The ongoing power struggle of the UCI

[Arnout]

So, Cookson yet again presented his ideas for cycling in 2017.

UCI president Brian Cookson has presented his re-worked plans for the reforms for cycling to race organisers in a meeting in Oudenaarde, Belgium. The reforms are set to come into effect in 2017 and hope to reduce the number of race days on the cycling calendar, which could see several organisers being forced to cut days from their events. Cookson is aware that he has a battle on his hands but remains confident of things going ahead as planned.

“There has been some resistance,” Cookson told Het Nieuwsblad after the meeting. “But with the flexibility we have in this system we will have it in place in 2017.”

Under current proposals the plan is to reduce the number of WorldTour race days from 153 to 120. Belgian Cycling President and UCI Road Commission chairman, Tom Van Damme suggests that this could be done by reducing the Grand Tours by three days and turning a number of stage races into a series of one-day events, such as the current format in Canada with the GPs de Quebec and Montreal. In an interview with the Spanish media earlier this week Cookson said that he would be prepared to cut the Grand Tours down from three weeks.

According to the report, Cookson also introduced the idea of a Challenge Tour during the meeting. The series would be a level below the WorldTour and would follow a similar format to that seen in football. The two series would work with a relegation/promotion system where the bottom team in the WorldTour would drop down and the top team in the Challenge Tour would see themselves move into the top tier. Ethical issues such as multiple doping infractions could also send a team out of the WorldTour and into the Challenge Tour.

Why am I struggling to see this as anything else than the ongoing power struggle between UCI and ASO (and RCS to a lesser extent)? As ASO owns two of three GTs and a bunch of smaller stage races with notably Paris-Nice and Dauphine Libere overlapping with other races, they stand to lose the most from the UCI plans. As we know, ASO and UCI have frequently clashed in the recent past, but an uneasy peace had been found in recent years. In my opinion, the intentions of the UCI to interfere with the most profitable cycling races is a new call to arms. If Cookson is really serious about this, I can't see the ASO not breaking away again. Since the dawn of cycling, it has always been race organizers who have determined when and where riders have raced. After all, cycling is not a sport with a fixed location, organizers are needed wherever races are held.

Personally, I do not like the plans one bit. Cutting all GTs down is a f*** you to cycling fans, riders, organizers and sponsors alike. I'd estimate that 60% of money in cycling is the direct result of the impact of the Tour de France, the sport event that benefits so much from the break in the football/soccer calender. Another 20% probably comes from the Giro, with smaller races just serving as preparatory races for either the one-day classics or the GTs.

One may or may not like the current calender and I'm not averse to some change, but I really don't get why Cookson feels the need to frontally attack the sport. Like I said the only reason I can think of is power. If this is the case, Cookson needs to go.

 

[LaFlorecita]

The reforms are so ***. I don't like any of the plans one bit.

Catalunya down to 3rd division?
Tour of Cali and Pais Vasco down to 2nd division?
Giro and Vuelta down to 2 weeks?
(Only a 2-week Vuelta and San Sebastian left as important Spanish races?)
One week stage races down to 6 days max?
Teams down to 22 riders?
Challenge Tour? (wtf is that anyway)

We can only hope none of this ever happens. Crookson should crawl back into the hole he came from. Bring back Pat.

 

[Sciocco]

Changing the GTs is a huge mistake. If they cut stages from 21 to 18, what do they cut exactly? No more TTT? Less flat stages? Less mountain stages? No more rest days? They lose out on using four weekends by doing that...

I wouldn't mind them changing the short stage races some though. For the WT the stage races vary between 5 and 9 days I believe? I don't see what's wrong with throwing a 6 or 7 day cap on them.

Does the 153 days including Beijing? We'd be losing a few days there. If they need to cut some more I'd offer up TDU next. After that? I'd leave the one days as is, hell some one days should be promoted probably. Maybe one of Pais Vasco and Catalunya is doomed from being WT which would likely lead to it disappearing altogether. Spanish cycling in general is ****ed. Poland? Probably done.

I wonder if a compromise can be reached with the Vuelta. My idea, note I'd prefer it to just stay a 21 stage over 23 days GT: Break the Vuelta into three separate stage races on three back-to-back-to-back weeks. Have at least one, preferably two be world tour. The winner of the Vuelta would be whoever has the shortest time from all three stage races combined. This would mostly preserve the Vuelta as a GT all the while reducing WT race days and probably allow for more options for riders who use the Vuelta as WCRR/ITT prep.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Each and every one of those plans is absolutely fricking stupid and shows absolutely no common sense, respect or understanding of the history or tradition of the sport.

There should not be any compromising. Each one of these stupid ideas should be thrown on the scrapheap of history along with the other borderline *** ideas that have dogged a number of sports over the years, like the idea to split football matches into quarters and have 35 yard shootouts modelled after hockey, gold silver and bronze medals at F1 races or the biathlon supersprint.

