Women's Tour de France

DeVlaeminck

Just watching Half the Road, Cookson comes out with a statement that a mirror image Tour - a 3 week Tour with long stages - is not appropriate for the physicality of women.

Just thought it was pretty shocking, leaving aside the economics, the history etc if the head of the UCI doesn't even believe in the ideal of women being an equal part of the sport it's no wonder there has been no progress since the 70s.

ddraver

I mostly agree with you but I'm going to try to disagree for the sake of a discussion.

One of the problems with a week tour and "physicality" is that a large percentage of the women's peloton are non-professional (and in some cases, basically still just kids) so that competing over a three week race would be ridiculous. Essentially imagine a TdF peloton made up like that Olympic Road Race.

Plus, on another side, I don't think there is much value in just making a mirror race. The Tour is The Tour. Women's cycling can make a race into their tour by giving it their own history and significance. The Women's Tour of Britain is not a mirror Tour of Britain - it's already a much bigger deal

bobmcstuff

/\ that's not really the same as saying women couldn't ride a three week tour, though - what you're really saying is that there isn't the same kind of depth in the women's peloton for that kind of racing.

There aren't even the same stage races for them to prepare/train/practice on.

ddraver

True, but when most women pretty much race every race already, where is the space for such preparation?

blazing_saddles

DeVlaeminck wrote:

Just watching Half the Road, Cookson comes out with a statement that a mirror image Tour - a 3 week Tour with long stages - is not appropriate for the physicality of women.

Just thought it was pretty shocking, leaving aside the economics, the history etc if the head of the UCI doesn't even believe in the ideal of women being an equal part of the sport it's no wonder there has been no progress since the 70s.

Is it necessary to ride a three week tour in order to become an equal part of the sport?
It's not just having a three week tour, but having a three week tour of well in excess of3000kms that is required to achieve complete equality.
Given the demographic of the women's peloton, as highlighted by DD, is this feasible?
Before attacking Cookson, I would like to know more about how the top riders feel about this prospect.

Women's tennis is equal to men's, and in some case more lucrative.
The only discrimination is in the duration of matches and the WTA don't appear overly keen on gaining parity.

RichN95.

If we were to design the the men's calendar from scratch with no knowledge of history, we would end up with nothing like we have now - a patchwork of a few countries cycling calendars designed to sell newspaper. There almost certainly would be no three week Grand Tours.

The Men's calendar is constrained by tradition, but the Women's is not. They are free to do anything - set up new events, to innovate and take chances. But some are obsessed with 'equality', even though men and women clearly aren't equal when it comes to sport. Women's cycling needs to do what is best for women's cycling and that is doing their own thing, not demanding the same as the men. This is what tennis did - they set up their own Tour separate from the men (bar the Grand Slams)

bobmcstuff

ddraver wrote:

True, but when most women pretty much race every race already, where is the space for such preparation?

Indeed.

I think my point is you couldn't just introduce a 3 week women's GT and expect it to be popular and competitive.

The sport needs to be developed over time in order to get that depth of field. Proper salaries etc would be a start. I think the point was made on the cycling podcast feminin though, the women's sport is much more popular in the UK than elsewhere and it's hardly on a level peg with the men's sport here. The women's TOB has a real chance to be one of the best events on the women's calendar and why not. But still they were apparently prevented from turning it into a full week stage race.

rick_chasey

Think Prudy needs to ride in the women's Tour of Britain peloton for a week.

w00dster

As mentioned above, it would be good to hear what the top riders think about a three week stage race mirroring The Tour. Personally I don't think there would be any benefit, the strength indepth just doesn't appear to be there. I honestly love watching cycling racing, mens or womens. But I'm not sure there would be enough drama in the womens race over 3 weeks.
What would be interesting would be for the ladies race to mirror the mens dauphine, maybe the week before The Tour. Give it equal billing / TV footage as the mens Dauphine. This way we get to see the skills of the ladies, TT'ing, sprint stages, mountain stages, and we get a good a idea of the strength of the teams.
I know the timing is out as the ladies Giro is on at this time and the ladies tour of Britain is a few weeks before it.

There has to be drama for the race, not just one or two stages, but drama throughout the race. There has to be discussions about it at family dinner tables, there has to be historic climbs we have all struggled up, there has to be team tactics for the sprint stages. Most importantly there has to be the story lines in the race that want to make us watch it. I don't think we will get that with a 3 week race. The ladies could probably complete the race but I don't believe it wouldn't hold public interest.

