure that it would bring a lot of new fans to the sport... So UCI should really pick this up and define a new, better system.

Oh and another thing to get rid of are the sponsors owned teams - who wants to be a fan of teams named after national lotteries, medicines or phone deals? The Real Madrid or the Chicago Bulls became brands with the sport, why couldn't we have a similar club / franchise system in cycling? I am a fan of cycling since my younger age but the dumbness of its system always drove me mad.

 

[Gigs_98]

I'd love to watch a cycling draft, but I also don't think that would work in a sport with so many teams in so many different countries.

 

[rainman]

How about a division system as with football? Would save loads of riders being out of a job, although many would earn less. The scrap to get into the 'premiership' would ensure good racing at all levels. The GT's and classics would only be for Premiership/Serie A teams of seven riders. Probably impracticable but maybe worth considering.
I had thought of splitting teams but you couldn't prevent Sky B working for Sky A and so on. Better if they were in a different race/division.

 

[PremierAndrew]

7 man teams would make transitional 200km stages in Grand Tours tougher as well, and there's less chance of the sprinters' teams reeling the break in, making those stages more interesting too

 

[Cannibal72]

Re: Re:

I have been reading stuff on this forum for years but this is my first post... More than smaller teams, I believe that the key to make cycling more exciting and less predictable is the introduction of a salary cap for World Tour teams. That would avoid the concentration of the best talents in a handful of teams, which would lead for more balanced rosters and force teams like Sky or Astana to think carefully on who they pick in their team (instead of just buying all the good riders).
Taking his further, we could even think about the potential introduction of a Draft for the young upcoming riders, with a format similar with what is done in the North American Pro leagues such as the NBA or the NFL.

What about the huge discrepancies in tax rates? You are going to have a big team purchase a license in the cayman islands or some other tax free zone and they will have a massive advantage over nations where the riders are taxed 40% or more on their income.

This is an all-important point. Drafts and caps are also basically impossible under EU law (see: football).

 

[HelloDolly]

I think we need to identify what problem we are trying to solve but not as happens with Government policy solve one problem and create another

Riders are humans with limited endurance ...to ride 3 weeks in a 6 man team is very hard
To inlcude a stage like Rio in an GT is very very hard

What you do is you get a team to employ the riders who have best enduraance and then they dominate
And races become boring as riders are holding on rather than racing
Domination is controlled by money and teams with money adapt to the requirement

It might be a start to take a race like the Dauphine or T/A and test some principles and then see what factors come in to play , ie 6 man teams and no radios

9 man teams work very well in the classics because these are very hard races with spills

9 man teams have worked well in the GTs as many riders crash out, etc and with smaller teams you may handicap a team if they say have a rider crash and another get sick

I personally would like to see more done with parcours, bonus seconds, radios, power metres befroe reducing team size in GTs

 

[HelloDolly]

Re:

7 man teams would make transitional 200km stages in Grand Tours tougher as well, and there's less chance of the sprinters' teams reeling the break in, making those stages more interesting too

Sprinters need a chance to sprint too ...

Everyone likes the race which is unpredictable ...i.e. where groups are all over the road ....but believe me they will be come predictable fast if every day in the Tour as they are dominated by Sagan or GVA

Variety is what is recquired ..there are enough races to include all types of teams,parcours, etc

 

[SKSemtex]

Re:

I think we need to identify what problem we are trying to solve but not as happens with Government policy solve one problem and create another

Riders are humans with limited endurance ...to ride 3 weeks in a 6 man team is very hard
To inlcude a stage like Rio in an GT is very very hard

What you do is you get a team to employ the riders who have best enduraance and then they dominate
And races become boring as riders are holding on rather than racing
Domination is controlled by money and teams with money adapt to the requirement

It might be a start to take a race like the Dauphine or T/A and test some principles and then see what factors come in to play , ie 6 man teams and no radios

9 man teams work very well in the classics because these are very hard races with spills

9 man teams have worked well in the GTs as many riders crash out, etc and with smaller teams you may handicap a team if they say have a rider crash and another get sick

I personally would like to see more done with parcours, bonus seconds, radios, power metres befroe reducing team size in GTs

I kind of agree except the statement that 9 man team perfectly works for classics. It does not and it won't. There is no reason why to have 9 man teams that control the race for the leader untill the last climb. Try 5 man teams and we can have a cycling from first km. Even for GT 9 man is too much, even if we take crashes to the consideration. But I agree with the last paragraph. They should start with easiest things, radios, powermeters and parkoursl, bonus seconds, and bonus prices.

