How BIG is Tour of Britain

Aulyin

Trying to find any mention of it in Scotland is difficult unless you go to the ToB website:
http://www.tourofbritain.co.uk/_ns_race ... _route.asp

So how big is the event in England?
Is it talked about highly in France?
Do they know about it in America?

The Scottish Government says it wants more people to exercise outside, so why is the event not being used here to promote cycling?

Cheers, Aulyin



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ugo.santalucia

It is a very minor race in the calendar... rated 2.1 in th UCI calendar

To give you an idea the Tour of Poland is rated higher and nobody cares about the Tour of Poland.

To add up it falls in an unlucky period in the calendar, where most cyclists are just training for the world championships or competing in the Vuelta a Espana, which is rated higher

That said, this year's winner, Boasson Hagen is a phenomenal rider

DaveMoss

It's way bigger than a mid table Scottish Premier league game, but yet gets nowhere near the coverage in the scottish press

Aulyin

It's way bigger than a mid table Scottish Premier league game, but yet gets nowhere near the coverage in the scottish press.

That's my point: No coverage.
Why is there no coverage?
Who's not doing their job?
Where are the potential Scottish World Cycling Champions training?

Scottish Government - talk to us.

(By the way Dave, I miss the Scottish Junior Cup Final on TV.)

Cheers, Aulyin

Aulyin

The ToB seems less important in Scotland than down south. MAKE IT BIGGER!
What would it take to get people interested?
Is it the coverage or the sponsorship.

E-on were the main sponsors last year and because I'm surrounded by wind turbines, some of which are E-on's, I thought East Ayrshire Council would have promoted it. Wrong.
Perhaps they're afraid to show just how much the countryside here is effected by wind farms and open-cast coal mines.

I always thought the A76 Nith Tour was a short and sweet ride which gave you the option of jumping on a train to Glasgow or Dumfries if you'd had enough. Great for families when the lorries aren't belting along it and there's less of them since the Parnassus Python was introduced http://www.flickr.com/photos/32963298@N03/ .

http://www.unitebycycling.org.uk/

Cheers, Aulyin

Aulyin

Is Glasgow sponsoring the ToB in 2010.
Is Dumfriesshire?

How much money does Dumfries make out of the event?
Would it be benefit East Ayrshire if the ToB came up the A76 (properly promoted)?

Cheers, Aulyin

kingstongraham

I'm in England, and I don't care about it.

fastercyclist

It came through my town and triggered a mini-cycling boom. Caused enough interest to make a new club form and the streets were lined as they came through the town this year. Having said that, it's largely a non-issue outside of areas directly affected unless you're into cycling. It's a shame it's not higher rated, I do think the media are missing out on something here.

gsk82

the big guys at the tour aren't the most media friendly apparently. it's understandable how little publicity it gets when starts and finishes are in such glamourous places as scunthorpe, peebles, gretna, froome, bideford and yeovil

Aulyin

Make it more attractive to the young and old.

Positives from above posts:

It came through my town and triggered a mini-cycling boom.
Caused enough interest to make a new club form.
The streets were lined as they came through the town this year.

Negatives from above posts:

It's largely a non-issue outside of areas directly affected unless you're into cycling.
It's a shame it's not higher rated.
I do think the media are missing out on something here.
The big guys at the tour aren't the most media friendly apparently.
It's understandable how little publicity it gets when starts and finishes are in such glamourous places as Scunthorpe, Peebles, Gretna, Froome, Bideford and Yeovil.

Question:
Were there other positive results from around the country.
This the chance for places like: Scunthorpe, Peebles , Gretna, etc to put themselves on the map.

Start promoting the ToB NOW!!!

Aulyin

Make road cycling safer and the trade will boom in my opinion. To do that, you have to make cycling the "to do" sport.

On Your Bike
Your Granddad has probably told you he used to walk 6 miles to school every day and that children these days are tremendously lazy. But they're not when it comes to cycling, apparently.

According to Sustrans, 50% of the UK’s children want to cycle to school. And how many actually get to? A measly 2%.

The potential benefits of the UK’s children pedalling to school everyday are incredible. For a start, 20% of all road traffic during a school day comes from taking children to school. If half of schoolchildren cycled instead, the reduction in the UK's carbon footprint would be phenominal.

Secondly, almost a third of British children are obese. Many more UK children are also inactive, meaning they partake in less than 60 minutes of exercise a week. Cycling to school would help break this barrier and provide remarkable longterm health benefits for children.

In fact, if children cycle from an early age and continue into adulthood, they will have the fitness level of someone 10 years younger.

Lastly, and perhaps just as importantly, cycling instills children with more confidence as they develop independence on the roads. In the long term, it will acutally help them lead safer lives. While there is a long road ahead for the UK to match up to the standards of the likes of Japan, where schoolchildren are not even allowed to come to school by car, Sustrans' Bike It campaign is making progress.

They are currently working with 500 of the UK's 60,000 schools to both encourage and facilitate pupils in cycling to school. 'Bike it' schools are able to boast that up to 45% of their students pedal to school, as opposed to the 2% UK average.

http://www.sustainablescotland.com/peop ... ldren.html

gsk82

to add to my earlier post. my main issue with the locations was the start being in scunthrorpe. a saturday start in a big city (manchester/leeds/sheffield/ even york) would have been far more of an occasion than one from scunthorpe. it was very short sighted imo to go to scunthorpe, which they did purely for the money they got from the local council.

gabriel959

No one really cares about it. In Spain no one knows about it.

Aulyin

I see your point.

A Saturday start in a big city (Manchester/Leeds/Sheffield/ even York) would have been far more of an occasion than one from Scunthorpe. it was very short sighted imo to go to Scunthorpe, which they did purely for the money they got from the local council.

Starting off from a bigger town and ending up somewhere like Scunthorpe would have made sense.

Somewhere with a good public transport system and other facilities which could entertain spectators and let them get home easily, as well as bring money into much needing economies.

Mind you, well done Scunthorpe and councils like theirs who have the gumption to put their money into sponsorship.

Come on East Ayrshire, follow on.

Aulyin

When does the promoting begin.

We had school kids lining the streets a couple of years ago, flag waving etc.
Really got them interested in cycling, but since then, nothing.

Cheers, Aulyin

cougie

As it hasn't a title sponsor - it goes where the money is. If york wanted a stage - they could almost certainly have it. When it finished in liverpool last year - it was a big event for the city.

thistle_

I was googling for the best way to ride the Horseshoe Pass near Llangollen earlier (see other post!) and one tourism website said "it used to be part of the now defunct Tour of Britain!"

Was it covered on ITV 4 at all?

Aulyin

There seems to be a wee bit of talk about 2010 ToB Thistle:

http://www.cyclingweekly.co.uk/news/lat ... -2010.html

http://www.tourofbritain.co.uk/

The Tour of Britain Attracts 4 Million Spectators
Large spectator numbers and increased TV viewing figures show interest in the sport has grown
SweetSpot, organisers of The Tour of Britain have announced that the 2009 event was a resounding success, with increased numbers of spectators on the race route and across television and media coverage watching the best field of professional cyclists ever assembled for a British professional race.
http://www.tourofbritain.co.uk/_ns_news ... news_id=83

Cheers, Aulyin

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