World Series Cycling is organised boredom

Thanks for replying fellas. I'm getting old and grumpy and pretty set in my ways so I'm always interested in how people newer to the sport view things. I was going to use the example of T20 (which incidentally I hated early on but love it now!). I think that events outside of the TdF are getting a greater following by general sports fans (from an Australian perspective anyway) with SBS now providing goog coverage of all three grand tours and selected classics such as Paris-Roubaix and with Eurosport now available through Foxtel, most major races can be viewed here. Of course the TdU is now covered and our national championships as well (cracking event last year too!) . Either way, lets hope cycling prospers for a long time to come.

This is going to sound horrible but it is not meant to be - Kid, Alan and Tlux, have you only recently got into cycling? I'm interested to know which demographic supports this proposal and which doesn't. Also do you, or have you ever raced? You are all obviously fans of the sport or you would not be motivated to take part in this discussion. Thanks for your input so far and I look forward to reading more of your opinions in the future.

But that is exactly what they are doing mate. The formula for each race will be exactly the same - eg one sprint per race, one climbing stage per race, one rolling stage per race and one time trial. Currently we have a spread of stage races that range from two day events right up to the three week grand tours that offer various combinations of flat/rolling/climbing terrain. Could Mark Cavendish or Andre Greipel win the GC of one of these new races? The answer is no, because they will lose to much time on the climbing stages. yet Cavendish and Greipel have both won GCs in the past (ok, Cav has only won one, but it is one more than he would win under the four day format proposed). The courses of the four day races will not be diverse because a sprint stage has to be flat, and a climbing stage has to have challenging climbs. I guess the rolling stage could be played around with a bit and I believe that the time trials would alternate between ITTs and TTTs, but I am not convinced that this series is the right way to go if we want to see the very best this sport has to offer.

Sorry Alan, you miss the point. It is not about playing or competing on the same venue each week. not even World Championship Cycling was going to do that. It is the sameness of each race that I object to. In fact, cycling does return to the same venues each year - the cobbles of Paris-Roubaix for instance. But throughout the cycling callender, not one race copies another. Each is different. And it is these differences between races that make things interesting and provide different opportunities to different types of riders. Teams and riders plan their seasons by their strengths and weaknesses and target different races making it difficult for one team or rider to dominate a season. The WSC would threaten that and I think the racing would become a lot more predictable and thus less interesting.

We already have races all over the world that provide unique challenges and in a much more interesting and varied way than this current proposal. It is actually the one part of cycling that isn't broken. Why disenfranchise the hundreds of thousands of loyal cycling supporters who have stuck with the sport through thick and thin for the sake of some third party which is only interested in skimming some extra money from possible broadcast rights. would this money filter down to the riders? I bet you it wouldn't. Also, cycling is as much a spectator sport as any other. Have you not seen the hoards of people standing hillside and crowding the start/finish areas of races not just in Europe, but in Australia, America, Britain? Often numbering not just in their thousands, but in their tens of thousands, even hundreds of thousands? It's standing room only on the slopes of Willunga Hill or the mountains of Colorado, with support at the big European races the best it's been for years. Cycling is not like motor sport. You will never have a season deciding event because of the very nature of the sport. Sprinters can't compete against climbers in the mountains and climbers have no hope in the sprints. in no other sport do such radically different athletes compete against each other. That is why trying to 'simplify' the sport will never work. Each race is itself an event bringing with it prestige and opportunity. A series of ten identical races does nothing to enhance the sports appeal.

We can be violent together on this one Bonesy. That the UCI have even jumped into bed with Jonathan Price's Gifted Group for this is only to protect their own interests and power and has nothing to do with the best interests of the sport. And the underlying reason for Jonathan Price's group is money. They sense that they may be able to make a quid and to hell with the fans and everything else. What really irks me though is the way that they tell us that this is what we want to see! Spectator attendance and interest in today's races has never been stronger despite the sport's problems (Tour of Beijing excluded). Really, the roster of races is the least of cycling's problems. If as much energy was placed into strengthening its drug testing procedures as with coming up with this silly idea, then the sport would be a shining light to the rest of the world.