UCI announces World Tour reforms

[MatParker117]

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/uci-adds-classics-series-as-part-of-worldtour-reforms/

Key Points

* World Tour remains at 18 teams which must participate in all events
* Three year licences with open system
* New Classics series made up of monuments and up to fifteen other races
* New UCI ProSeries made up of .HC and .1 events
* Fewer wildcards for GT organisers as top two teams from ProSeries would have right to participate (Wanty and Cofidis based on current rankings)
* Minimum of 27 riders per World Tour team


Nothing much to complain about really.

 

[staubsauger]

 

[Koronin]

Actually there is, by requiring all WT teams to participate in all WT events it means even LESS races for Pro Conti teams. California will ONLY have World Tour teams as they limit the number of teams to 18. There are other WT events that this will be true of as well and there are several WT events that some teams just flat out do not want to be part of and it's going to be a bigger strain on the budget of many teams. I expect to see even more teams fold over the next could of years.

Also believe by forcing the WT teams to go to all of the WT events it will have a major negative impact on many of the continental races to the point that some of those races very well may throw in the towel and disappear as they won't be able to get WT teams to show up at all because the WT teams are going to be stretched too thin.

 

[staubsauger]

This will cause 2008 all over again. Simply not acceptable for the Giro d'Italia or the Tour of California either. Complete nonsense. I wonder if they in fact came up with this mess to produce a final nail in the coffin for the world tour.

Time to implement the world calendar and GS 1 and GS 2 teams again! Back to the 90s business model, when cycling was on it's all-time high commercially!

 

[Koronin]

Re:

This will cause 2008 all over again. Simply not acceptable for the Giro d'Italia or the Tour of California either. Complete nonsense. I wonder if they in fact came up with this mess to produce a final nail in the coffin for the world tour.

Time to implement the world calendar and GS 1 and GS 2 teams again! Back to the 90s business model, when cycling was on it's all-time high commercially!

I have a feeling those aren't the only two that do not find this acceptable.

I also won't be shocked if you see teams send just the young kids to races they want no part of but are forced to go to. I doubt they are going to care what happens and will instruct their riders to just finish the race. I could even see them show up and after a stage or two pull their riders and go home thus having fulfilled their requirement.

 

[Red Rick]

The UCI never fails to fail to disappoint

 

[Gigs_98]

I like the new classics series and the "UCI ProSeries" if it helps smaller races while I don't really have an opinion about the three year license and the minimum of 27 riders per team. However I'm not a fan of the other two points. The good thing about the old rule of WT teams not having to participate in all WT events meant that race organizers couldn't just buy relevance as a race that didn't actually draw the attention of the cycling world wasn't sustainable. That made it harder for countries where people don't actually have interest in the sport to host big races. Don't get me wrong I'm not saying cycling has to stay European, it's just that the countries willing to pay for hosting a WT race often weren't the countries where I think cycling actually has a future (the middle east races say hello) while races like Colombia oro y paz which was a huge success can't become a big race because the organizers don't have the money and because of reforms like this it doesn't really matter where the interest of the fans lies.
Now I have to correct myself as I read the point with the fewer wildcards again and now actually think that's not that bad of an idea. As this concept favors teams that actually have success over teams that simply come from the right country that means some weak teams that have started a GT just to do absolutely nothing will become more rear while.

Edit: I'd like them to take this idea further though. I think 18 WT teams are too much and result in a weakening of the pro conti teams in general. Make it one or two less WT teams and give those extra spots to the best teams of the pro tour as well

 

[Koronin]

I like the new classics series and the "UCI ProSeries" if it helps smaller races while I don't really have an opinion about the three year license and the minimum of 27 riders per team. However I'm not a fan of the other two points. The good thing about the old rule of WT teams not having to participate in all WT events meant that race organizers couldn't just buy relevance as a race that didn't actually draw the attention of the cycling world wasn't sustainable. That made it harder for countries where people don't actually have interest in the sport to host big races. Don't get me wrong I'm not saying cycling has to stay European, it's just that the countries willing to pay for hosting a WT race often weren't the countries where I think cycling actually has a future (the middle east races say hello) while races like Colombia oro y paz which was a huge success can't become a big race because the organizers don't have the money and because of reforms like this it doesn't really matter where the interest of the fans lies.
Now I have to correct myself as I read the point with the fewer wildcards again and now actually think that's not that bad of an idea. As this concept favors teams that actually have success over teams that simply come from the right country that means some weak teams that have started a GT just to do absolutely nothing will become more rear while.

Edit: I'd like them to take this idea further though. I think 18 WT teams are too much and result in a weakening of the pro conti teams in general. Make it one or two less WT teams and give those extra spots to the best teams of the pro tour as well

But are you good with races not having any wild cards at all? California will ONLY have the WT teams as they will not expand their team limit from 18 and they actually prefer to have even less teams than that. There will be no Pro Conti teams there at all now. Forget how good they are, that also means NO CHANCE for ANY US based Pro Conti team to compete in any of the big races. I would expect to see almost all if not all the remaining US Pro Conti teams give up that and go back to being Conti teams as having a Pro Conti license in the US will become 100% meaningless.