 

[MatParker117]

Re:

I think we need to identify what problem we are trying to solve but not as happens with Government policy solve one problem and create another

Riders are humans with limited endurance ...to ride 3 weeks in a 6 man team is very hard
To inlcude a stage like Rio in an GT is very very hard

What you do is you get a team to employ the riders who have best enduraance and then they dominate
And races become boring as riders are holding on rather than racing
Domination is controlled by money and teams with money adapt to the requirement

It might be a start to take a race like the Dauphine or T/A and test some principles and then see what factors come in to play , ie 6 man teams and no radios

9 man teams work very well in the classics because these are very hard races with spills

9 man teams have worked well in the GTs as many riders crash out, etc and with smaller teams you may handicap a team if they say have a rider crash and another get sick

I personally would like to see more done with parcours, bonus seconds, radios, power metres befroe reducing team size in GTs

They tried 6 man teams in Poland in 2013 and the results weren't great.

 

[Gigs_98]

Re:

I think we need to identify what problem we are trying to solve but not as happens with Government policy solve one problem and create another

Riders are humans with limited endurance ...to ride 3 weeks in a 6 man team is very hard
To inlcude a stage like Rio in an GT is very very hard

What you do is you get a team to employ the riders who have best enduraance and then they dominate
And races become boring as riders are holding on rather than racing
Domination is controlled by money and teams with money adapt to the requirement

It might be a start to take a race like the Dauphine or T/A and test some principles and then see what factors come in to play , ie 6 man teams and no radios

9 man teams work very well in the classics because these are very hard races with spills

9 man teams have worked well in the GTs as many riders crash out, etc and with smaller teams you may handicap a team if they say have a rider crash and another get sick

I personally would like to see more done with parcours, bonus seconds, radios, power metres befroe reducing team size in GTs

I disagree with basically all points.
If someone can't ride a gt with 6 teammates cycling is probably the false sport for him. A gt should be about endurance anyway. And no, teams which have money can't just adapt and dominate like before and honestly I have no idea why one would think thats the case. Sky right now has 8 riders in the tdf who are trained to control. Why should those riders suddenly get stronger only because there are less of those riders. What I understand even less is why it should lead to passive racing. Do you think its a coincidence that riders in bad teams are usually the ones who get attacked most.
And that leads me to the point that I don't really understand in which world 9 men teams work. Look at the tdf or LBL. Those were horrible races because they got controlled. The only really good gt's and monuments in the last years were good because the leaders or favorites were in bad teams (Kruijswij, dumoulin and contador in gt's, sagan and cancellara in classics). Imagine if sagan would ride for sky. The ronde would be great with Thomas, Rowe, stannard and kwiat controlling the race, right.

 

[hrotha]

When you take into account the road surfaces and, most importantly, the gears, it's hard not to conclude that cycling has never been less hard than nowadays. A solution to all this boring racing would be to increase the hardness, not to reduce it.

 

[veji11]

Re: Re:

I have been reading stuff on this forum for years but this is my first post... More than smaller teams, I believe that the key to make cycling more exciting and less predictable is the introduction of a salary cap for World Tour teams. That would avoid the concentration of the best talents in a handful of teams, which would lead for more balanced rosters and force teams like Sky or Astana to think carefully on who they pick in their team (instead of just buying all the good riders).
Taking his further, we could even think about the potential introduction of a Draft for the young upcoming riders, with a format similar with what is done in the North American Pro leagues such as the NBA or the NFL.

What about the huge discrepancies in tax rates? You are going to have a big team purchase a license in the cayman islands or some other tax free zone and they will have a massive advantage over nations where the riders are taxed 40% or more on their income.

A salary cap can only work if all stakeholders become part of the same structure based say in Switzerland which would centralize TV rights, contracts for the WT teams, etc... Then you have the same rules (taxes and so) for all actors.

 

[MatParker117]

The issue isn't team size with Sky it's that other teams with similar budgets haven't really spent it well or tried to be all things, Sky are so focused on the tour that there best nine riders are always at top wack in July.