Who else thinks the UK can handle a one day race now?

[Cult Classics]

The Leeds/Brighton/Rochester classic died a death in the mid 90s and the world cup race went to Hamburg instead, mostly because nobody cared. But the crowds yesterday were unlike anything I've ever seen in a bike race before, and given the wave of cycling euphoria now I think the UK could handle a single day race every year.

Suggestions?

I think something in that week or two after the Tour, when people are most likely to pay attention to it. Let's leave San Sebastian in its traditional non-2012 spot right after the Tour and stick a race in the UK the Saturday/Sunday after that. Either something similar to the race yesterday, or something like London to Brighton with a ride down to the coast and then a few laps of a circuit before a seafront finish. Maybe combine it with an amateur event - pros Saturday, amateurs Sunday or vice versa. Now or never to capitalise on this cycling wave! Yesterday was the first time since 2007 that top level cycling was in the UK (2.1 races don't count), and at the moment the next time decent racing will return to these shores after the Olympics will be if Yorkshire or Scotland can get the start of the Tour 2016.

 

[Richeypen]

There were rumours of a one day race around South Wales. Don't know how far the plans got though.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

I'd say, actually, hold it the week before the Tour of Britain, to tempt teams to stick around for that. If they hold it in London (which would be the most likely and the best in terms of crowds and to make it feel 'special' with the landmarks and everything, but with full size WT teams probably quite dull and sprint-tastic I'm afraid, unlike yesterday. The parcours lends itself for being a summer version of KBK if you have eight man teams), then that removes the tendency to go for the London finish in the ToB and opens up new opportunities for that race too.

 

[Panda Claws]

Lol they can have it.

The real question is how long it will take for that race to become prestigious, if ever.

 

[User Guide]

I'd say, actually, hold it the week before the Tour of Britain, to tempt teams to stick around for that. If they hold it in London (which would be the most likely and the best in terms of crowds and to make it feel 'special' with the landmarks and everything, but with full size WT teams probably quite dull and sprint-tastic I'm afraid, unlike yesterday. The parcours lends itself for being a summer version of KBK if you have eight man teams), then that removes the tendency to go for the London finish in the ToB and opens up new opportunities for that race too.

IM not so sure about the crowds ,the commonwealth games in Manchester had enormous crowds for cycling road race.However as has been shown in the ToB which makes pityful use of what should be the perfect geography for a one week race;its where its financially viable.
Personally id like to see a one day race around ribble valley/trough of bowland area finsishing with a couple of laps of pendle hill ending on the nic of pendle all Mur de Huy styleee lol.It would be epic if the weathers good you have the beauty of ribble/Bowland if its not pendle hill is really brooding in cr**py weather so equally good.

Edit: S.Wales good too just please anywhere but farkkin London

 

[Cult Classics]

Lol they can have it.

The real question is how long it will take for that race to become prestigious, if ever.

It doesn't have to be the next Paris-Roubaix, that's not the point. Just something like Hamburg or Montreal - a chance to see top riders in your country, a fun day out, and hopefully a chance for you to ride the same course as the pros the day before/after. A race like that, crowds lined along the roads from start to finish, has to be better than empty roads in Poland or China.

 

[El Pistolero]

We don't need another one day race on Mark's palmares.

 

[SirLes]

I live near brighton and have often thought that the seafront would make a beautiful finishing straight.
Ditching beacon just before the finish and talking advantage of the north and south downs plus ashdown forest would enable a suitably challenging course. You could start near London or even the centre and there are large population centres all around that area which would guarantee big crowds IMO. (especially Brighton)

With the numbers of big rallies that go from London to Brighton (cycles, motorbikes, scooters, classic cars, minis etc) the police have experience of large events and Brighton itself hosts big events.

There are several sportives already in the area and linking one to the pro race would be popular.

I would love to see a one day race with a good field come to the UK and I think the money and support would be there.

 

[will10]

We could call it the Cavendish Classic.

