Cycling thread

Bruce Wayne said:
It's funny isn't it? One of those utterly meaningless gongs yet it seems to get people rather hot under the collar for a few weeks each year.
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Exactly Bruce, fully agree.

SPOTY should be renamed The Personality of sport on the BBC anyway in my opinion, and there really isn't a wide coverage of popular live sports such as Rugby, Golf or Cricket on the BBC never mind cycling or boxing.

This year the main award was won by a road cyclist in a non Olympic year and so very much the exception with the tour de France is on itv4 or Eurosport, but was largely thanks to him being Welsh and garnering all the partisan Welsh votes. Mostly it's invariably tennis, athletics, Olympic heroes/heroines or anything the BBC still cover that's honoured, and they go heavy on minority sports as it's all they've got left to pad out their sports coverage.

Minor sports have a field day as they now get more and more coverage on the BBC as the major sports move away to Sky or other commercial channels.

The result is it's heavily skewed in favour of what's on terrestrial tv which being free will obviously get the largest audiences, or who strikes the right chord on the night with all the people watching who like these kind of award shows, this show is on a par with strictly and x factor for me, i just don't watch them.

It often has nothing whatsoever to do with sporting merit in that particular year or certainly that can be completely bypassed. Its been a bit of a joke for years even if this years winner did have merit and was far more deserving than some in the past.

Last years winner was Mo Farah (correct winner but completely the wrong year, even he was stunned) with some motor sport bloke, who most people other than enthusiasts had never even heard off, in second.

It's now just like a gameshow, not to be taken too seriously.

(This despite the length of this post as I'm on the train from work and bored lol)
 

Walken said:
I doubt froome will be at all worried about not winning spoty when he retires, it is interesting that both thomas and wiggins won it either side of froomes success, granted wiggins had huge fan fare for being first and and taking gold in a home olympics, think he may also have a silver from the worlds that year. Some people just don't capture peoples affections for one reason or another, not that he strikes me as the the type to crave it
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Yeah imagine the embarrassment of having to hand back a couple of spoty trophies aswell as several yellow jerseys in a couple years time..

Bet he's glad not to be nominated
 
Might as well give Froome his fifth TdF now; unless something completely out of the ordinary happens:

[main targets for 2019]

TdF: Froome, Quintana, Adam Yates, Pinot, Bardet, Kruiswijk, [and apparently Thomas also has a preference for the Tour; I suppose this could result in some 'spectacle', if Sky doesn't find a new sponsor].

Giro: Dumoulin, Valverde, Nibali, Simon Yates, Bernal, Lopez, Roglic.
 
Wiggins has had his say on Sky's decision to end it's sponsorship and pull out of cycling, warning that those rejoicing should be careful what they wish for as cycling will be “worse off” if the team folds.

"People need to be careful what they wish for because if Sky go now the sport will be worse off for it," Wiggins said on talkSPORT. "(Cycling) won't disintegrate but it won't have the profile it has enjoyed now. This day was always going to happen because the sport is so backward in some ways, the people that run it. It's not corrupt but it's so backward. There's no money in the sport.

"Sky brought money but I'm talking about sponsors in general aside from Sky. Rather than be grateful for a company like Sky people just hammered it.

"The amount of money they've put in over the last 10 years...is incredible, and the timing of that with the generation of cyclists and what Dave wanted to do, we may never ever see it again.”

Asked whether he thought Brailsford would be able to find another backer, Wiggins replied: "I can't envisage them getting a sponsor like Sky - a UK company, wherever it's owned these days but based in London - the size of the company coming and doing that for cycling. To replace them to carry on and cover the wage bill and the budget will be a tough thing to do...

"It's the end of an era in some ways. That's not to say the team can't carry on but it's whether they can find a sponsor with that much money and that much weight to cover the wage bill so they can keep everyone there."
 

Chris O'Connor said:
Wiggins has had his say on Sky's decision to end it's sponsorship and pull out of cycling, warning that those rejoicing should be careful what they wish for as cycling will be “worse off” if the team folds.

"People need to be careful what they wish for because if Sky go now the sport will be worse off for it," Wiggins said on talkSPORT. "(Cycling) won't disintegrate but it won't have the profile it has enjoyed now. This day was always going to happen because the sport is so backward in some ways, the people that run it. It's not corrupt but it's so backward. There's no money in the sport.

"Sky brought money but I'm talking about sponsors in general aside from Sky. Rather than be grateful for a company like Sky people just hammered it.

"The amount of money they've put in over the last 10 years...is incredible, and the timing of that with the generation of cyclists and what Dave wanted to do, we may never ever see it again.”

Asked whether he thought Brailsford would be able to find another backer, Wiggins replied: "I can't envisage them getting a sponsor like Sky - a UK company, wherever it's owned these days but based in London - the size of the company coming and doing that for cycling. To replace them to carry on and cover the wage bill and the budget will be a tough thing to do...

"It's the end of an era in some ways. That's not to say the team can't carry on but it's whether they can find a sponsor with that much money and that much weight to cover the wage bill so they can keep everyone there."
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how many grand tours or classics or even track events do sky show?
 