Back when the Cookson/McQuaid election stuff was going on, I said that in some ways McQuaid was kind of preferable simply because "better the devil you know". I couldn't have foreseen that Cookson's ideas would be this ridiculous.

That said, I don't like the alternative idea of split stage races for the Vuelta either. Frankly, sorry, but I think it's an absolutely horrible idea and arguably worse than Cookson's. The three GTs should always follow the same format as one another. Yes, the Vuelta is the runt of the litter, but if it isn't the same format as the Giro or Tour, it isn't a GT anymore, and then it isn't sacrosanct, and just turns into a long stage race that eventually becomes raped and mutilated like the Volta a Portugal has been where people are saying they should "temporarily" reduce the length again, knowing full well if it shortens it will never recover those racing days. What you propose is to turn it into a stage racing version of the Challenge Mallorca, a race where people care about the individual race days, but the actual GC is nothing more than a token trophy for the few riders who bothered to take the startline in all of the races. That would kill the credibility of the Vuelta far more than taking two or three race days off it.

That said, what's the problem with there being two prestigious races simultaneously? Nobody is going to enter all 120 race days under Cookson's pathetic idea anyway*. Even with 22 riders a team (in a sport struggling for sponsors in many key markets already, is it really smart to be making more riders unemployed and cutting down the race days where teams can benefit from their sponsors getting coverage?!) there's scope for 5 injuries/illnesses and teams still to field a team at a GT (9 riders) and another front-line stage or one-day race (8 riders). Is it really necessary to try to kill a race that's been going since the 1930s so that it doesn't clash with the fricking GP Quebec? I mean, I like the Canadian one-day races, they've been a lot better than I anticipated, but they do not need to harm the Vuelta: there's a good niche going on at the moment with both races simultaneously.

A maximum of 6 days for stage races is an insult to races like the Tour de Suisse, and makes a joke of a race like Paris-Nice, which now either throws in massive, objective-ruining transfers or is highly limited in parcours to going almost as the crow flies, and eliminates the possibility of TT mileage. All so that there isn't a period where we can watch two races on the same day with two completely different pélotons, because you know the French teams will still target Paris-Nice, and what Italian teams are left (you know, because the sponsors are hæmorrhaging away from the sport) will still target Tirreno-Adriatico. And the endless shortening of races takes away the factor that is recovery - it is often the fatigue of athletes that causes the most interesting stages towards the end of such stage races. Way to ruin that. Evelyn Stevens did 16 or 17 consecutive race days in 2014 (11-day Giro followed immediately by Thüringen Rundfahrt), so it's not like it can't be done. And that's in women's cycling, where the difference in depth between the top and bottom rider in the group is much bigger and the number of domestiques is greatly reduced too.

If this is the idea for the future, then count me out, and the sooner we get a head of the UCI who actually has some respect for the sport the better. The ASO should not stand for this, and in fact if they don't tell Cookson to stick his ideas somewhere painful I will be deeply disappointed in them.

*except possibly Adam Hansen.

 

[Red Rick]

I once got banned for suggesting they should kill McQuaid. I now want to officially renounce that claim. Cockson is the biggest ****ing cancer the sport has seen in a long while and somebody should put an end to his terror, it's been enough already.

I don't understand why there isn't a breakaway leauge already. Allmost all the money in cycling comes from the Tour, other GT's and other great road races, none of which are in the hands of the UCI (They only have the Worlds if i'm not mistaken). ASO, RCS and Unipublic should stand up to this crap and see how the UCI makes their calendar with only the Worlds and crap races like Bejing.

 

[Red Rick]

What is Cookson's background in cycling anyway. So far it doesn't look like he remotely understands anything thats going on to me.

 

[Dean1234]

I completely agree that the three grand tours should remain the same, as in 3 weeks of 21 stages and 2 rest days. However i think that they should be capped at a total of 3100km long in total, i believe that this years tour was 3600km, if this would happen then it may encourage most gc riders to ride two grand tours in the same year. I also think that shortening the shorter stage races to 6 days is also a good idea to simply prevent build up of race days and overlapping of events. I also think that these stage races are the chance for the spread of cycling world wide however this will come at a cost to its european heritage that some people may not be a fan of. This in my opinion should see the TDU stay and the tour of Oman and the USA pro cycling challenge date changed and to stay on the calendar
Finally in my opinion there should only be 10 one day races on the calendar, i think these should be the 5 monuments and then the other 5: Omloop het nieuwsblad, E3 harelbeke, Gent wevelgem, Amstel gold race, Flèche wallonie.
Obviously these are my opinions and i don't mean to offend anyone by them.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

There are 22 WT teams with up to 30 riders each, and there are still hundreds of riders going without contracts. There need to be more race days, not fewer.

