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John's avatar

Interesting view point from the rider perspective.

From a commercial view point, the main reason the scene is dying is purely down to British Cycling and race organisers. Commercial partners want to see a return from investment and currently what generates that return? Tour of Britain on ITV2 for 5 days of the year, and the tour series the day after the event on ITV2 in the evening. It’s hardly game changing from a coverage point of view and any commercial business worth their salt recognises that BC and its partners aren’t doing enough to create significant enough interest from an audience perspective or attracting new audiences.

At a time where most businesses are withdrawing spending on anything non-essential due to the current financial position of the UK and the general inflation/cost of living challenges, combined with a cycle industry that is now in the hangover stage of covid and has more inventory than it has demand, then there’s no surprises that the vision of domestic racing from BC and race organisers is struggling to get investment into the scene.

Saint Piran is an anomaly to all of this and is pretty much bank rolled from passion, and I’d be surprised to see it last a couple more years as the model isn’t sustainable.

If the ‘scene’ needs to change then it needs to look at the current F1 model and how Liberty Media has overhauled the engagement and revenues it generates. Part of the problem, is that are far too many hobbyists in positions of power for the scene, and not enough business people that understand how to generate revenue. If we have more of the latter, you’ll see more funding coming in, more riders and teams going professional and overall standards improving.

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Jon Clarke's avatar

Thanks for the Lincs League mention, up to 5 races this year and the first 2 have sold out in 24 hours. We are trying to keep grass roots racing alive. Great article.

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