If the above was implemented I'd probably go and watch it and coincide it with a stage or two of the tour.

DeVlaeminck

Well on the documentary - which I'm sure will be repeated every few hours on the Bike channel - they made the point that in the past the women have had races which were - if not the same as the mens Tour de France then at least much more challenging than the races they have now. They also argued that women tend to excel at endurance rather than raw power and that if the races don't exist how will they ever get a peloton of women who prepare to ride them.

We've been through all this in other sports - women weren't allowed to run long distance events until my lifetime, women weren't allowed to play football and if an FA affiliated club allowed women to use their pitch they were sanctioned. It's always been based on women not being capable and it's an outdated attitude. Women footballers may not play with the pace and power of men but they still play 90 minutes. I could buy Cookson saying the money isn't there for a 3 week Tour but the argument about physicality isn't acceptable from someone in his position imo.

w00dster

I can see the argument about the physicality...loosely. I'm pretty sure they could complete the race, but are the ladies currently strong enough for it to be interesting enough to engage the public and push ladies cycling forward? 3 weeks of racing is a long time, for the racing and the public to remain interested.
Personally I think they have to build up support, sponsors, money - this then translates to wages and more professional teams throughout the peloton - they need to think how they use any additional money so it is not just given to the main two or three teams.
I'll watch the Cookson interview later on this evening if I get the chance, I'd be hoping for a positive statement from someone in his position.

blazing_saddles

DeVlaeminck wrote:

Well on the documentary - which I'm sure will be repeated every few hours on the Bike channel - they made the point that in the past the women have had races which were - if not the same as the mens Tour de France then at least much more challenging than the races they have now. They also argued that women tend to excel at endurance rather than raw power and that if the races don't exist how will they ever get a peloton of women who prepare to ride them.

We've been through all this in other sports - women weren't allowed to run long distance events until my lifetime, women weren't allowed to play football and if an FA affiliated club allowed women to use their pitch they were sanctioned. It's always been based on women not being capable and it's an outdated attitude. Women footballers may not play with the pace and power of men but they still play 90 minutes. I could buy Cookson saying the money isn't there for a 3 week Tour but the argument about physicality isn't acceptable from someone in his position imo.

But this is cycling, not football, so doesn't run to a set time, but a set course.
So physicality cannot simply be made to disappear by calling it outdated.

How long would it take the women's peloton to complete the 300km Milan-San Remo route, or to power over 55kms of pave in a 275km Paris-Roubaix?
You are looking at races approaching 9 hours in duration. A logistical nightmare, if not an impossibility.

In the real world, equality can be achieved, but only cutting down the duration of men's races, while increasing women's and meeting at some point in the middle.

However, it's going to be extremely difficult to sell a 170km Tour of Flanders "monument", or 80km TDF road stages.

DeVlaeminck

It may be logistically impossible within financial realities for women to race the same distances but that is different to claiming that women physically can't race those distances - and I mean race not ride. If Cookson doesn't even believe women can race those distances - against all the evidence - then how committed is he going to be to actually extending the distance and stages in women's races. So long as the races are so much shorter than the men's and generally over much more limited terrain then they are inevitably going to be seen as more akin to an exhibition event. I mean look at the Paris race - that is some glorified crit - same with the one in London - they get live TV coverage but they are basically just exhibitions - if that was what cycling was about it'd never have become a spectator sport. There has to be some equivalence for the sport to be taken seriously - it may not be identical but it can't be so far out of kilter and expect to get media coverage necessary to progress.

Additionally I have no idea why you think a women's Tour stage would be 80km - christ I race further than that in LVRC - I suspect women would average rather more than 20mph in MSR but even if they didn't it's still substantially faster than the men used to average in the early days of the race.

blazing_saddles

DeVlaeminck wrote:

Additionally I have no idea why you think a women's Tour stage would be 80km - christ I race further than that in LVRC - I suspect women would average rather more than 20mph in MSR but even if they didn't it's still substantially faster than the men used to average in the early days of the race.

They also used to start races at 2am.
I figured on 35kph, which is eight and a half hours.

Well, 80kms may be bit on the short side given the increased length this year from the UCI.

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/giro-ro ... 017-route/

6 of the 10 stages are 100-120kms, and possibly no mountain finish?
Last year 5 of the stages were less than 95km and one was 77kms.

Anyhow, I'd certainly watch the women tackle the proper Paris-Roubaix.
At least in part.

