Trouble for the Tour Down Under? Re-designing the UCI World Tour

We’ve just had one seismic shift in cycling’s evolution with the election of Brian Cookson as the UCI’s top dog, but by February next year we could have an even bigger one…the reshaping of the sport’s entire calendar.

A few days ago, the UCI released the October edition of its Sport and Technical bulletin, which features on its front page an interview with Brian Cookson.

We’ve heard and read about plenty about his thoughts on cycling’s immediate future, but we haven’t heard much of what’s printed on page three, a short article titled, ‘A decisive stage in the reform of professional cycling.’

There’s not a lot of detail but enough to bring up some significant talking points.

Focusing on the proposed World Tour, with all the changes in place by 2020, one aim is reduce the number of teams from 19 to 16.
Given the chronic instability that’s blighted ‘team’ cycling forever, that can’t be a bad thing. Although it will mean less riders get a chance to race at World Tour level.

The UCI also want to reduce the racing calendar from 154 days to 120.

It says this can, in part be achieved by restricting stage races to no more than six days.

So Paris-Nice would lose two days and Tirreno Adricatico would lose one. Tour de Suisse would have to lose at least three days, while the Dauphine, like Paris-Nice would see two days disappear.

I don’t think lopping off one day is too much of an issue, but three certainly is.

That said, snipping a day here and there from a few races won’t be enough. Some races will have to disappear from the World Tour calendar.

Of course, they could just drop to the next tier, but will the dollars still be there for races that have suddenly stopped being World Tour events?

Possibly not, so which ones should go?

Races that don’t have long history such as the Tour Down Under or European races that aren’t in the monument/classics category like the Volta a Catalunya or Tour de Pologne?

Further, do you think the UCI would try to reduce the Giro and/or Vuelta to something less than three weeks?
For instance, could we see just one three-week Grand Tour, and two two-week races?

Or would just reducing the Vuelta suffice? After all, once the Tour de France is over, the intensity seems to disappear from the peloton until the Worlds in September.

Plus, when you consider the starting lists for each Grand Tour, the Vuelta is never as strong as the Giro or Tour.

Reducing the number of race days will help prevent another stated aim of this dramatic restructure, preventing events overlapping.

This year, Paris-Nice and Tirreno-Adriatico overlapped as did the Dauphine and Tour de Suisse.

Six-day stage races will make it easy to avoid World Tour events overlapping, but it’s not yet clear whether the UCI also want to stop the second-tier events overlapping with World Tour events.

If they don’t then this is where things could get really interesting, and a little bit messy.

In January, Brian Cookson and the UCI Executive will vote to restrict the cycling season from February to October.

If this vote gets up then what does it mean for the Tour Down Under?

Traditionally held in mid-late January just before the school holidays end, a move to February, would rob the TDU of potentially tens of thousands of spectators, a fair number of who comes from interstate.

The South Australian government which bankrolls the TDU, wouldn’t like this idea one bit.

And if you’ve ever been to this race, then like me, you wouldn’t like it much either.

I think the idea of shortening the season has some merit, but there’s no way the TDU can move to February.

But if it had to, then what does it do for the other races scheduled around that time such as the cash-rich Tours of Qatar and Oman, the Tour de Langkawi, the emerging Tour de San Luis, and the just re-designed and re-announced Herald Sun Tour?

This year, Qatar ran from Feb 3-8, Oman from Feb 11-16 and the Tour de Langkawi from Feb 21 to March 2.

The Herald Sun Tour is set for Feb 5-9. Next year, the Tour de San Luis and the Tour Down Under are scheduled from Jan 19-26.
These races can’t all be scheduled in February.

Personally, I’d dump the wind-blown sprinters fest in Qatar but as the ASO – which runs the Tour de France has its hands all over it, they may not be so willing to play ball.

Qatar is also hosting the Worlds in 2016, so politically this won’t be happening.

I watched the Tour of Oman for the first time this year and was surprised how dynamic it was. The parcours were spectacular and the racing superb given how early it was in the season.

But it one event has to go then so be it. Asia needs its races so Langkawi should stay.

The Herald Sun Tour, traditionally an October affair, and thus almost forgotten by the outside world, was moved to February to maximise the bounce from the Tour Down Under. It can’t move again and expect to stay relevant.

The UCI has many crucial decisions to make in January, but for me and the nations outside of the sport’s traditional heartland, none is bigger than whether to start the season in January or February.