Also, there already IS a plan to spread cycling worldwide. It's called the Continental calendars. If the UCI wants to develop cycling worldwide, it would be better served developing the sport outside of Europe, rather than killing it in Europe to make room for that, because what happens when those races fail due to having no heritage and the sport not having caught on there first? Some places like the Tour of Japan could sustain it, but the Middle Eastern Tours are in front of no fans. Seems to me Cookson just wants to turn this into F1, where everything's homogenized, no race is more important than another, and that means they can just up and move the calendar to whoever pays the most, which results in a large number of sterile, painfully dull race on boring circuits designed by the same man in front of no fans in countries with no interest or heritage in the sport, and teams can't afford to keep running because they have to keep jetting across the world to go to races. China has to bus in fans, Turkey sold 7000 tickets to a GP a few years ago (7000!!!) and Bahrain has had to import fans to give the illusion of an audience.

Part of the beauty of cycling is its accessibility to the fans and a link to history that is perhaps more direct than any other sport. How many other sports can honour as many historical monuments and events in the same race as a cycling event? Don't take that all away to fill the pockets of the UCI so that we can see soulless racing between soulless teams in front of zero fans in a sterile race atmosphere funded by oligarchs.

Ten one day races in the whole calendar? You do know how much easier a one-day race is to fund than a stage race, right? And how are riders supposed to develop the ability to do the Classics if there are only 10 a year, and specialists will fill the lineups at those? You may not be offending anyone, but I cannot possibly fathom how you can justify those opinions and still claim a love for the sport your suggestions seem set on killing. Be glad I'm the first to respond and not Echoes.

 

[Dean1234]

Listen you are not the only person with opinions. Why should Europe be the only place with world tour races. Make less race days on the calendar means making them more special and more important for teams to get them. Yes only 10 but they can ride races outside of the world tour as well just like they do now. Cycling has a bad image because of doping and yes i love this sport and have watched it for years i love the heritage of it and i want it to become the biggest in the world but the only way that will happen is to move away from that base and heritage and show the world at the highest level with the best riders, just how good it can be.

So don't go criticising my views, and saying that i don't love this sport when you are looking at it with such a single minded view!

 

[Christian]

Can someone explain to me the reasoning behind limiting the teams to 22 riders? What is that supposed to achieve? Thanks!

 

[janraaskalt]

Can someone explain to me the reasoning behind limiting the teams to 22 riders? What is that supposed to achieve? Thanks!

"The best riders in the best races". Less races on WT level, but most riders on WT are only allowed to race in WT races. Should make cycling more recognisable for the average cycling fan and therefore increase the amount of money for the sport.

We can criticise the new ideas, but more interesting is probably trying to find what makes sense in the plans. A lot of stakeholders are in favour, UCI, race organisers, teams, riders, so it can't be only bullsh*t.

 

[Swifty's Cakes]

Can someone explain to me the reasoning behind limiting the teams to 22 riders? What is that supposed to achieve? Thanks!

Teams wont need so much $$$ from sponsors and race organisers to limp from season to season and in theory it means the heads of state (copyright phil and paul) will race against each other more often.

Marketing men love cr@p like that, but from a personnal point of view I like to see the team leaders taking different routes to a handful of major clashes during the season.

 

[argyllflyer]

We can only hope none of this ever happens. Crookson should crawl back into the hole he came from. Bring back Pat.

You do know these plans go back to McQuade's era?

 

[LaFlorecita]

You do know these plans go back to McQuade's era?

Yes, but at least people then refused to accept them, probably b/c Pat.

Crookson is toxic. New cycling. Yuck.

 

[Arnout]

Teams wont need so much $$$ from sponsors and race organisers to limp from season to season and in theory it means the heads of state (copyright phil and paul) will race against each other more often.

Marketing men love cr@p like that, but from a personnal point of view I like to see the team leaders taking different routes to a handful of major clashes during the season.

Yeah I really don't see the point of having the same riders face each other over and over. It's a lot more fun to see different matchups every time and it also allows youngsters and outsiders a shot at a GT podium once in a while.

Basically Cookson wants to make the sport more repetitive and predictable (if there's anything even cycling fans will concede as a downside it is that the sport can be exactly that).

Sports brokers will love it though.

 

[Sciocco]

good stuff

I actually agree with you, but... It seems like many, if not a majority of those in power of cycling want to demolish the sport. There are some changes I would like to see but I did not notice anything from the released information. The sport could be screwed, I hope it isn't.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Teams wont need so much $$$ from sponsors and race organisers to limp from season to season and in theory it means the heads of state (copyright phil and paul) will race against each other more often.

Marketing men love cr@p like that, but from a personnal point of view I like to see the team leaders taking different routes to a handful of major clashes during the season.

