While it took seven Belgians to dominate the Men’s Cyclocross World Championship race on Sunday, it only took a single Dutchwoman to dominate the women’s race. That’s seven times more dominanter, if my math is correct – which it always is.
Cyclocross fascinates me, mostly because it is completely insane. But I admit: I like the idea of combining Cycling and miniature golf. Put some canti’s on your road bike, take to the mud and woods, add some water hazards, sand traps, man-made climbs and jumps, and now you’ve got a sport for people who hate the way their faces look.
Marianne Vos took her fifth World ‘Cross Championship (a record) to further crowd here palmares with rainbow bands. She’s been World Champion in every discipline involving drop bars, many of them multiple times. She’s also won La Fleche Wallone more times than I can count (I can only count to three), National road and time trial championships, and the Giro d’Italia Femminile. She was even World Champion in Mountain Biking as a Junior. One could easily argue that “V”os is the best active cyclist in the world, bar none.
To that point, we don’t pay close enough attention to Women’s cycling. I’m as guilty as anyone; if I was going to pick the winner of a Women’s race, I’d likely pick Vos or Cooke (if she’s not broken, which she often is) or Teutenberg if the race is likely to end in a sprint, which I wouldn’t be able to tell you without first doing some research. And that pretty much exhausts my knowledge in terms of naming riders, which is disgraceful. After all, if one is to understand the great mystery, one should study all its aspects. (Yes, I just quoted Darth Sidious.)
With the ‘Cross season coming to a close, we’re ramping up to start the 2012 Velominati Super Prestige and with it, we are dragging ourselves into paying attention to Women’s Cycling: the 2012 competition will include women’s races with the points amassed counting towards the overall title.
We are also making some coding changes to the backend system in order to fix some problems which means we’re probably only introducing new problems without necessarily fixing the things that needed fixing in the first place.
We’re also adding more races like the Strada Bianca, changing the scoring model, and eliminating certain things such as free DNF swaps. Stand by for further updates and keep a weather eye on the VSP Page for the updated schedule and rules.
I know as well as any of you that I've been checked out lately, kind…
Peter Sagan has undergone quite the transformation over the years; starting as a brash and…
The Women's road race has to be my favorite one-day road race after Paris-Roubaix and…
Holy fuckballs. I've never been this late ever on a VSP. I mean, I've missed…
This week we are currently in is the most boring week of the year. After…
I have memories of my life before Cycling, but as the years wear slowly on…
View Comments
@Paco
that s exactly what I mean with humiliate, it s not about winning. Admit you don t like to be outclassed by a girl/woman (or by anyone at all), even if you know she is better than you and no matter how much 'you don t care'.
oh well, we do the talking, they do the riding. guess who s right in the end...
Joey's OK! That was spectacular.
Here I go, about to be a jackass again. Women can be great riders. My wife and I just watched "Ride the Divide," and wow. Talk about hard. I rooted so much for Mary Metcalf-Collier... Just, wow.
But.
Where is this money going to come from for women's cycling? You hear Bronzini spouting off about women's wages and the president of the UCI like he has control over companies' sponsorship dollars. I hate the UCI as much as the next guy, maybe more, but there will never be a market for women's professional cycling. Very few people want to watch it. The fields are small and non competitive. I don't mean these women aren't good, just that the gap between the best and the rest is an intraversable distance. Do you see anything like the domination by Bronzini, Vos, Longo, Van Moorsel? I am not a hater by any means. In fact, I spent many teenage nights spankin' it to Leontien. It's just never going to happen, though, and it's not because of sexism. Tennis is an example where there is wage equality, but it's also an example of a sport where there is a great deal of public interest. That will never be the case with riding.
I support allowing women to compete with men. I'm sure that Vos could kick most of our asses. However, she's not fit to be a domestique on any UCI Men's Pro Tour team. That isn't being harsh. Could any of you see a forty-nine-year-old Jeannie Longo, good enough to be TWO seconds shy of a bronze medal at the 2008 Olympic Time Trial, not getting dropped at just about any Pro Tour race? It's not enough to suffer as much as the men, as Bronzini said. Otherwise, cross country skiers would make as much a pro cyclists.