 

[hazaran]

So they reduce the number of riders per team, then institute a minimum of 27 riders? What is that, a welfare program?

 

[tobydawq]

Re:

The UCI never fails to fail to disappoint

Hmm... Quadruple negative by my count. So is this a praise of the UCI?

 

[Koronin]

Re:

So they reduce the number of riders per team, then institute a minimum of 27 riders? What is that, a welfare program?

Don't they still have a max number of riders of 30?

 

[Red Rick]

Re: Re:

The UCI never fails to fail to disappoint

Hmm... Quadruple negative by my count. So is this a praise of the UCI?

Whoops.

Can't..... ban......myself.....

 

[Zinoviev Letter]

The wildcard decision arguably makes things even worse for PCT teams. It’s going to result in the same teams getting all of the invites. It also makes running a BMC or Cervelo Test Team, a PCT team that has the advantages of being WT without either paying for the license or having to compulsorily attend races they aren’t interested in, viable again.

A better solution, if they won’t make the WT smaller, would be to give the top 2 the right to first choice of GT invite, third and fourth second choice and fifth and sixth the remnant. Who the hell wants to see two sub WT teams at all three GTs? Quite apart from anything else, they don’t have teams to be remotely competitive while doing three.

 

[Gigs_98]

I like the new classics series and the "UCI ProSeries" if it helps smaller races while I don't really have an opinion about the three year license and the minimum of 27 riders per team. However I'm not a fan of the other two points. The good thing about the old rule of WT teams not having to participate in all WT events meant that race organizers couldn't just buy relevance as a race that didn't actually draw the attention of the cycling world wasn't sustainable. That made it harder for countries where people don't actually have interest in the sport to host big races. Don't get me wrong I'm not saying cycling has to stay European, it's just that the countries willing to pay for hosting a WT race often weren't the countries where I think cycling actually has a future (the middle east races say hello) while races like Colombia oro y paz which was a huge success can't become a big race because the organizers don't have the money and because of reforms like this it doesn't really matter where the interest of the fans lies.
Now I have to correct myself as I read the point with the fewer wildcards again and now actually think that's not that bad of an idea. As this concept favors teams that actually have success over teams that simply come from the right country that means some weak teams that have started a GT just to do absolutely nothing will become more rear while.

Edit: I'd like them to take this idea further though. I think 18 WT teams are too much and result in a weakening of the pro conti teams in general. Make it one or two less WT teams and give those extra spots to the best teams of the pro tour as well

But are you good with races not having any wild cards at all? California will ONLY have the WT teams as they will not expand their team limit from 18 and they actually prefer to have even less teams than that. There will be no Pro Conti teams there at all now. Forget how good they are, that also means NO CHANCE for ANY US based Pro Conti team to compete in any of the big races. I would expect to see almost all if not all the remaining US Pro Conti teams give up that and go back to being Conti teams as having a Pro Conti license in the US will become 100% meaningless.

Didn't realize that but yeah that's sh*tty

 

[Sestriere]

I'm a bit sceptical of the introduction of even more ranking based systems, like the classics series and the Pro series. Systems that reward consistend point scoring (greatly) over wins have lead to conservative racinf in the past. Of course this always depends on the actual details of those series.
What I'm really glad about is that there won't be a system of promotion and demotion for the World Tour as it can be found in many of European sports. Very often, the demoted team's sponsor would probably just pull the plug and the team would be gone. Fortunately, they realised this.

 

[Zinoviev Letter]

If this goes ahead it will likely see the PCT division becoming starkly two tier. Heartland country PCT teams, focused on their local GT and local WT one week races, will have to guarantee that they are one of the two strongest PCT teams from their country or die. PCT teams from elsewhere will have to be one of the two strongest PCT teams in the world or get few if any invites to any WT races. There will be a small group of teams, probably all or almost all of them from core countries, that will spend the money to try to guarantee themselves either one of the earned spots or the suddenly more exclusive patronage of the ASO/RCS/Unipublic. The rest will effectively operate as very expensive Conti teams or will formally drop to Conti level.

This will probably be compounded by the expansion of rider numbers in the WT. The WT is going to need maybe 40 additional riders who would otherwise be on PCT teams. That will lower the average standard of the PCT division. On the other hand, it will stretch the budgets of WT teams a little more, so making it a little easier for the more ambitious minority of PCT teams to compete for the signatures of a few marquee riders or regular winners. So maybe a few more Barguils, Terpstras etc, which would not be a bad thing in itself.