 

[Don't be late Pedro]

We could call it the Cavendish Classic.

And then make it a hilly circuit just for the irony value.

 

[The Hitch]

This reminds me of that race London was supposed to have which "we hope in 5 years will be as big as Paris Roubaix"

 

[Libertine Seguros]

This reminds me of that race London was supposed to have which "we hope in 5 years will be as big as Paris Roubaix"

Wasn't it going to be 160km and part of the Olympic legacy program, so probably similar to the race yesterday but with far fewer laps of Box Hill (maybe more like today's race in route then?)?

Yup, that'll be as big as Paris-Roubaix in 5 years.

Still, Japan host the Japan Cup on the course they had the Worlds on and Beijing are putting parts of their Olympic RR into their Tour, so I guess they may be able to put it together. Don't think they'd get crowds quite the same as yesterday's for it though - loads of cycling fans for sure but Olympic fever certainly helped the crowd volume.

 

[Dead Star]

What happened to that Rutland one day race? The one on the farm roads.

 

[Dr.Sahl]

Lol they can have it.

The real question is how long it will take for that race to become prestigious, if ever.

+1

I agree

 

[Panda Claws]

It doesn't have to be the next Paris-Roubaix, that's not the point. Just something like Hamburg or Montreal - a chance to see top riders in your country, a fun day out, and hopefully a chance for you to ride the same course as the pros the day before/after. A race like that, crowds lined along the roads from start to finish, has to be better than empty roads in Poland or China.

No, but some races just never 'make it'. The 2 canadian classics are a good example of newer races who got rather prestigious pretty fast, but on the other hand you've got races like all these small French and Italian classics that nobody really cares about.

But a British classic would have the advantage of being made WorldTour pretty fast.

 

[hrotha]

Lol they can have it.

The real question is how long it will take for that race to become prestigious, if ever.

Nothing wrong with having a new 1.1 or 1.2 race.

 

[LugHugger]

What happened to that Rutland one day race? The one on the farm roads.

The Rutland CiCle Classic? Still going strong, still the UKs highest ranking annual one day race. One of my fave's, rode the sportive over the pro course 3 weeks ago.

 

[The Hitch]

Wasn't it going to be 160km and part of the Olympic legacy program, so probably similar to the race yesterday but with far fewer laps of Box Hill (maybe more like today's race in route then?)?

Yup, that'll be as big as Paris-Roubaix in 5 years.

Still, Japan host the Japan Cup on the course they had the Worlds on and Beijing are putting parts of their Olympic RR into their Tour, so I guess they may be able to put it together. Don't think they'd get crowds quite the same as yesterday's for it though - loads of cycling fans for sure but Olympic fever certainly helped the crowd volume.

I dont think there were many cycling fans at all. The place exploded with laughter when they heard a rider called "jack bauer" existed. I stood for a while with some Belgians who were getting the riders names better than the commentator, but I also stood next to people who asked if Gilbert was any good and listened attentively as 1 older man explained gently that Gilbert won everything last year.

1 group when they saw Duarte off the back said that Colombia were crap at cycling to which their friend replied that he heard a Colombian once rode the Tour de France.

People reading the break off their phones had no idea who any of them was.

On the train, 1 group asked their friend if he had heard of this Uran fella, another was consoling themselves with the fact that no one can climb as good as Wiggo and Froome will easily win next years TDF

Many such stories, bottom line, is I think this was a olympic thing very much. People were talking about what other events they had tickets for and they had tickets for everything. hundreds of thousands bought tickets for the cycling because its the olympics and the tickets were cheap. But I dont think most knew any more about cycling than the people packing the beach volleyball stadium know about beach volleyball.

 

[LugHugger]

I dont think there were many cycling fans at all. The place exploded with laughter when they heard a rider called "jack bauer" existed. I stood for a while with some Belgians who were getting the riders names better than the commentator, but I also stood next to people who asked if Gilbert was any good and listened attentively as 1 older man explained gently that Gilbert won everything last year.