Lanterne_Rogue

The Tour de France distorts perceptions about what top-level cycling is about (witness the absence of any mainstream interest in the classics, for example), and that extends to thinking that if the women can't race their own version then clearly they're not as good. Whether we like it or not, that's become symbolic. If the women's peloton isn't currently at a standard to make it feasible then Cookson's priority should surely be on improving the quality, not making statements which are (at the very least) open to interpretation, and aiming to make it possible.

The feasibility of running male and female events at the same time depends on the course, but surely isn't always impossible (the London marathon manages it, albeit in a sport where average speeds are more predictable. Even if that's not a flyer, taking the brakes off some of the development (the UK is currently seeing three races vying to establish themselves as the top women's race, so why encourage that as a start?)

RichN95.

underlayunderlay wrote:

If the women's peloton isn't currently at a standard to make it feasible then Cookson's priority should surely be on improving the quality, not making statements which are (at the very least) open to interpretation, and aiming to make it possible.

To be fair we don't actually know what Cookson said. Just someone's interpretation of it.

ddraver

bobmcstuff wrote:

ddraver wrote:

True, but when most women pretty much race every race already, where is the space for such preparation?

Indeed.

I think my point is you couldn't just introduce a 3 week women's GT and expect it to be popular and competitive.

The sport needs to be developed over time in order to get that depth of field. Proper salaries etc would be a start. I think the point was made on the cycling podcast feminin though, the women's sport is much more popular in the UK than elsewhere and it's hardly on a level peg with the men's sport here. The women's TOB has a real chance to be one of the best events on the women's calendar and why not. But still they were apparently prevented from turning it into a full week stage race.

Ah, so we mostly agree then.

Youre right about salaries of course...

I'd say in general actually that Men's and Women's cycling is vaguely levelly pegged in the UK, but that is mostly because the "outdoor cycling" bar is so low in the UK. try it in Belgium and you have much more of an issue - that said, to contradict myself, see how much Sporza showing the Women's CX has seen the sport explode in Belgium - a country far from advanced in these areas (Wie Knijpt ze in Harelbeke)

Lanterne_Rogue

RichN95 wrote:

underlayunderlay wrote:

If the women's peloton isn't currently at a standard to make it feasible then Cookson's priority should surely be on improving the quality, not making statements which are (at the very least) open to interpretation, and aiming to make it possible.

To be fair we don't actually know what Cookson said. Just someone's interpretation of it.

I agree with you on that . If they have been misinterpreted though then they were definitely capable of being misinterpreted...

awavey

I think you are all missing the point, you couldnt go from where we are now in the womens world tour, to an instant 3 week Grand Tour, but it doesnt mean the Womens world tour couldnt evolve towards that direction if it was given the chance if say the head of some I dont know international type of cycling organising body who was elected on a manifesto claiming to want to develop womens cycling, felt we could head that way and set that as a specific goal for womens cycling, then teams could prepare, sponsors would know what they were getting and the sport would evolve and grow towards that, else we are stuck in perpetual groundhog day where people keep saying but the womens pro peloton isnt good enough, doesnt have the money, cant ride the distance.

The current womens pro peleton develops towards the current set of races that are sanctioned because thats the only way they can survive from year to year,

"It’s no secret that women’s cycling is the poor relation of the men’s sport" so said Brian Cookson in 2013, when he also commited to at least a minimum wage for pro women cyclists, which was ditched by 2014 when he was in office.

bobmcstuff

awavey wrote:

I think you are all missing the point, you couldnt go from where we are now in the womens world tour, to an instant 3 week Grand Tour, but it doesnt mean the Womens world tour couldnt evolve towards that direction if it was given the chance.

That was exactly my point.

RichN95.

awavey wrote:

I think you are all missing the point, you couldnt go from where we are now in the womens world tour, to an instant 3 week Grand Tour, but it doesnt mean the Womens world tour couldnt evolve towards that direction if it was given the chance if say the head of some I dont know international type of cycling organising body who was elected on a manifesto claiming to want to develop womens cycling, felt we could head that way and set that as a specific goal for womens cycling, then teams could prepare, sponsors would know what they were getting and the sport would evolve and grow towards that, else we are stuck in perpetual groundhog day where people keep saying but the womens pro peloton isnt good enough, doesnt have the money, cant ride the distance.

But why is having a three week Grand Tour the specific goal, and not providing the best race program possible?
A women's three week Tour in the current world makes no sense on any level other than satisfying a false idea of 'equality'.

