07 July 2016
We Need To Talk About Mark…
Cycling, a sport overlooked.
by Archie Wilson
As well as bisecting calendars, the sporting tournaments of the Tour de France and Wimbledon have similarly complicated scoring systems. To the naïve or new spectator trying to follow the sport, this can be off-putting. But whilst, during the two weeks of Wimbledon, the BBC will air every single match (by viewer manipulation of a variety of coloured buttons), hugely expensive celebrity commentators will guide viewers through the arcane practices and rules, and spectators will show off their Britishness through their keenness for the sport and pronunciation of the word “scone”, “Le Tour” will barely get a mention until the third week. And then, only assuming a certain Brit by-way-of Kenya is wearing the yellow jersey*.
It must be conceded that at least tennis has clearly-defined victors in clearly-defined categories. The Tour de France is a complicated mess of coloured jerseys, points, times, mountains, and sprints. In most sports, to celebrate an individual’s success on just one day of a multi-week tournament would seem over-enthusiastic, but in the context of cycling it is the done thing.
On Monday this week, Mark Cavendish achieved the second stage victory of this year’s Tour de France, his 28th ever in the race. Despite this he has never won the Tour outright and his first time ever wearing of the coveted yellow jersey was briefly on Sunday after his win on day one. He holds joint second place for the most number of stage wins at the Tour, alongside French Behemoth, Bernard Hinault, and is now six behind Belgium mammoth Eddy Merckx. Despite this, the BBC News the morning after barely mentioned the race, focusing instead on the number of quarterfinals Andy Murray has been in.
The chief complaint about watching cycling is that it is dull. A huge pack of bug-eyed, bottom heavy, hairless men pedal side by side incessantly for six hours until a mad dash for the finish is made by the few riders who were ever in contention for victory anyway. But tennis matches can last a similar length of time and the scenery never changes.
What makes sport exciting is the tactics . The popularity of football can be explained by its simplicity, basic team structure, and marketability. Cycling, in contrast, is a lost game. The rules can be (are) tediously complex, the team structures are a labyrinth of roles and cross-party deal making, and, given the most popular style of racing is road racing, it’s very hard to charge people for spectating. The cycling industry struggles very hard to make money; often ProTour teams outside of their few leading stars earn very little.
This combination of elements is also what makes cycling so interesting to some. There is no barrier between spectator and the stars, you hear their breathing and grunting, feel their pain and sweat (literally the latter if you are in the wrong place). To get a feel for how difficult the mountain they are climbing is, you can cycle up it yourself the morning before the race. (Try turning up for a couple of sets on Centre Court at 7am and see what happens.) The inter-team and personal politics within a cycle race can be as controversial or brilliant, as obscure or as bizarre, as any of those at Westminster.
The Tour de France is consigned in the TV listings to those brief gaps between storage locker auction shows (the TV equivalent of watching paint drying) and 80s crime dramas (sixteenth repeat) on ITV4, and for most races only the last couple of hours are broadcast. Yet, more and more people are taking to cycling as a form of healthy activity or commuting, and inevitably many are starting to take more notice of the racing side of the sport. If national pride is what is needed in sports then we can have plenty in cycling. At the Tour, post the Armstrong/doping scandals, British riders have consistently had the best results. At the Olympics, if they do go ahead, we will be taking one of the strongest looking teams, Cavendish included.
Perhaps it is not people’s inattentiveness that leads to cycling being overlooked as an entrancing spectator sport, but the media’s slow response to its growing popularity. A sport like tennis is easy for a media plug-in, not far from home and with plenty of seating to give a back up of cheering and crowd atmosphere, a couple of cameras and a tethered observation balloon. If France is not your bag, and what is needed is a domestic setting, the Tour of Britain is in September this year (how much publicity have you seen on that so far?) with British teams lining up against some of the best Continentals. It will showcase some of the best of the British landscape, feats of athleticism and possibly (and this may be the best enticement that can be given to attract local residents) at least some roads will get resurfaced.
*The redoubtable if controversial Chris Froome, for the uninitiated.
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