1 group when they saw Duarte off the back said that Colombia were crap at cycling to which their friend replied that he heard a Colombian once rode the Tour de France.

People reading the break off their phones had no idea who any of them was.

On the train, 1 group asked their friend if he had heard of this Uran fella, another was consoling themselves with the fact that no one can climb as good as Wiggo and Froome will easily win next years TDF

Many such stories, bottom line, is I think this was a olympic thing very much. People were talking about what other events they had tickets for and they had tickets for everything. hundreds of thousands bought tickets for the cycling because its the olympics and the tickets were cheap. But I dont think most knew any more about cycling than the people packing the beach volleyball stadium know about beach volleyball.

I'm pretty sure you're on the money here. I'm at the beach volleyball Friday and will have F all clue what's going on!

 

[spalco]

Lol they can have it.

The real question is how long it will take for that race to become prestigious, if ever.

Sufficient prize money could make it prestigious near instantaneously if you find someone to foot the bill. I think that would be the least of the problems.

 

[will10]

Let's see a 1.1 race on this parcours every year. The riders make the race.

 

[Libertine Seguros]

Not many 250k 1.1 races. Unless maybe they start somewhere else, do the laps then into London - probably easier to organise than the out-and-back element of it?

I say 1.HC - enough to be fairly prestigious in terms of prize money, but still enable the British Continental teams to take part in order to animate it. Similar kind of profile to the Tour of California... maybe in a few years it could develop the kind of prestige of a semi-Classic type race like Emilia or Frankfurt... Paris-Tours is 1.HC but I don't see it matching that for prestige for a long time.

Thing is, without the Olympics, some of the WT teams have little reason to be there - the Spanish ones and some of the French ones in particular - so you could have a strong lineup of WT and Pro Conti teams plus the GB Continentals.

For example, I think a plausible lineup for such a race at the .HC level if it were held this year would be:
Argos
BMC
Brétagne-Schuller
Endura
Europcar
Farnese Vini
Garmin
GreenEdge
IG-Sigma Sport
Liquigas
Lotto
Node 4-Giordana
OPQS
Rabobank
Raleigh
Rapha Condor
RusVelo
Saxo Bank
Sky
SpiderTech
Team Type 1
Team UK Youth
Topsport Vlaanderen
Vacansoleil

That's 24 teams, so you wouldn't need more than 2/3 of these to make a decent .HC level field.

 

[Caruut]

I think one problem is that without the top riders in the world really going for it and small teams, even this race over 250km would have sucked. Something like Mill Hill in London would make for a much better finish, if you started in a town like Brighton, then did the laps, then came into London.

 

[Skibby the bush kangaroo]

And then make it a hilly circuit just for the irony value.

I was thinking about this yesterday. Until 2003 there was the Manx International, 3 laps of the Isle of Man TT circuit and was UCI 1.5 (equivalent to 1.2 now). They could revive that as it definitely wouldn't suit Cav.

 

[rhubroma]

IM not so sure about the crowds ,the commonwealth games in Manchester had enormous crowds for cycling road race.However as has been shown in the ToB which makes pityful use of what should be the perfect geography for a one week race;its where its financially viable.
Personally id like to see a one day race around ribble valley/trough of bowland area finsishing with a couple of laps of pendle hill ending on the nic of pendle all Mur de Huy styleee lol.It would be epic if the weathers good you have the beauty of ribble/Bowland if its not pendle hill is really brooding in cr**py weather so equally good.

Edit: S.Wales good too just please anywhere but farkkin London

Well that's just it, everything has to be "finacially viable."

It should be about the land. If the Tour or any other traditional race had thought about something else, they would have died prematurely, as has hapened with every other "designed" race since then.

I understand the necessity for marketing, but is this development? Thinking short term for profit (or at anyrate a type of profit), but not long term. Though that's what happens when modernity gets in the way.