 

[Koronin]

Re:

If this goes ahead it will likely see the PCT division becoming starkly two tier. Heartland country PCT teams, focused on their local GT and local WT one week races, will have to guarantee that they are one of the two strongest PCT teams from their country or die. PCT teams from elsewhere will have to be one of the two strongest PCT teams in the world or get few if any invites to any WT races. There will be a small group of teams, probably all or almost all of them from core countries, that will spend the money to try to guarantee themselves either one of the earned spots or the suddenly more exclusive patronage of the ASO/RCS/Unipublic. The rest will effectively operate as very expensive Conti teams or will formally drop to Conti level.

This will probably be compounded by the expansion of rider numbers in the WT. The WT is going to need maybe 40 additional riders who would otherwise be on PCT teams. That will lower the average standard of the PCT division. On the other hand, it will stretch the budgets of WT teams a little more, so making it a little easier for the more ambitious minority of PCT teams to compete for the signatures of a few marquee riders or regular winners. So maybe a few more Barguils, Terpstras etc, which would not be a bad thing in itself.

I agree with you. I think within two years you'll only have PCT teams from the core countries and the rest will drop to the Conti level as they literally have no reason at all to be at the PCT level. If this goes through I'll be shocked if there are any US based Pro Conti teams as the ones left will just drop to the Conti level. They have no shot at WT races outside of North America to begin with and with the new rules have no shot at going to California, so why bother. These new rules look like a great way to formally kill the sport in the US. I'd also be shocked if Colorado race will last under these new rules and they rely on the US based WT teams to field teams as does Utah and they may also fold.

 

[Nirvana]

It's a concatenation of decisions. Bugno asked to rise the minimum number of riders per team because riders felt that the teams were reducing that with the reduction of team sizes in the races, to allow more riders to have a proper program teams need all WT races mandatory, otherwise with 27/30 riders some teams couldn't guarantee a proper number of race days for all the riders but all the WT races mandatory for all WT teams reduce the number of WC for Procontinental teams so UCI was forced to guarantee the right to race the GT for the two best PCT teams and the monuments for the three best, if they wanted.

I don't think it's a big change for the sport, probably the cancellation of WT ranking, the new one day series and pro series are a way bigger change, the races left out of this two new series could easily end up lengthening the already very long list of disappeared races.

 

[Koronin]

Re:

It's a concatenation of decisions. Bugno asked to rise the minimum number of riders per team because riders felt that the teams were reducing that with the reduction of team sizes in the races, to allow more riders to have a proper program teams need all WT races mandatory, otherwise with 27/30 riders some teams couldn't guarantee a proper number of race days for all the riders but all the WT races mandatory for all WT teams reduce the number of WC for Procontinental teams so UCI was forced to guarantee the right to race the GT for the two best PCT teams and the monuments for the three best, if they wanted.

I don't think it's a big change for the sport, probably the cancellation of WT ranking, the new one day series and pro series are a way bigger change, the races left out of this two new series could easily end up lengthening the already very long list of disappeared races.

Thus making the Pro Conti title/license 100% worthless to most teams as many races won't even bother to give out wildcards because they have a cap of 18 teams to begin with and with this WT teams will CUT the number of continental races they go to thus having continental race organizers scrap races if they can't count on around 4-8 WT teams showing up for those races. If you are a team in a non traditional country the pro conti license won't mean anything to you. I can there being no US pro conti team at all within 2 years based on this because they won't get ANY WT events. I can see a lot more current pro conti teams dropping down to the Conti level because the Pro Conti license isn't worth it to them. I also see more teams and races folding due to this. This is going to hurt the sport as teams and races fold due to these specific rules. The races the WT teams don't want to be at, they definitely won't be sending riders to do anything more than get experience or train. It will then make those races much worse to watch because you will have teams that don't want to be there in the first place and you'll have a major lack of Pro Conti teams to spice things up to even no Pro Conti teams because some of those races have capped the number of teams they want at 18.

 

[the asian]

Only the 3 GT's and 5 monuments should be made mandatory for WT teams.

 

[Red Rick]

Re:

Only the 3 GT's and 5 monuments should be made mandatory for WT teams.

Not even that.

 

[the asian]

Re: Re:

Only the 3 GT's and 5 monuments should be made mandatory for WT teams.

Not even that.

There's no euskatel these days. .

 

[Koronin]

Re:

Only the 3 GT's and 5 monuments should be made mandatory for WT teams.

I agree with this.

 

[RedheadDane]

Re:

Only the 3 GT's and 5 monuments should be made mandatory for WT teams.

Agree so much! Have the WT teams be automatically invited, but with the option to opt out. And whenever a team opts out the organisation of a race should be required to replace it with a Wild Card team.

 

[Koronin]

Re: Re:

Only the 3 GT's and 5 monuments should be made mandatory for WT teams.

Agree so much! Have the WT teams be automatically invited, but with the option to opt out. And whenever a team opts out the organisation of a race should be required to replace it with a Wild Card team.

That wild card can go to whomever the race organizers wish to invite. Depending on the race I would open it up for up to say 2 continental teams being able to get invites.