DeVlaeminck

Cookson says to camera that he thinks a shorter race of a week to ten days with shorter stages is possible but he doesn't think " an exact mirror image of the TdF is appropriate for the physicality of women".

He isn't saying at this stage in the development in the sport - unless it's been edited unfairly - which is possible - he is saying women aren't capable of racing a TdF which looks like the male TdF.

gsk82

RichN95 wrote:

awavey wrote:

I think you are all missing the point, you couldnt go from where we are now in the womens world tour, to an instant 3 week Grand Tour, but it doesnt mean the Womens world tour couldnt evolve towards that direction if it was given the chance if say the head of some I dont know international type of cycling organising body who was elected on a manifesto claiming to want to develop womens cycling, felt we could head that way and set that as a specific goal for womens cycling, then teams could prepare, sponsors would know what they were getting and the sport would evolve and grow towards that, else we are stuck in perpetual groundhog day where people keep saying but the womens pro peloton isnt good enough, doesnt have the money, cant ride the distance.

But why is having a three week Grand Tour the specific goal, and not providing the best race program possible?
A women's three week Tour in the current world makes no sense on any level other than satisfying a false idea of 'equality'.

Its because society can't distinguish being equal and being the same.

Whenever a women's race goes over a train bridge half the pack get spat out of the back. Unfortunately the races can't be made more difficult until there are more riders closer to the level of the top riders. How we get to that stage I don't know. But I certainly don't think copying the men is the way to go. Women's sport needs to be supported by women, not just men watching a copy cat event.

DeVlaeminck

gsk82 wrote:

RichN95 wrote:

awavey wrote:

I think you are all missing the point, you couldnt go from where we are now in the womens world tour, to an instant 3 week Grand Tour, but it doesnt mean the Womens world tour couldnt evolve towards that direction if it was given the chance if say the head of some I dont know international type of cycling organising body who was elected on a manifesto claiming to want to develop womens cycling, felt we could head that way and set that as a specific goal for womens cycling, then teams could prepare, sponsors would know what they were getting and the sport would evolve and grow towards that, else we are stuck in perpetual groundhog day where people keep saying but the womens pro peloton isnt good enough, doesnt have the money, cant ride the distance.

But why is having a three week Grand Tour the specific goal, and not providing the best race program possible?
A women's three week Tour in the current world makes no sense on any level other than satisfying a false idea of 'equality'.

Its because society can't distinguish being equal and being the same.

Whenever a women's race goes over a train bridge half the pack get spat out of the back. Unfortunately the races can't be made more difficult until there are more riders closer to the level of the top riders. How we get to that stage I don't know. But I certainly don't think copying the men is the way to go. Women's sport needs to be supported by women, not just men watching a copy cat event.

Well women watch men's sport so why shouldn't men watch women, men watch female tennis, athletics, even a womens football match has plenty of men in the crowd so I don't see why you think cycling should be different. I would much rather watch a decent womens one day race or grand tour than a uk domestic crit or just about any track cycling.

Second no half the field do not get spat out over a train bridge, I assume you are arguing there is a greater disparity in ability between the riders in women's racing. Yes maybe ere is, as there was with the men in what we now look back on as the golden age of bike racing! We can't spend the last 20 years bemoaning how USPostal/Sky are so strong it neutralises the racing and then say there isn't enough depth in the women's peloton - maybe we'd see some old fashioned racing between the main contenders. In any case unless we give women the races what incentive is there to train for them - if your bread and butter are crits or 80km flat road races that's what you'll prepare for.

Thirdly, to answer Rich, a 3 week Tour seems to have successfully established itself as the gold standard format in bike racing - why shouldn't that also be the case for the women? Yes of course it may not be logistically or financially possible or even desirable to go straight in with one but not to have it as a goal or at least an ideal needs some justification. It seems Mr Cookson's justification is that women aren't physically suited to racing 3 weeks by virtue of their inherent lack of physicality. It's the same type of view that sees the u16 females in my soccer club stuck on a smaller pitch than the u13 boys, that saw women prevented from running long distance races, that stopped them playing football, boxing etc.

awavey

RichN95 wrote:

But why is having a three week Grand Tour the specific goal, and not providing the best race program possible?
A women's three week Tour in the current world makes no sense on any level other than satisfying a false idea of 'equality'.

