Pro-cycling thread

I had no idea they were in a relationship! I think the Olympics coverage could have mentioned that at least once.

It's actually a pretty good idea, from a business prospective.

Wonder if the name change resets her 'three strikes' status.

The last bit being the kicker

Well it might become better to watch.

I'd much rather pay a £100 a year subscription to a cycling channel, get all the big races in HD and get loads of good real time info.

Most other big sports work well in this format.

The UCI are useless really.

Bit harsh to blame the UCI, when the commercial rights to all the bike races these days (apart from the Giro) are owned by the ASO, who have made it perfectly clear to the UCI that they can fuck right off.

That was more a throw off point generally.

get all the big races in HD and get loads of good real time info

come live in Netherlands/Belgium, learn Dutch/Flemish, turn on public TV, presto

Meh, I like the UCI. They've got a very nice velodrome, and they let me use it every Saturday when I'm over in Aigle. And they gave me free entry to the Three Days of Aigle racing, which was nice.

Fanboy.

That does aound nice though.

Yeah I do steam sporza sometimes.

I think they have an impossible job, they'll always upset someone, irrespective of the decision they've made. I think they've improved immeasurably under Cookson.

Plus my mate works for them.

I don't buy the highest bidder argument. Bro do u even moral high ground?

I doubt the authorities would deign an exemption.

Plus my mate works for them.

Pfft, clearly a case of omata. :)

Oleg got into cycling as a vanity project, then discovered there wasn't a lot of money in the sport when you are both owner and sponsor, so spent the rest of the time lobbying to monetarise the sport more. Problem is when the sport takes place in the open air on public roads there's not you can charge people for. And to watch most of it you do need a subscription to Eurosport/Sky anyway, in this country at least. I mean how much is on ITV? TdF, Vuelta, Tour of Britain IIRC.

I think if there was profit in charging people to watch cycling on telly it would be happening already, and if the majority of cycling went to pay-to-watch you might generate more revenue but you run the risk of losing or alienating a lot of cycling's audience. His callous reference to losing the old ladies who like to look at the French countryside shows the dissonance between him and the average fan. I don't know if it was in the most recent interview but I recall him arguing for much more inner-city criteriums, which would probably come at the expense of plenty of the more traditional races.

Bottom line the man is an unrelenting cunt and the sport is better off without him. And I think some of the elements of the cycling media should hang their heads in shame in giving him platforms to spout his Trump-esque bollocks, considering the horrible stuff he regularly vomited forth on Twitter.

Oops tl:dr Oleg Tinkov is a bellend of monstrous proportions

Bottom line the man is an unrelenting cunt and the sport is better off without him.

Well, that escalated quickly

Oh I dunno, it's been said before on this thread. He was a character yes, but with that character came no edit button in the form of homophobic, racist and misogynistic smears on Twitter.

Come on mate - there's Kennaugh terrible puns in the memes thread.

I have that on ignore, so it's not where I would chance my arm instead. I find it rather Doull.

Geraint enough punning these days.

Mental finish by Gaviria at Paris-Tours; sprinted from 500m and held the gap he made

Yup, that was pretty great

plus gold for Etixx at the WC TTT

Now saying he went somewhere 700-800m(!)