Teams might not need so much $$$ from sponsors, but it might mean that sponsors with limited geographical reach see less benefit in sponsoring a sport when they aren't seeing as much in the way of race days for the key audience - the home audience - to get them some money back. Long-time sponsors like Lotto, FDJ and Lampre have comparatively limited markets, will it be worth them continuing if the French, Belgian or Italian calendars get molested to cut race days down or to make room for a calendar with fewer race days but with pointless races in front of no people like Dubai or Oman getting promoted in status?

You then have the problem that when a big multi-national company sponsors a team, they are harder to replace (see Mobile, T) - a team like Bouygues Télécom or Caisse d'Épargne were able to appeal to a strong national identity which enabled them to persuade a sponsor to step in, while a team like HTC, which was more successful than either of the above but without a firm national identity to call on, was unable to find the sponsorship money required.

These plans are aimed at making money through having more races with the showdowns between the big guns. But it will be making money in the Supply Side Jesus way. "Average income is going up!" because the few at the top are making a killing, while young riders who can't get to the top because there are fewer places on top teams, and because the top teams are beholden to do all of these races, they're reliant on a small number of wildcard entries for second-tier teams, are giving up on the sport left right and centre.

Nobody's saying the sport can't internationalize more. But doing it this way is absolutely the wrong way to do it. You can't just run roughshod over the calendar, mutilate the races that have been around for almost a century in traditional countries and that have illustrious histories, and wipe them out in favour of a soulless race in an oil-rich country without expecting some kind of backlash.

The best solution in my opinion is to get rid of the World Tour concept entirely. Nobody gives a flying one who wins it anyway. Let the organizers invite who they want and the teams race where they want as long as the organizers want them. Then the teams that have the interests in Asia can do the races in Asia, if the UCI want to give a leg up to developing races they can subsidize them and help them provide an attractive proposition to bring along top teams, and there aren't any wastes of race entries, like Euskaltel in Roubaix and Flanders, or the original GreenEdge team in the Giro when they got eliminated from the Teams classification for not having enough finishers.

Cycling's current model is far from flawless. But mutilating the existing calendar in the name of a hypothetical audience elsewhere is cutting the nose off to spite the face. They should build the audience elsewhere before they start killing races in the homelands of the sport. Because if the bottom falls out of those far-flung races and the support for them drops away (you know, like we just saw in Beijing), who will still be putting on races? The traditional countries. Oh, except to a large extent they won't be, because the UCI either cut their race days or relegated their races in status until there were no big teams riding and the organizers couldn't get the sponsorship interest.

F**k the UCI, f**k Brian Cookson, and if this is the price to pay for making the sport a bigger global deal, I'm happy with it staying the global deal it is right now, thanks.

 

[Afrank]

I never thought having Cookson as president of UCI would be this bad. Every one these ideas of his should be scrapped. Especially cutting the Giro and Vuelta down to two weeks. That has got to be one of the stupidest ideas ever proposed. Can't think of a better way to describe it other than...

a f*** you to cycling fans, riders, organizers and sponsors alike.

It's the fact that they are 3 weeks that many times gives us good racing and brings the factor of fatigue into play. Cutting down 2 of the GT's is good way to kill off that factor.

How about instead of butchering the established and popular races we already have, we stop trying to spread cycling to places that hold little interest in it and build up those established races instead? I'm really hoping ASO, RCS, and Unipublic stand up the UCI on this. These plans would do nothing but hurt each one of them after all.

Also, Libertine for UCI president.

 

[Red Rick]

Also, Libertine for UCI president.

Where can I sign/donate, or help with the campaign?

 

[ebandit]

It is interesting to see how different people react to the concept of change......especially those who don't realise the Tour (for example) has evolved constantly during its lifetime

Mark L

 

[Libertine Seguros]

It is interesting to see how different people react to the concept of change......especially those who don't realise the Tour (for example) has evolved constantly during its lifetime

Mark L

There's a difference between evolution and gradual adaptation of a race, and ripping everything up in one go and starting again.

 

[lemon cheese cake]

Thing is, Cookson was fine as the president of British Cycling. At BC he they are focused on developing young riders, and he was incouraging that. But now he seems not to be wanting riders get to where they want (The World Tour and Le tour) by limiting the number of riders in a team to 22. So currently young riders may not actually race in a World tour event but are able to ride for a WT team.

Also will the 22 riders include stagaires.

 

[ebandit]

To be honest I think we need to wait until he gives the rationale.....and indeed the actual decisions

Mark L

 

[Netserk]

Burn the UCI and burn the Pro/World Tour down to the ground.

And for the love of god, drop the damn anglicization of cycling. It's a continental sport first and foremost.

 

[ebandit]

Burn the UCI and burn the Pro/World Tour down to the ground.

And for the love of god, drop the damn anglicization of cycling. It's a continental sport first and foremost.

Really?.....the first documented cycle race was won by an Englishman

Mark L