Im not sure that has to be the specific goal as such to match a 3 week race just because the men do it, its that in mens road racing, 3 week grand tours are considered the top class of road racing, with the TdF being the most prestigious blue riband event of those, generally because of the length and physical endurance required to do them.

there isnt really an equivalent blue riband race in womens road racing, the nearest is probably the Giro Rosa,which is at least back to 10 days/stages (they announced this years parcours only 2 days ago, but if you blinked you missed it) but there are no real equivalent set of top class competition races across the year to back it up, its mostly one day races or the occasional races upto 5 stages like the Womens Tour, though why BC feel it has to be constrained to 5 stages theyve never really explained.

so the specific goal should be get to a level where there is an equivalent Womens blue riband multi long stage road race on a par with the mens TdF, and with a supporting set of top class multi long stage road races to support it, they could be 3 weeks, they could be 2 weeks or they could be 10 days in duration.,

but absolutely the idea a multi week race with long stages is not appropriate for the physicality of women, needs to kicked into the trash where it belongs, in my view at least.

gsk82

awavey wrote:

RichN95 wrote:

But why is having a three week Grand Tour the specific goal, and not providing the best race program possible?
A women's three week Tour in the current world makes no sense on any level other than satisfying a false idea of 'equality'.

Im not sure that has to be the specific goal as such to match a 3 week race just because the men do it, its that in mens road racing, 3 week grand tours are considered the top class of road racing, with the TdF being the most prestigious blue riband event of those, generally because of the length and physical endurance required to do them.

there isnt really an equivalent blue riband race in womens road racing, the nearest is probably the Giro Rosa,which is at least back to 10 days/stages (they announced this years parcours only 2 days ago, but if you blinked you missed it) but there are no real equivalent set of top class competition races across the year to back it up, its mostly one day races or the occasional races upto 5 stages like the Womens Tour, though why BC feel it has to be constrained to 5 stages theyve never really explained.

so the specific goal should be get to a level where there is an equivalent Womens blue riband multi long stage road race on a par with the mens TdF, and with a supporting set of top class multi long stage road races to support it, they could be 3 weeks, they could be 2 weeks or they could be 10 days in duration.,

but absolutely the idea a multi week race with long stages is not appropriate for the physicality of women, needs to kicked into the trash where it belongs, in my view at least.

They have also stopped the tour of Yorkshire becoming 4 days. At best they're being cautious, but idon't guess it's because it's not their race and they're a bitter group

tailwindhome

DeVlaeminck wrote:

It's the same type of view that sees the u16 females in my soccer club stuck on a smaller pitch than the u13 boys, that saw women prevented from running long distance races, that stopped them playing football, boxing etc.

Is it an inequality that ladies tees exist on a golf course?

DeVlaeminck

TailWindHome wrote:

DeVlaeminck wrote:

It's the same type of view that sees the u16 females in my soccer club stuck on a smaller pitch than the u13 boys, that saw women prevented from running long distance races, that stopped them playing football, boxing etc.

Is it an inequality that ladies tees exist on a golf course?

Do you think it is? I don't mind giving you my opinion on that as part of a discussion but I'm not just here to educate you.

tailwindhome

DeVlaeminck wrote:

TailWindHome wrote:

DeVlaeminck wrote:

It's the same type of view that sees the u16 females in my soccer club stuck on a smaller pitch than the u13 boys, that saw women prevented from running long distance races, that stopped them playing football, boxing etc.

Is it an inequality that ladies tees exist on a golf course?

Do you think it is? I don't mind giving you my opinion on that as part of a discussion but I'm not just here to educate you.

Ok

Richmond Racer 2

TailWindHome wrote:

DeVlaeminck wrote:

TailWindHome wrote:

DeVlaeminck wrote:

It's the same type of view that sees the u16 females in my soccer club stuck on a smaller pitch than the u13 boys, that saw women prevented from running long distance races, that stopped them playing football, boxing etc.

Is it an inequality that ladies tees exist on a golf course?

Do you think it is? I don't mind giving you my opinion on that as part of a discussion but I'm not just here to educate you.

Ok

That'll learn you, TWH

phreak

It's always struck me as odd that women competing in amateur sportives complete tougher parcours than their professional peers in the 'biggest' races. For instance, 277 amateur women completed the Maratona last year, on a course that's tougher than anything the pros compete on. Sure, you could say that their times were often slow'ish, but these are amateurs, so you'd have to think that any pro would be able to do a lot better.

Just seems we sell women short in cycling with this frankly bizarre rule that stage races are capped at 100km per day.