Armel said:
Might as well give Froome his fifth TdF now; unless something completely out of the ordinary happens:

[main targets for 2019]

TdF: Froome, Quintana, Adam Yates, Pinot, Bardet, Kruiswijk, [and apparently Thomas also has a preference for the Tour; I suppose this could result in some 'spectacle', if Sky doesn't find a new sponsor].

Giro: Dumoulin, Valverde, Nibali, Simon Yates, Bernal, Lopez, Roglic.
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The Giro is always the better race, isn't it?

Walken said:
how many grand tours or classics or even track events do sky show?
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Not really the point, is it? They sponsored a road team for over a decade, and the track team as well, so must have invested a few hundred million in British cycling over that time. Bit churlish to say that isn't significant.
 
Bruce Wayne said:
The Giro is always the better race, isn't it?



Not really the point, is it? They sponsored a road team for over a decade, and the track team as well, so must have invested a few hundred million in British cycling over that time. Bit churlish to say that isn't significant.
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That part is certainly up for debate, and brailsford pulls his riders from GB events at the drop of a hat.

Regardless, it wasn't an act of philanthropy anymore than roman abramovich in coming to chelsea was. I've seen little evidence of the sky machine increasing global participation in cycling and can't wait for them to leave. Wiggins no long ago was telling any up and coming rider to avoid joining team sky.
 
Walken said:
That part is certainly up for debate, and brailsford pulls his riders from GB events at the drop of a hat.

Regardless, it wasn't an act of philanthropy anymore than roman abramovich in coming to chelsea was. I've seen little evidence of the sky machine increasing global participation in cycling and can't wait for them to leave. Wiggins no long ago was telling any up and coming rider to avoid joining team sky.
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I don't suppose anyone would believe it to be so, but equally, the prevailing narrative at the moment is that the team will do well to find a sponsor willing to back them to the same extent, so that in itself says to me that their investment was no bad thing.
 
Bruce Wayne said:
I don't suppose anyone would believe it to be so, but equally, the prevailing narrative at the moment is that the team will do well to find a sponsor willing to back them to the same extent, so that in itself says to me that their investment was no bad thing.
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Only if you believe Sky hoarding good riders to monopolize the grand tours is a good thing, personally I don't and will enjoy them far more without sky around. Frankly after several displays from brailsford showing him to be very much in the little dictator role, I've little sympathy for the man.
 

Walken said:
Only if you believe Sky hoarding good riders to monopolize the grand tours is a good thing, personally I don't and will enjoy them far more without sky around. Frankly after several displays from brailsford showing him to be very much in the little dictator role, I've little sympathy for the man.
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I posted this earlier, but I think the only rider Sky have signed that was in the CQ top 50 rankings was Kwia. It's far more common for them to sign young riders or those not really wanted by their team. Of the 2018 Tour roster, for instance, Froome was not highly thought of at Barloworld, Bernal was a young and unproven rider, Castroviejo was a very good time trial rider but not world class, Kwia we've discussed, Moscon was a young hopeful who turned pro with Sky, Poels had done nothing really before hand, and was 21st and 38th in GTs the year before he signed for Sky, Rowe came through at Sky, whilst Thomas largely did too.

If you look at their wider roster, the two Henaos turned pro with Sky, as did Stannard, Puccio, Basso et al. I'd hardly say Kiri or Ellisonde were superstars prior to joining. Apart from Kwia, probably the most star like rider they've signed is van Baarle, and he's for the classics squad.

Their approach in recent years has been to take young riders and improve them. They haven't signed a super star since Cavendish.
 
Bruce Wayne said:
I posted this earlier, but I think the only rider Sky have signed that was in the CQ top 50 rankings was Kwia. It's far more common for them to sign young riders or those not really wanted by their team. Of the 2018 Tour roster, for instance, Froome was not highly thought of at Barloworld, Bernal was a young and unproven rider, Castroviejo was a very good time trial rider but not world class, Kwia we've discussed, Moscon was a young hopeful who turned pro with Sky, Poels had done nothing really before hand, and was 21st and 38th in GTs the year before he signed for Sky, Rowe came through at Sky, whilst Thomas largely did too.

If you look at their wider roster, the two Henaos turned pro with Sky, as did Stannard, Puccio, Basso et al. I'd hardly say Kiri or Ellisonde were superstars prior to joining. Apart from Kwia, probably the most star like rider they've signed is van Baarle, and he's for the classics squad.

Their approach in recent years has been to take young riders and improve them. They haven't signed a super star since Cavendish.
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Wiggins talking about Tom Pidcock
"Don't go to Sky in the future, steer clear of them," the 37-year-old told the teenager, who won junior world titles in both cyclocross and road cycling last year. "Go somewhere else, because they'll ruin you."
 
Bruce Wayne said:
I do believe he was being sarcastic :)

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I don't, a continuation of the interview
“Maybe,” he replied when asked whether a salary cap could be the answer. "Sky are running away with it. With the office blocks they bring with them [to races], it's difficult to compete, isn't it?



"Whether that helps performance or not, I don't know. Going forward something has to change to even it out a bit."
 

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