Is it just me or has the racing scene changed?

I have nothing to add on the

I have nothing to add on the cycling snobbery front, maybe Yorkshire isn’t just as Yorkshire as it used to be. Plenty of money spent on bikes round by me, always has been to my mind, no one blinks when someone turns up on a clunker, quite the opposite, most want the clunker to beat the carbon electrics.

For my two penneth, my club has a set of routes which hasn’t changed much ever, you can clearly see that the average speeds over the past few years have just shot up, and they keep going up seemingly, the whole club has just got faster and faster, the slow sunday group now averages 19/20, the fast group can average 23/24mph… the whippets, have got whippety’er.  It’s changed our Sunday rides from being a come along everyone ride to being un-apologectically elitest indeed. (Don’t get me wrong, we have rides all through the week for all types of rider, but the Sunday club run was the one which started it all, has now changed it’s tone.)

My point being, that the sport is more mainstream, there are more people doing the sport, which means the ‘top tier’ gets squeezed, spaces in races aren’t growing, but the demand for them is, yes I think racing is becoming more elitest.

What’s the answer though?  More races – who’s gonna run them, it’s a thankless task at best. Open up the field to accept more people per race – that’s a no go for safety reasons.

alotronic wrote:

I used to race in the 80s (!) and there were proper tnucs round then, even when clubs were small. They had the best bikes and pro kit (benottos, colnagos, campy record) and never said hello. We just ignored them, or beat them. Half the club was like that, the other half really nice people.  Later me and mates moved to MTB when that kicked in because it was a lot more fun.

I don’t really do clubs but there are two local clubs, one known for being racy and the other inclusive. I have ridden a couple of times with the latter and they are nice. I suspect the other club are intense. I guess if you want the intensity you can certainly find it, and if you want a more fun approach then you should find a nicer club, go MTBoing, CXing gravel riding. Road racing has always had a large proportion of arses in it – it’s  a hard sport and those who take it seriously can get a bit wrapped up  in it.

The other point above is true too though, you are never quite sure what kind of rider someone is until you get to know them a bit and see through the gear. Sometimes it’s the unexpected kind wheel at the end of an epic that really counts, not the attitude at the start line….

 

I was interested in the mention of the Benotto brand. An American friend has a Benotto that he bought when working in Nicaragua. I thought that they were exclusively sold in Latin America and have not heard of them in a UK context before.

I used to race in the 80s (!)

I used to race in the 80s (!) and there were proper tnucs round then, even when clubs were small. They had the best bikes and pro kit (benottos, colnagos, campy record) and never said hello. We just ignored them, or beat them. Half the club was like that, the other half really nice people.  Later me and mates moved to MTB when that kicked in because it was a lot more fun.

I don’t really do clubs but there are two local clubs, one known for being racy and the other inclusive. I have ridden a couple of times with the latter and they are nice. I suspect the other club are intense. I guess if you want the intensity you can certainly find it, and if you want a more fun approach then you should find a nicer club, go MTBoing, CXing gravel riding. Road racing has always had a large proportion of arses in it – it’s  a hard sport and those who take it seriously can get a bit wrapped up  in it.

The other point above is true too though, you are never quite sure what kind of rider someone is until you get to know them a bit and see through the gear. Sometimes it’s the unexpected kind wheel at the end of an epic that really counts, not the attitude at the start line….

Think srchar nailed it when

Think srchar nailed it when he said it was about pro level kit becoming more accessible.

However opposed to his angle, I actually think that’s a good thing. Exclusivity breeds elitism, not the other way around. Democratising posh kit like carbon wheels for example is one of the last hurdles. Carbon frame, great ones are cheap now. Just waiting for wheels. Discs will help that happen.

Have a question though. How do you know someone’s actually looking down on you? It can’t be from the way they’re dressed, or their kit – that would make ‘you’ the judgemental idiot with a chip on his shoulder, surely?

I see lots of guys out in all sorts of kit, and people generally are very civil. Only cyclists I ever look down on are the ones spitting angstly when another rider is coming up behind them, and there’s plenty of folk around. Just looks scummy and sad. Or the guys throwing banana skins on the road. Just silly. 

But they don’t know I’m looking down on them. So I do wonder, is this all a matter of feeling looked down upon? 

For the record, I’m not saying that there are people who do look down on you. Of course there are, loads of people like that. But I think it’s more naunced than, ‘that guy has a Colnago, he must look down on me!’.

It’s not just bike racing.

It’s not just bike racing. Every amateur sport is like this now. People spend more money on it, pro-level gear is more accessible, everybody’s trying to get some bragging rights for Instagram or the office. Before the internet came along, if you wanted to participate as a high-level amatuer in a given sport, you had to go and compete for a few years, rub along with people, learn from them and buy your gear from a shop who probably had to order it in for you. Now you can just do some cramming on Google, order your gear from Wiggle and turn up on day one ready to look down on people with aluminium frames and Decathlon shorts.

Well obviously; you have to

Well obviously; you have to take it more seriously than anyone else does, otherwise what’s the point? What if a photographer from Rapha happens to show up to document the epic suffering you’re dishing out, those black and white photos of you cresting the 3% mountain finish behind the industrial estate aren’t going to make the cut if you’re on some Fred bike with mismatched gear. It’s a race mate, ether treat it with the respect it deserves or don’t bother turning up. Next time, I want to know about your fasted training the day before, what your current blood sugar levels are, how many shades darker your tan lines are from the Mallorcan Training Camp, and wear your Isotropic HRM Sunglasses with HUD ffs, you look like you only just started cycling last week

I tried a bit of crit racing

I tried a bit of crit racing last year and although the winners were generally from the bigger clubs and ‘teams’ there were still plenty there who were on ‘reasonably priced’ bikes and just there to test themselves. Unfortunately though, racing has got very serious due to its greater popularity and people are prepared to spend their hard earned on it and/ or spend lots of time training really hard to earn equipment sponsorships. Give it a few years and maybe the buzz from being a great cycling nation might die down a bit, the money will dry up and we can go back to how it was.

On the flip side though, club runs and even more casual groups are on the up too. There’s often a load of different rides with different average speeds because there are more people getting into the scene. Is there a need to race any more if you aren’t super serious about actually winning? I’ve found since I moved to where I am and keep slightly more regular hours that I’m overwhelmed with opportunities to have fast rides, or slow rides and if I really want to experience that racing buzz I’ll go and do a closed-road sportive feel like Wiggo as I speed past all the choppers.

You could always try CX, I hear thats quite friendly…..