So... I just don't agree. I have nothing but respect for VMHs, but in a climate where Highroad Sports couldn't even secure enough sponsorship to keep an incredibly successful organization afloat (in terms of results), how can there ever be hope for women's pro cycling?
*'with humiliate' has to be 'by humiliating' (?) #GrammaticalGenius@Work
Great article, Frank.
I still think it's very interesting that most women/mens sporting events are still gender-segregated.
Is it left-over puritanical prudishness?
Is it worry that women couldn't compete with men based on muscle mass or something like that?
It seems to me with cycling, the bike itself is somewhat of an equalizer, as the "physically strongest" person isn't necessarily the best cyclist, and being big is somewhat of a disadvantage depending on what type of cyclist you are. It's not the same as American football for example, where the dudes pump iron (amongst other things) and are HUGE, and women would have a distinct disadvantage. But I'd say cycling seems to be a sport where men and women can intermingle well.
@Calmante
I think you're off on two things:
What you describe here is pretty close to what Men's racing was back in the 70's. By and large, dominated by a few guys who were head and shoulders over the rest. There was less money, less incentive for people to become Pros, and thus bigger gaps. In his best year, Merckx made as much money as his son did riding as a domestique at Domo.
It has much less to do with how good the women are; it has to do with popularity of the sport not yielding the money to do the big races and attract enough of the best riders to foster the competition. Even a casual glance at the change in the level of competition in the Men's field since it became a high-paying sport in the 90's is enough to answer that question. (And drug use further evidence of that.)
Never say never: if women's racing gets enough exposure to become profitable, the money will come. Businesses seeking a profit are very good at finding ways to do just that.
Before starting Highroad Sports, Bob Stapleton ran a major telecom here in Seattle. He was well known in his dealings for being abusive and using complex contracts to exploiting and take advantage of his vendors. Nothing illegal, mind you, but very underhanded shit that made vendors unwilling to do repeat business with him.
I can't name sources, but when Columbia stepped in as sponsor, he did the same to them and treated them as trash. They stepped in when no one else would, and then HTC came on board, he fucked Columbia over without hesitation. Columbia grew tired of it and withdrew their sponsorship. I have no doubt he did the same to HTC in the end.
Again, nothing illegal about what he did, but my guess is that his inability to find a sponsor had much less to do with the state of the sport and more to do with his modus operandi. To fuck vendors over in Telecom is one thing, but screw enough sponsors over in a community as small and tight-knit as Cycling - especially in the state it's in - and you will soon find yourself holding the bag.
I firmly believe Bob Stapleton got what was coming to him. I only feel awful for the staff and riders that were left without their means to make a living as a result of it.
This notion of pitting men against women is interesting...I don't know enough about power, strength, or genetics to have an informed opinion on these things but I know enough to guess that Vos could be a monstrously good climber with her power-to-weight ratio.
I'd have paid good money to see a head-to-head race between Pantani and Vos up l'Alpe d'Huez.
Check out that bitchin counter-steer.
And is just some nasty, rooty, slippery, muddy shit right there. Badass.
She's doing it wrong.
More awesomeness at this photoset on FB.
@frank
Dude. Come on. The owner of the three fastest times up AdH? Someone has to have examples for women's ascent times. I'm sure they are impressive, but... There. Is. No. Fucking. Way.
I don't think that head to head male vs female is the way forward, as it has the potential to go horribly wrong. And any sort of equivalency factors (e.g. weight penalties for race winners in touring car racing) just become a joke. It shouldn't be about be about competition between the sexes. Remember how Michelle Wie competed in men's PGA tournaments a few years ago and failed miserably, probably ruining it for everyone? I agree this case was more marketing than pure sport, but the fans don't care about that. They just see a chick losing to dudes.
But better marketing for women's racing is the way forward IMHO. The public won't know about it unless they are told. Let's hope that the UCI can incorporate this into their globalisation plan (women do race on the same globe as men). However, as it won't offer immediate financial returns for the UCI, I doubt that they will.